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How the Chicago Bears’ offense has become a long-term problem

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The Chicago Bears underperforming offense continues to haunt the franchise as the Bears stumbled to 5-4 on the season.

After a 5-1 start, including a win over the high flying Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Bears were firmly placed to return to the postseason despite an underperforming offense.

Chuck Pagano’s defense masked the Bears offensive woes throughout the first six weeks of the season, but Chicago’s problems have been visible throughout the last three weeks.

A problem that continued against the Tennessee Titans, a problem that continues to waste one of the best defenses in the NFL.

Chicago failed to capitalise on a superb performance by the defense on Sunday, which surrendered just 228 total yards and 11 first downs in Nashville. The unit restricted the NFL’s leading rusher Derrick Henry to just 68 yards on 21 carries and held Ryan Tannehill to 158 yards passing.

       

On the season, the Bears defense is eighth in points per game, 10th in points conceded and are just one of two teams alongside Pittsburgh Steelers to not concede 30 or more points in any game this season. But despite a strong defense, the offense continues to be a burden.

Chicago have mustered just 50 points in the past three weeks and just four offensive touchdowns as such is their problems. The quarterback position in particular continues to plague the team.

Chicago Bears quarterback problems

The quarterback uncertainty surrounding Matt Nagy’s team with neither Mitch Trubisky or Nick Foles appearing to be a long-term solution at the position continues to plague the Bears.

Trubisky was benched after underwhelming in his first three starts in the season and hasn’t been seen since. General Manager Ryan Pace essentially banked his future on Trubisky being the franchise saviour, surrendering a treasure chest to the San Francisco 49ers to move up one spot.

Yet, somehow the Bears keep stumbling from one disaster to another at the position.

       

Despite producing a whirlwind comeback against the Atlanta Falcons, Nick Foles hasn’t been much better either.

The Bears picked up Foles in the hope that given the chance, he could recreate the magic which saw him star in the Super Bowl. Instead the Bears have seen the opposite.

Instead of a Super Bowl MVP, Chicago have got a guy who has been a career backup for the majority of his career, a guy who runs as fast as an offensive lineman and a player who was quickly discarded by the Jacksonville Jaguars.

The 2018 Super Bowl MVP is averaging under 260 yards per game passing and has thrown just seven touchdown passes while throwing six interceptions. Trubisky for comparison threw six touchdowns to three interceptions. Throughout history the Bears have had issues at quarterback.

Bears historical quarterback woes

A look at Bears history shows an astounding fact and that is no quarterback has started all 16 games in a season more than once.

Furthermore, only Vince Evans, Jim Harbaugh, Erik Kramer, Rex Grossman and Jay Cutler have done it at all. That speaks volumes of the problems the Bears have had developing quarterbacks in their long history.

While perhaps even worse, Chicago has only had just five Pro-Bowl quarterbacks in their history. They were Bill Wade in 1963, Johnny Lujack in 1951 and 1952 and Ed Brown 1955 and 1956.

Since then, the Bears have just two in the past 50 years in Jim McMahon in 1985, the year the franchise won its solitary Super Bowl, and Trubisky in 2018 as a Super Bowl replacement. In short the Bears have been truly awful at developing quarterbacks.

Running game continues to flop

Although the Bears do have a bad quarterback problem, that doesn’t give any excuses as to why the running game has been so poor for Chicago.

David Montgomery hasn’t had a 90 yard game on the season, let alone a 100 yard game this season.  The former Iowa State man is averaging just over 55 yards a game, one rushing touchdown and is under four yards a carry.

While as a team the Bears are 31st in rushing yards per game, 29th in yards total, last in rushing touchdowns and 29th in yards per carry. Throughout the season the Bears have failed to gain any traction, even against the worst run defenses.

Yes, the Bears have been without their speed back in Tarik Cohen, depriving Matt Nagy of one of his most explosive weapons. However, this can’t be blamed for the Bears inept ground game.

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