Bear Digest

The Biggest Obstacles Facing the Chicago Bears in 2024

Five real problems present themselves as the Bears get ready for their first mandatory practices involving the full roster.

Gene Chamberlain

Caleb Williams works on his throws at Halas Hall during OTAs. The full squad is supposed to be on hand for three days this week.
Caleb Williams works on his throws at Halas Hall during OTAs. The full squad is supposed to be on hand for three days this week. / Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports
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The Bears hold mandatory minicamp for three days starting Tuesday and it's the first time they're holding practices with an entire squad, or at least those who are healthy enough to practice.

So far some players have always been unavailable at different times during voluntary workouts known as OTAs.

Just before the first time they all practice on a field together is a good time to pinpoint the biggest obstacles they face.

It's been four seasons since they played in a postseason, six since they won a division and they haven't won a playoff game since 2010. Overcoming a history of defeat isn't really one of their problems, though, because of the great turnover in personnel and coaching over the years.

The only ones who own their history of defeat are the team's owners and fans.

Since the last playoff win they've had five head coaches. The only Bears left from the 2020 playoff team are kicker Cairo Santos, long snapper Patrick Scales, tight end Cole Kmet and cornerback Jaylon Johnson. The only one left from their division champion team of 2018 is Scales.

NFL=Not for Long. The cast changes, the problems change.

Caleb Williams represents a rebirth of sorts but it's only one position even if he was the first pick in the draft.

Here are the five biggest problems facing the Bears in 2024 as they approach mandatory practice, and they don't have a thing to do with training camp on HBO's Hard Knocks.

5. The Defensive Line

It's a personnel issue. It's one you'd think they would have corrected by now but GM Ryan Poles made it less of a priority than other spots.

It's possible they might have an answer in some form or other, but this is a team with the fewest sacks in 2022 and second fewest last year even though they brought in edge rusher Montez Sweat and improved the rush. The lack of a pass rush from the front four is a problem when the coach uses a defensive scheme built on the premise that they'll play seven in coverage and won't blitz.

Is a fifth-round rookie defensive end, Austin Booker, going to find a way to contribute in the rush? Can one of the others who haven't done it yet suddenly become a force in this scheme, like DeMarcus Walker, Gervon Dexter, Dominique Robinson or Zacch Pickens?

It's not just the pass rush. They lost 3-technique Justin Jones to free agency and are counting on either Dexter or Pickens to replace him in their second year after neither approached even average run defense, according to Pro Football Focus grades.

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PFF graded the Bears defensive line the worst in football after free agency. Selecting Booker in Round 5 didn't exactly upgrade it a great deal.

4. Regaining Winning Momentum

Teams almost always need to learn to win together to figure it all out. They reach an epiphany together as a team and once they make the breakthrough they can move on to taking aim at the bigger prizes. Detroit did this.

The Bears looked last year like they had gained the confidence and knowledge as a team to win games after they went through a 14-game losing streak, an 11-game divisional losing streak and an eight-game home losing streak.

The formula was a defense forcing takeaways and an offense with a running quarterback who never passed for 2,600 yards but had run for over 1,000. Now the dynamic that helped them win five out of the last eight games and five out of the last six at home has changed.

Can they quickly regain the momentum they seemed to establish in the second half of last season or will they need to re-establish this?

3. The NFC North

It was 30 years ago exactly when the Bears won a key home game over the Detroit Lions in November and went on to make the playoffs under coach Dave Wannstedt with a 9-7 record. The significance? That season the Lions, the Vikings and the Packers all made the playoffs with the Bears. The NFC Central that year, as it was known then, also included Tampa Bay and only the Buccaneers were out of the postseason.

The same four divisional teams all seem to be rising now and some people wouldn't be shocked to see all four in the playoffs. The most difficult challenge the Bears face with their schedule could be the NFC North oppponents, with all the games in Week 11 or later. The Bears are getting better now at a time when the entire division is arriving or has arrived.

CBS Sports' Jeff Kerr wrote a rating of division strength last week and in it he ranked the NFC North second only to the AFC North.

