Bears Report Card: Coaches, Offense Go Sit in a Corner

There are no excuses for missing players due to injuries or COVID-19 when it comes to grading, and the Bears get the marks they justly deserve for a 24-17 loss to Tennessee.

It would be easy to dole out poor marks for the Bears offense based on production.

However, first you need to pause and take into account how difficult it had to be for the Bears offensive line to pull together with inexperienced players like guard Alex Bars at center, Rashaad Coward at right tackle and Arlington Hambright at left guard.

OK, that's long enough.

The Cincinnati Bengals had offensive line troubles the previous week and still put up 31 points on the Titans, so neither injuries nor COVID-19 can be used as excuses.

Here are this week's Bear grades and it doesn't get much more lopsided.

Running Game: F

There was no push by the line. Nothing. Barkevious Mingo broke their long run of the day and he's an outside linebacker. And it was only 11 yards. Tennessee's run defense had held no opponents below 92 yards and the Bears could gain only 56 yards, 43 by their running backs. To top it off, they got David Montgomery a concussion. At least he got to leave the field then and the beating stopped.

Passing Game: D-

The Bears went 2-for-15 against the worst third-down defense in the NFL. Two touchdown passes and 335 yards by Nick Foles might have looked good to the fantasy football crowd, if there is actually someone who would have a Bears quarterback on their fantasy roster, but considering Foles needed only two more attempts to rank in the top three all time for most pass attempts in a game it looke pretty bad. When you throw it 52 times and average only 6.4 yards per attempt, it's not going to win any games. A key false start by Jimmy Graham offset his touchdown catch, which came at garbage time. Anthony Miller made some decent catches and also made up for it by fumbling. Even Allen Robinson's performance was tainted by failing to pick up a first down there for the taking on the first possession, one play before they failed to pick up a fourth-and-1 conversion.

Run Defense: A

If you can hold Derrick Henry to less than 4.0 yards a carry and 68 total yards, you've won the game—unless your offense screws it up. And that's what happened. Bilal Nichols was a force in this one, and the Bears also got the usual strong efforts up front from Akiem Hicks and Brent Urban, while Roquan Smith was all over the field for the fourth straight game. Smith had 11 tackles, a sack and two tackles for loss. Quietly, Daniel McCullers came up from the practice squad and made four tackles at nose tackle, which was invaluable in stopping Henry.

Pass Defense: B

Mario Edwards and Bilal Nichols with sacks and the only real flaw was in how the Titans managed to get tight ends or A.J. Brown over the middle, and also the 40-yard TD pass allowed by Buster Skrine. In Skrine's defense, there wasn't much more a player could do on that play except interfere with the receiver because the ball landed exactly in his hands. However, he also gave up the other TD pass to Jonnu Smith. No interceptions again, although Kyle Fuller had a nice shot at one early in the game, and they had five passes defensed. The other flaw was giving up 40% on third downs. Some teams would love that number, but the Bears were leading the league and now have fallen behind the Rams on third downs. It's tough to be harder on the pass defense when they've helped hold an NFL team to 11 first downs.

Special Teams: C+

Pat O'Donnell saved the Bears with a few deep punts and two inside the 10. It was a standoff in terms of starting field position, the Bears at their own 26 and Titans at their 25. The kicking game wasn't a factor, and the same could be said for Cordarrelle Patterson's kick returns with only 53 yards on three of them. Dwayne Harris's six punt returns for 64 yards is a 100% improvement over when Ted Ginn Jr. was doing it.

Coaching: D

There seemed only a Plan A for dealing with the COVID-19 and injury troubles on the offensive line, and once the Titans adjusted to their quick passes and continued stuffing the run, the switch to throwing back-shoulder passes on the sidelines came too late. The play calling diidn't necessarily beat them, but some of Matt Nagy's decisions did. He should have kicked a field goal early in the second quarter just to get some points up to support his defense. Chuck Pagano had an excellent scheme for shutting down Henry.

Overall: D+

Simply by not turning the ball over on two fumbles they might have had a chance to win this one. Perhaps they could lose the coin flip and defer to the fourth quarter, skpping right over the third quarter in the future.

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