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During the 2018 season we often wondered why the Chicago Bears didn’t try to get Jordan Howard more involved in the passing game. His offseasons were spent working on his catching ability and his hand eye coordination, so why not throw a few balls his way from time to time to keep a defense honest.
Well, Jordan had a few thoughts on that subject in his latest interview with Zach Berman of The Philadelphia Inquirer while at Eagles OTAs.
“I feel like they’re allowing me to do more, show my game off more instead of just being one-dimensional like Chicago had me,” Howard said after practice Monday.
Howard was referring to catching the ball out of the backfield. He has 72 career receptions, and the volume declined in each of his three seasons. But Howard insisted that he can help in the passing game and that he didn’t in Chicago “because they had a [certain] view of me.”
“I thought it was going to be similar to Chicago, but it’s a lot more diverse,” Howard said of the Eagles’ offense. “We do a lot more than Chicago does. So I’d definitely say it’s a lot different.”
For what it’s worth, Howard was targeted just 26 times last season, while receiving 250 carries as the Bears’ bell-cow back. And, just because both Doug Pederson and Matt Nagy are both from the Andy Reid coaching tree, that doesn’t mean they’re anything close to being similar to one-another. It will be interesting to see how Howard is used in Doug Pederson’s backfield, considering they also invested a 2nd round pick on running back Miles Sanders during the 2019 NFL Draft.
Meanwhile, the Bears overhauled their own backfield, as they signed Mike Davis in free agency while drafting David Montgomery in the 3rd round of the very same draft class. Whether the Bears made the right choice(s) will be determined at a much later date and time. All we know is the running game is likely to be a lot more different than the one we saw last year.
The Chicago Bears travel to play the Philadelphia Eagles on 11/3/2019.