Grading the Bears ... and One Texan

The struggles by Justin Fields made this a closer game than it had to be, and resulted in a Bears report card somewhat lacking considering the 23-20 win.

No one caught more than two passes from Justin Fields on Sunday and four players did this.

The problem was, one of those four players was Jalen Pitre and he plays for Houston.

Fields fumbled the first snap from center and it got worse from there. It was that kind of a day for the Bears quarterback, coming on the heels of that kind of a night for the Bears quarterback in Lambeau Field a week earlier.

They won 23-20 over Houston because of everyone else, and namely Roquan Smith, Angelo Blackson and Khalil Herbert.

"I played straight up, I just played—I don't want to say the A-word—but I played like trash," Fields said. "Really just got to be better."

Not sure which "A-word" he meant, but awful will do here.

Fields overthrew Cole Kmet on one interception and the other tried forcing it in a crowd to Darnell Mooney. Pitre caught both.

"First one I missed Cole, wide open," he said. "Missed it."

The second one he threw with pressure in his face, but throwing into a crowd with pressure in his face?

"That's one thing I'm going to work on, getting pressure, boom, check down," Fields said.

It's been 13 NFL starts in two different offenses so maybe Fields can be forgiven for this type of start to his season, when coach Matt Eberflus chooses to kill off the clock before halftime to boos rather than put the ball at risk in Bears territory.

Who can blame him?

Last week it was Luke Getsy trying to explain 11 pass attempts.

This week it might be Luke Getsy explaining how he could let Fields throw 17 times.

On opening day in a monsoon and in standing water, Fields completed 8 of 17 for 121 yards with two touchdowns and an interception against a darn good defense.

On Sunday, on a relatively nice day, Fields completed 8 of 17 for only 106 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns against one of the league's worst teams.

That's regression defined.

The two interceptions Sunday equaled his total for the first two games. Except, in the first two games there were offensive players who struggled right along with Fields. Kmet and Money, in particular, got off to slow starts. Both appeared ready to go Sunday and made catches.

They made two catches of Fields throws apiece, just like Houston's Pitre.

"You know, that's one of our keys to victory on offense is 100 percent ball security," Fields said.

Two interceptions would be something less.

Here are the Bears grades for Fields and everyone else from a 23-20 win over Lovie Smith's 0-2-1 Texans. 

Pitre is not graded for his receiving here.

Bears Passing: D-

Giving them an F would discredit the players who did step up with plays like Kmet with a 24-yarder to get the Bears out of a hole, or Equanimeous St. Brown, who had a 20-yard catch. Fields did make a 29-yard scramble, which technically is a rushing play but came out of the passing offense. It led to a game-opening field goal, which might have been his biggest contribution of the day. His passer rating made him seem more like a mobile version of Rex Grossman: 27.7.

Bears Rushing: A

When you rushed for more yards than any Bears team since before the Super Bowl Shuffle, you've established the run. Khalil Herbert seems to have a real feel for the blocking scheme and quickly picks up where the holes are developing. A 41-yard St. Brown end around helped establish the ground game, as well. In particular, guard Lucas Patrick seemed to enjoy success blocking the run. They also got a strong blocking performance from fullback Khari Blasingame.

Bears Pass Defense: B

Considering injured Jaylon Johnson was replaced by undrafted rookie Jaylon Jones, it was definitely an acceptable performance against the pass. Roquan Smith's interception capped it and Eddie Jackson had the money pick in the red zone early in the game, but the defense did a few other things well, like 3-of-12 on third down conversions. A few big gainers, like Chris Moore's 52-yarder when he beat Kyler Gordon, upped the Texans passing yardage total but the poor 70.4 passer rating testified to how the pass coverage adjusted and performed. They had six pass defenses credited to five different players.

Bears Run Defense: A-

Gradually the Bears won back the line of scrimmage from Houston's offense after losing it early in the game. Justin Jones, Blackson, Armon Watts and Mike Pennel gave up chunks to Dameon Pierce early but then shut it off and the Texans didn't reach 100 yards rushing, while averaging just 3.8 yards per carry. Smith's tackling made a difference here, obviously. He made 16 tackles and

Special Teams: C

The Texans have strong special teams and the Bears knew this coming in. The 47-yard and 50-yard field goals by Cairo Santos contributed a big impact toward their grade. Other than that, Trestan Ebner was held to an abysmal 17.3 yards per kick return, the punt coverage was atrocious and gave up a 31-yard Desmond King return after Trenton Gill had boomed a punt 56 yards and Dante Pettis had trouble fielding one punt correctly before letting it hit and then running with it. A fake Texans punt on a snap directly to an up-back worked for a first down against the Bears, as well. Not their best day on teams and they'd have been flirting with failure if not for Santos long kicks and game-winner.

Coaching: B

Their decision to kill the clock before halftime despite being in possession of all their timeouts met with boos from the Soldier Field crowd, but honestly, it was the right decision for Matt Eberflus considering how poorly Fields played. Then again, do you want to show that little confidence in the second-year quarterback?

In a word, yes. Fields shouldn't be playing this way.

Adjustments made in their secondary throughout the course of the game by Alan Williams and staff helped to make receptions difficult to come by in the second half for the Texans. Luke Getsy still had a conservative game plan, like last week, but it's difficult to blame him when his quarterback is putting the ball at risk. What Getsy did well was junk the bootlegs, although it took a sack, an intentional grounding and a few other mishaps before he did it.

Overall: C+

If the quarterback ever gets with the program, they might start to pull down solid Bs.

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