Mike Martz Rips Justin Fields, Or Did He?

Analysis: Poorly edited interview of Mike Martz ripping the QBs in Sunday's Bears-49ers game makes it sound like the former Bears offensive coordinator is completely down on Justin Fields.

It would be very easy to go off on a tirade about Mike Martz and his comments about Justin Fields while he talked to The 33rd Team, a so-called football website.

The weekly interview he does has numerous outlandish statements about Fields and also 49ers quarterback Trey Lance, but it is so poorly edited that it makes Martz sound like a complete fool or even impaired. 

The worst thing about it is that whoever edited it did it in a way that makes it difficult to tell who Martz is actually talking about in the interview. At several points, it's obvious he's talking about how Lance played poorly, but the editing passes it off as criticism directed at Fields.

Regardless, Martz does take enough stupid and blatant shots at Fields that it's apparent he either didn't watch the full game, didn't realize the severity of the weather conditions both passers faced, or simply lost his mind. 

I'm voting the latter.

"That second half of offensive football was really difficult to watch," Martz said.

So was the Bears offense in the 2010 and 2011 seasons when they finished 30th and 24th with Martz as their offensive coordinator, but those of us who follow or root for the Bears had to watch it. 

So enjoy.

Martz thought the second half Sunday on offense was hard to watch?

There were seven points, 14 first downs, two turnovers and 247 yards in the first half. In the second half there were 18 first downs, 22 points, one turnover and 288 yards.  And the second half was worse? 

Right. Perhaps he didn't even watch the game. Maybe he doesn't know the difference between the first and second half of a game. 

After all, Martz thought it was better to have Kellen Davis, Matt Spaeth and Kyle Adams at tight end instead of Greg Olsen when he was Bears offensive coordinator. So obviously the guy has problems.

My fav part of the rain celebration pic.twitter.com/p7KSlrC92j

— (Ryan Cox) (@MrRyanCox) September 13, 2022

Martz says on this video:

"I'm just shocked at the Bears. I mean they took this quarterback. They went up and they spent a lot to get him and he was less than remarkable, would be the kindest thing that you could say about him."

That was probably close to true. Then again, try standing out there and throwing passes in varying degrees of monsoon to receivers who don't have sure footing and it's easy to see why neither QB hit 50% completions. 

Nevertheless, if Fields was so bad, where was the criticism for any number of other quarterbacks in the NFL on Sunday?

Fields had a better passer rating in Week 1 than Baker Mayfield, Matt Ryan, Jalen Hurts, Jared Goff, Marcus Mariota, Mitchell Trubisky, Trevor Lawrence, Joe Flacco, Jacoby Brissett, Derek Carr, Aaron Rodgers, Matthew Stafford, Joe Burrow, Lance and Dak Prescott.

Fields threw for more touchdowns than Tom Brady, Mac Jones, Lawrence, Mayfield, Ryan, Stafford, Tua Tagovailoa, Trubisky, Russell Wilson, Hurts, Lance, Mariota, and Prescott.

He threw fewer interceptions than Burrow, Carr, Stafford, Josh Allen and Carson Wentz.

His yards per attempt were better than Ryan, Geno Smith, Lawrence, Mariota, Davis Mills, Burrow, Lance, Stafford, Goff, Rodgers, Kyler Murray, Trubisky, Prescott and Brissett.

And Martz is singling out Fields for criticism?

"They're a really good coaching staff with the Bears," Martz said. "They're very disciplined but they're just not very good. They just don't have a lot of talent there. You know, the offensive line is not very good, they did some good things on defense. But the talent basically on that football team is not very good.

"And Fields is going to have to shoulder it and he did a good job with that particularly in the second half but ultimately when you look at them compared to Detroit today, when you watch the two teams play, it just seems like Detroit made a huge leap."

I thought the second half was impossible to watch?

Nothing against the Lions, but Fields had a better passer rating and threw for a yard and a half more per attempt than Goff on Sunday, while throwing for the same number of touchdowns and interceptions.

And if Fields is so bad, then how could he have been good enough to carry the team on his shoulder in the second half, as Martz himself said?

This was purely a poorly edited video. 

Martz was obviously talking about Lance in sections of it that were passed off as Fields by the website. 

Why would they do this?

They remember how Martz's criticism of Fields and the Bears in preseason got them the only notoriety they received all summer and probably the most page clicks they've ever had. They'd rather have Fields getting ripped by Martz to get clicks from angry Bears fans, and Martz just didn't do enough ripping. So they put some of the criticism of Lance in as if it was Fields being blasted by Martz.

What they need to do is put that entire interview back on the site without stops or editing of any kind and simply let everyone hear it word for word. 

Martz can't possibly be as far out of touch with reality as that interview made him sound. 

Actually, it's best not to go to that website and it's best not to pay attention to Martz.

Both are phony.

Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven