First off, I need to make something abundantly clear: I spent all day Tuesday and Wednesday refreshing my X feed waiting for word that the Chicago Bears had fired Matt Eberflus and hired Jim Harbaugh to resurrect the franchise.
And when I heard that Flus was staying and Luke Getsy and a licorice assortment of coaches were getting canned, I was simultaneously satisfied and disappointed for obvious reasons.
And then tonight, as I started to dig out of my COVID-induced haze I started to look at just what was the 2023 Chicago Bears.
For a season that began with so much optimism for the effect the WR DJ Moore and rookie RT Darnell Wright would bring to the offense, it ended with just as many questions as fans had after the 2022 active tank that got the Bears the #1 overall pick last year.
At least, so I thought.
I know what my eyes saw. A tortured QB that couldn't get out of his own way at times, but mostly operated an offense that multiple talking heads were confused by on the regular. A WR corps that refused to have anyone perform at an adequate level that wasn't named 'Moore'. Too many internet video clips of Bears offensive linemen blocking each other. (Yes, it happened more than once) A defense that started off playing so soft the team could have been sponsored by Hims. MLB Tremaine Edmunds took a minute to get going. The 4th quarter collapses.
Oh god- the 4th quarter collapses!
All in all, the Bears more than doubled their win total from 2022. How could they not? They played the 5th easiest schedule- improving on 2022's 3 wins should have been the baseline expectation. They kept the possibility of playoffs interesting longer than anyone expected, especially after starting the season out looking absolutely tawdry.
So I looked at profootballfocus.com ratings. Like I had done last year for fun. And what I did was I plotted how far away each team was from the average of the top 10 teams for each category. Why the top 10? Because who the hell wants to be average?
Where did the Bears have the most distance to cover in 2023? Pass Rush, where overall they were 25.8 points behind the average. After that, rushing defense followed only then by passing offense- lagging 23.3 and 22.3 points off the average, respectively. Receiving ratings were only 7.8 points off the average, but before we all jump on the anti-Justin Fields bandwagon, the Bears pass blocking 15.6 points off the average of the top 10.
So I saw this and I was not suprised by any of this. So I went deeper. I looked at the same stats from 2022 and then compared the distance from the top 10 in 2022 and 2023. What I found is grounds for some real optimism.
Overall, the Bears finished 17 points off the top 10 average but that was 8.9 points better than last season. Only the Houston Texans and Detroit Lions posted bigger improvements, with the Texans bettering 2022 by a whopping 22.7 points. Ridiculous.
Passing offense? Actually better by 7.4 points, the 6th best improvement in the league. Pass receiving ratings improved by 11.3, best in the league. Overall defense improved by 12.4 (3rd best), rushing defense by 19 (6th best), tackling by 22.5 (5th best), and finally coverage ratings improved by 14.8 (7th best).
There are giant opportunities for offensive line play as both run blocking (-16.3) and pass blocking (-7.9) all regressed. Those were the 2nd and 7th worst variances in the league, respectively.
So while we're about to get months of panic and stress over whether Justin Fields will be the Bears quarterback again in 2024 or they use their newest #1 overall pick on the world's consensus choice: Caleb Williams from USC, Bears fans should rest assured that the arrow is indeed pointed up.
The key is to keep it there.
Comments