Chicago Bears vs Seattle Seahawks Preview: What to Watch For

The Chicago Bears will open their home slate of action on Monday night against the Seattle Seahawks. For only the second game of the season, this one sure feels big. Monday night marks the first real opportunity to see how new head coach Matt Nagy and this young Bears team reacts to adversity. Do they let a brutal loss to the Packers set the tone for the season, or do they come out throwing hay-makers?

I will be curious to see if Nagy comes out and calls a game that uses less trickeration and more staples of his offense. The Seahawks defense is a mere shell of what it once was, and this feels like the kind of game where you can punch them in the mouth. Jordan Howard and the running game looked pretty good last week, so that is something to keep an eye on as well.

What to Watch For

On offense, it will be interesting to see what the game plan is to start the game. Do they come out and run heavily from the start or do we see more of those crossers and rubs that we saw in the preseason? Nagy has stressed that his team will be aggressive and take shots, but that isn’t what we saw last week. The bones of this offense have been shown to be very effective in today’s NFL, so my advice to Nagy is the KISS method (Keep It Simple Stupid).

This game ultimately is going to come down to the offensive line, protection calls, and the center/quarterback exchange. Playing at home can only help a young quarterback and a struggling center. Protecting Trubisky will be paramount to the Bears success on offense.

Defensively, it is going to be all about the front-7. Seattle’s offensive line gave up 6 sacks to the Denver Broncos last week, and dare I say the Bears are even better up front than they are? I am also curious to see if Roquan Smith gets his first career start. He played only 8 snaps last week, but he sure looked good in those snaps.

On the back end, it’s time for some turnovers. The offensive line is bad, the Seahawks are without Doug Baldwin at wide receiver, and they have scant else offensively. Wilson should be running for his life all game long. He is a maestro outside of the pocket, but he will also throw balls up for grabs. The Bears secondary should have the advantage here, it is time for them to make the most of it.

That’s what I will be watching for on Monday night, what about you? The Bears looked good for a half last week against the Packers, what do they need to do on each side of the ball to steal a win from the beak of defeat?

Tomorrow I’ll have my ‘which players to watch for,’ so stay tuned!