"The NFC North could compete with the AFC North for the best division," Kerr wrote. "It depends on how the Bears and Vikings progress."

Back when the Rams, 49ers and Seahawks all were conference champion material, the Cardinals had drafted Kyler Murray and looked like a rising team as well. They never really got where they wanted to go trying to play in wild west. Now the Bears look like a team faced with a daunting task in an improving division, possibly one where three teams could make the playoffs. The Bears might need to make it four teams in the playoffs to get in themselves.

2. Time on Task

Last year the defense struggled until midseason. At almost the same time they traded for Sweat, they had been playing without as many as three members of their secondary due to injuries but then got all of them back. 

They finally started logging time together in practice and games and it showed down the stretch. In the base defense, they had six new players and seven who hadn't played those positions with the team the previous year. Jack Sanborn had been the middle linebacker replacement and hadn't played strongside in the base defense. The other six: Tremaine Edmunds, T.J. Edwards, Tyrique Stevenson, Andrew Billings, DeMarcus Walker and Yannick Ngakoue. They didn't have the full group on the field for a practice in training camp or preseason due to injuries of various sorts until two weeks before the regular season.

Actually, they didn't even have the group together that established the defense until midseason because it was Sweat's arrival that proved the catalyst. It took time to get them all pointed the right way and moving together.

It takes time together to iron things out.

That was last year.

Now? It's the offense that has two new wide receivers, a new second tight end, a new center, a new running back and a new quarterback.

Oh, and new offensive coaches and don't forget a new offensive system.

This isn't defense, where the scheme was relatively easy to pick up because it was Tampa-2 with a lot of cover-3 and cover-2 zone. Instead, it's a complicated offense and they're all learning it together from scratch.

How long will it take offensive coordinator Shane Waldron to pull it all together so they can be competitive as an actual passing team instead of an offense relying on the crutch of a scrambling quarterback?

"Again, there are a lot of first-time things that we're doing with the offense," coach Matt Eberflus said last week. "It's the first time that we've done last plays and certain scenarios, and that is going to be an ongoing process as we go through this because the experience, and then, the experimentation of the offense, and also, the skillsets are vital for the process to understand who we have, what we have, how we're going to operate and what is going to be our formula for success going in to training camp, working through that, and then getting to our first game."

As they say, good luck with that. 

1. The Rookie QB

The Bears record for rookie passing yards by a quarterback with at least 100 throws is 187.6 yards per game by Jim McMahon in 1982. The record for rookie passing yards is 2,193 by Mitchell Trubisky in 2017.

Cade McNown and Kyle Orton are the only Bears rookie quarterbacks to play more than 12 games.

A fellow named Charlie O'Rourke holds the team record for rookie touchdown passes with 11, set the year after Pearl Harbor. Orton holds the record for throws with 368. Tyson Bagent set the rookie record for completion percentage last year at 65.7% and played in only five games.

These are records for a team 105 years old.

Obviously the Bears are not known for passing but their lack of a rookie who puts up big numbers is even better reflected in a list of their top rookies ever. Chicagobears.com senior write Larry Mayer has a post with his top 10 Bears rookie seasons plus honorable mentions. Nowhere in the list will you find a quarterback.

The Bears are an extreme example as no other team has failed to find a passer who could hit 4,000 yards.

Still, it's entirely uncommon for rookie QBs to put up big seasons. C.J. Stroud was the rare example. Andrew Luck gets talked about as the shining example of a rookie QB who led a team to the playoffs and was an immediate success. He only threw for five more touchdowns (23) than interceptions (18).

For every Dak Prescott and C.J. Stroud, there are literally dozens of passers who come into the league and can't live up to immediate draft status.

Williams is going to need to learn a new offense, with players who are learning a new offense, with half the offense learning a new team and new coaches.

There are weapons for Williams and he could be backed by a top 10 defense, but it's a daunting task for a rookie quarterback even with those assets.

The odds are against Williams being the driving force for a playoff team as a rookie.

Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

BearDigest.com publisher Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.