Teaching Bears Old Tricks. Running the Ball and Defense

With all of the talk about how the new offensive system is going to revolutionize the Bears, it may be the same old formula that gets us out of the gates winning games. Running the ball and defense.

And the congregation says…….

Amen.

of an excuse riddled start of the regular season. Urlacher and Briggs are nicked up, which opens the “well we were never really 100% when the season started” excuse when if they go down early or the team finds itself 1-5.

the “offense is new and complicated” excuse should probably be written on the back of tickets for every home game. this way, no one can really get that mad when routes are broken off early or Cutler completely misreads the defense and throws into double or triple coverage.

the “offense line just needs to jel” excuse should follow that one … i mean, that could take like at least 5 games if not a whole season, especially if they play musical guards and tackles in search of that “right” combination.

the “we’re just not getting it done” excuse that Lovie gives for his defense has already come out and will be the mantra for the entire season if this crap keeps up. the failure to shut down an offense on third down is a problem, as is the pass rush and the ability to tackle. this starts in preseason and when it carries over into the regular season it makes me long for Blackhawks hockey again.

let’s run the football (we won’t) and hit and tackle people like we mean it. i hope they just get down to the fundamentals of football and just play like they mean it on Sept. 12, because right now, while the games don’t mean crap, they sure are playing like it.

That should open up the passing game a little bit. And stopping teams on 3rd down goes back to generating pressure and forcing an incompletion – or a turnover.

Both of these fundamental areas depend on:

1) Having big, physical lines on both sides of the ball.
2) Making in-game adjustments

Our O-line is probably average, and the jury is still out on the D-line (depending on how T Harris is able to produce over the course of the season). Unfortunately, having his team prepared and making in-game adjustments are probably not two of Lovie’s strengths.

this preseason was just a primer and gauge for Martz to start running the ball when the regular season starts. It’s not a bad plan of attack, especially if they can get the Lions defense back on their heels early.

Edit: mute should be moot.

but outside of a couple of good runs they havn’t showed much run blocking ability, I hope that is because they have been using vanilla run blocking schemes and they have something better for when the games count for real. Right now it looks like all you have to do is pin back your ears and go after Jay to stop the Bears.

It’ll take at least a couple of months, I figure that’s all he’s got.

Hello..?? Mr. Cowher??

The Bears have been nasty on third down!
… Nasty as in making me go BWWAAARGHHHH!!!, that is.

These Bears are starting to remind me of the 1974 Bears. Abe Gibron was the coach and he was terrible and so was the team. The only thing he has over Lovie is that he wore his emotions on his sleeve. Alas, gents and ladies, lets face it we’ve been here before and we know what we’re looking at. I watched several games over the weekend and I saw other coaches interact with the players and other assistants. Lovie does none of that. He stands there either befuddled or acting as he was above it all. FIRE Lovie now. It’s too late to save the season. We may have a few players that have skills, but for the most part the rest would be second stringers on other teams. I say clean house, starting with the McCaskeys. They should sell the team to someone who cares about putting a football team on the field worthy of the passion the fans have for their football team. I LOVE THE BEARS. This S**t has got to come to an end. I am sick and tired of it. Chicago is a great city with great sports fans. Witness the Blackhawks championship and the fervor it caused in the city. I say we boycott, lest I leap from the ledge. AAARRRGGGGG!!!!!!!!

Our defense sucks and is aging, our offensive line sucks and some of our receivers will find the Martz system too complex. We are going to suck very badly this year. Yes its only the preseason, but its obvious that half of the team doesn’t have a goddamn clue in what it is supposed to do.

No offense to Mark, but there is no way in hell this team is winning a super bowl. We are going to be lucky to win more then 5

Just asking.

The 2008 Detroit Lions probably have something to say about the meaning of preseason wins and losses, considering they won all four of their preseason games and didn’t win a game the rest of the year. Same with the ’85 Bears who went 1-3 and the ’07 Patriots who went 2-2, and we all know how those years turned out.

That’s not to say don’t take what you see lightly, but a lot of what we’re seeing is just experimenting with personnel and scenarios that help to build strategy for the year. For instance, in the Oakland game, a lot of the offensive lineman ended up in one on one situations to test how they’d handle it, and if they got beat that badly in a game by one or two guys, they’d be double teaming those people with an extra blocker or shift protections or something. That’s also not mentioning that we’re subbing players in and out and testing individuals in certain situations, or not mentioning that the locked-in starters probably aren’t playing at full speed to prevent injury, or that this isn’t about moving the ball down the field and scoring as much as it is testing possible in-game scenarios.

Am I saying that the concerns are unwarranted? No. The defense has not looked sharp. But, what I am saying, is that we can’t act like what we’re seeing now is what we’ll see come regular season. When the focus is on actually winning games rather than testing players and the offense and defense aren’t meshing, then I’ll be worried. Until then, let’s just hold our horses.

It’s about how well the starters play when they are in. So far, I do not see lapses in execution or numerous false start, offside and/or procedure penalties. The starters are just getting beat individually. For some it may be a process of learning, say Louis or Omiyale, but even the vets do not look good. We should all be concerned. This team does not look like it is improving or learning anything. They simply look disorganized and lacking in effort every week. Moving to a run heavy offense is not the answer. Short of 1 run each by Talyor and Forte, the blocking and running are mediocre. The defense is inexcusably bad for a veteran group who mostly know the defense and have executed it for many years. This is scary bad, plain and simple. There will have to be a dramatic shift in attitude and/or coaching to change any of this mess we call the 2010 Bears.

It really looks like that we might have to count on defense and the run game to carry us until the offense starts clicking on all cylinders. I am encourage that the run game looks much improve from last season. Not too worried about the defense as they seem to always struggle in preseason, but the miss tackles and poor safety play is alarming.