This off season the Bears barely even whiffed at high priced free agents like Alan Faneca and Michael Turner. Part of the reason was so they could resign their own. The Bears gave big money to Tommie Harris, Lance Briggs and Brian Urlacher among others. But so far this season the Bears D have not held up their part of the deal.
Only one team in the NFL is spending more money on their D than the Bears.
The defense is ranked 18th in the 32-team NFL despite the fact the Bears have allocated a higher percentage of their salary cap to that area than all but one other team. The Bears have put 47 percent of the $116 million salary cap into their defense for this season. It's a massive amount of money when you consider they have just 32 percent of their salary cap -- the 26th-lowest amount -- invested in an offense that ranks 15th in the NFL.
The Bears defense was directly to blame for giving up leads late in games, which has accounted for the Bears 3 loses.
The Bears currently have 16 sacks which is 16th in the league. They rank 3rd in the league in INTs with 12. They rank 6th in the league in rush defense allowing only 81.8 yards per game. So it would seem the Bears defense is pretty good, but the Bears have only recently started showing signs of life on D.
The two biggest problems with the Bears defense is their inability to create consistent pressure on the QB. We have decent money wrapped up in that front 4, they should be able to get to the QB. Secondly, the Bears cannot stop the pass. Whatever scheme they are in is ineffective. They rank 29th in the league in passing yards allowed giving up 247.8 a game.
With Kyle Orton out for a few games and a tough schedule ahead the Bears defense needs to earn their money.