Bears vs Rams: Snap counts, stats and more

That was Matt Nagy’s worst game as head coach of the Chicago Bears, but what made it look even worse was that it happened while he was across the field from Sean McVay, who coached a brilliant game. McVay pushed all the right buttons for his Rams team, and while his offense sputtered through the first half, he stuck to his identity and his players kept executing his game plan until they finally broke through.

To pile on Nagy’s awful night, Brian Griese, who was working as an analyst on Monday Night Football, dropped a damning bombshell in the fourth quarter.

“We were talking to Nick Foles yesterday, and he said, ‘You know, sometimes play calls come in and I know that I don’t have time to execute that play call. And you know, I’m the one out here getting hit. Sometimes the guy calling the plays, Matt Nagy, he doesn’t know how much time there is back here,’ so that’s something that they have to get worked out.”

Here’s the clip from last night if you want to hear it for yourself.

Foles said it was a miscommunication between he and Greise during their pregame talk, so we may never know if that’s true or if there’s a real disconnect between he and his play caller.

There may or may not be some tension between the two, but one thing’s for certain, the offense is still broken. Anyone making any future Bears bets, with a site like betway88 perhaps, need to take the inept O into account before placing the wager.

The Bears had 279 yards of total offense to the Rams’ 371, they only managed to pick up 14 first downs to L.A.’s 24, and they only held the ball for 27:25 of the 60 minutes. Chicago’s third down conversions, which has looked better of late, took a turn back down at just 4 for 14 (29%), and they only went 1 for 4 on 4th down tries. The Bears held the Rams to 4 for 13 (31%) on third downs.

Neither team was penalized a ton, but the Bears were hit more (6 for 46 yards to 4 for 46 for L.A.), but Chicago’s penalties were real killers all night long.

But now let’s take a closer look at the playing time break downs for the Bears, and also some individual stats.

OFFENSE

We keep hearing about rookie tight end Cole Kmet earning more reps, but it’s not really translating to the game plan. Sure he finally played more snaps than Demetrius Harris, but Harris’ ineffective receiving should get Kmet more time in the passing game. At this point Harris should only be on the field as the third tight end when the Bears go with 13 personnel, which should be limited as well. Kmet may not make any betway88 rookie of the year props with only 5 catches this year so far, but if he can prove to be a viable option in the passing game moving forward he’ll at least open some things up for the offense.

Against the Rams, Kmet caught 2 for 45 yards, Harris snagged 2 for 15 (and a holding penalty), and starting U tight end Jimmy Graham had 5 receptions for 31 yards.

Allen Robinson led the Bears with 70 yards on 4 catches, and David Montgomery tied Graham’s 5 receptions while picking up 21 receiving yards. Montgomery also ran for 48 yards on 14 carries.

Darnell Mooney had 3 catches for 40 yards while Anthony Miller had 3 for 20.

This was Nick Foles worst game as a Bear, as he was 28 of 40 for 261 yards, with 2 interceptions and a 66.8 passer rating.

Sure the pressure on him was fierce most of the night, but he also missed on a few shots that he should have made and his end zone interception was atrocious.

The Bears only managed 2.9 yards per carry and the Rams’ defense had 8 quarterback hits, 4 sacks and 4 tackles for loss.

DEFENSE

The Bears defense is very good, but they’ll never get back to the top of the DVOA standings until their offense can do enough to keep them fresh and allow them to play with an occasional lead. They were bullied at times by the Rams but I have to wonder how much of that was due to exhaustion.

L.A. kept the Bears on their toes all game by controlling the tempo. I’ll again go back to the masterful job done by McVay, and by extension, quarterback Jared Goff, as they mixed in quick counts, no huddle, bootlegs, play action, and jet sweeps and jet sweep action, all in an effort to stress the edges of the Bears defense and to make them run all night.

Goff didn’t light it up — he only threw for 210 yards — but he was efficient as his 2 TD passes and 108 passer rating can attest. The Rams running game went for 161 yards and a 4.7 yards per carry.

Eddie Jackson led the Bears with 9 tackles and he finally got his defensive TD on an 8 yard scoop and score.

Roquan Smith had 8 tackles and a TFL and Buster Skrine had 7 tackles.

The Bears lone sack went to Khalil Mack, who also had 4 tackles, a forced fumble and a TFL.

Barkevious Mingo had 4 tackles and 2 TFLs, and Mario Edwards Jr. chipped in with 2 TFLs and a QB hit.

Robert Quinn had 2 tackles and the forced fumble that led to Jackson’s TD.

SPECIAL TEAMS*

*The above image has players that only played in the third phase.

Cairo Santos provided the Bears their only offensive points with a 42 yard field goal.

Patrick O’Donnell punted 5 times with a 44.8 net average while dropping 2 inside the 20 yard line, but his counterpart, L.A.’s Johnny Hecker, had all 5 of his punts settle inside the 20 as Ted Ginn Jr. continually wanted no part of catching the punts.

Cordarrelle Patterson returned 4 kickoffs for a 23.5 average, and on offense ran 3 times for a yard, with 3 catches for 11.

Joel Iyiegbuniwe had 2 special teams tackles and Roy Robertson-Harris blocked a field goal.

To check out the full Bears vs Rams box score I find that ESPN has an easy to navigate site.

All statistics and snap counts are taken directly from the NFL’s Game Statistic and Information System, as are the accompanying pictures.