Offense Needs to Rediscover Running Backs

The Bears offense has ground to a halt so to speak, and needs a recommitment to getting the conventional running attack going to succeed in the final three games.

When you're a running team, the best last year and one of the top five this year, you run.

The Bears haven't been, at least not in the way most teams do it to impact the flow of their offense. It's catching up with them.

On Sunday this really showed as their running backs gained only 38 yards on 17 carries. They were coming into the Browns game after gaining 64 against the Lions in a win but only on 15 carries. They had only 16 carries against the Vikings for 59 yards. When they lost the game to Detroit in the final four minutes they did have a sufficient number of carries with 28 but only 79 yards, or 2.8 yards a carry.

Matt Eberflus touched on the problem after Sunday's loss.

"Just looking at it right now I just think we needed to run the ball to set ourselves up a little bit better in terms of the third downs and manageables," Eberflus said. "They loaded the box and did a good job of stopping the run."

Sunday's jam-up at the 1-yard line typified their inability to get the run blocked. Eight plays on a drive starting at the 1 and they finally got into the end zone on a pass.

"Again, it comes down to execution," Eberflus said. "It comes down to winning the line of scrimmage. Short yardage is always that.

"When you have those plays, you've got to win up front. That's a big part of it. Having the right push is obviously important, and then design is important too. So, it's all three factors."

In the last three games there have been only two runs longer than 10 yards by a running back. They had a 22-yarder by Roschon Johnson on Sunday and a 13-yarder by D'Onta Foreman against the Lions at home Dec. 10.

This all came at a time when they finally got the offensive line together for four straight games, and now they might be without Teven Jenkins due to a concussion suffered against the Browns.

The running game in general hasn't been what it was last year, even though they have 60 runs of 10 yards or longer and had been leading the league at this going into Week 15.

They haven't had the really longer explosive runs as there have been eight 20 yards or longer but none by Justin Fields longer than 29 yards and 34 is the limit for backs. At this point last year, they had 14 runs longer han 20 yards and on the year had 11 runs longer than this year's longest run.

The difference?

Khalil Herbert would be one. He came back from an ankle injury suffered Oct. 5 and has 31 runs for 75 yards. His long run since returning is 9 yards. He's had 8 yards each of the last two weeks.

When Roschon Johnson had a concussion and then D'Onta Foreman a knee injury, it's been a case of the backs being beaten up.

Everyone is supposed to be healthy now, though.

The running team needs to run to succeed and it can't always be the quarterback, who is supposed to be passing for more than 166 yards, like Sunday.

Yet the backs have had 76 runs for 240 yards in four games.

They need the production and the recommitment to the run.

"We had a lot of third-and-longs yesterday and it's hard to win in this league in third-and-longs," tight end Cole Kmet said. "You've got to keep it third-and-manageable and I think when we've had success in third-down situations, it's always been in that third-and-6 and going on in.

"But when you get third-and-7 plus, it's hard to convert those, especially on a defense like (Cleveland) with how physical they play. We've got to stay ahead of the chains in that regard and be able to pick up some first downs there in the weather and what it kind of was on the field conditions and with how our defense was playing you've got to be able to suck up some clock and get some first downs there. There were opportunities to do that; we just didn't execute."

The Cardinals defense is 31st against the run, Atlanta 15th and the Packers 30th.

Going back to what has worked for them and executing it with running backs needs to be their path forward and needs to work as they try to finish the season on a positive run even if playoffs are realistically out of the picture.

Considering how ineffective they've been in the conventional running game in the season's second half, maybe what they really need to do in the draft is find a back who can be a real presence and worries defenses but isn't supposed to pass as well.

Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven