Chicago Sports

When you go into a season with precious few proven threats in the passing game, you better make sure to use them.

For the Bears to get anything going in that department this season, it was expected to come from leaning heavily on 1,000-yard receiver Darnell Mooney and steadily improving tight end Cole Kmet. If anything, there was concern about being overly dependent on those two.

Instead, they’re invisible.

Through two games, Mooney and Kmet have gotten a combined seven targets. Kmet doesn’t have a catch yet, dropping a five-yard pass from Justin Fields in the loss to the Packers on Sunday, and Mooney has just two for four yards.

Mooney’s lone catch in Green Bay actually cut his season yardage total in half, losing four on a doomed screen pass — symbolic of the overall dysfunction.

“It’s Week 2, so I don’t think too much of it,” he told the Sun-Times. “I just continue to push. I know what they think of me. They love me and they know the playmaker that I am. I’ll shine when I get the opportunities.”

But getting the opportunities isno certainty.

Fields completed just 7 of 11 passes for 70 yards, and offensive coordinator Luke Getsy insisted on pounding the ground game even with the Bears down 14 in the fourth quarter. On the drive that got them within an inch of making things interesting, Getsy called a run on 10 of 13 plays. The three pass plays were an incompletion, a sack for a loss of 10 yards as pass rusher Preston Smith went unblocked and scramble on third-and-goal at the 6-yard line.

The running game worked, but that’s at least in part because the Packers were correctly vigilant for passes. If the Bears wanted to grind their way nearly the length of the field and melt clock for half the fourth quarter, no problem.

That’s a time when Mooney and Kmet were absolutely necessary.

When Bears coach Matt Eberflus was asked Monday if it was possible for the Bears to have a thriving passing game without those two leading the way, he said, “No. I think you’ve gotta highlight your skill.”

Instead, eight Bears have targets over the first two games, led by Equanimeous St. Brown with seven. Running back David Montgomery is the only player with more than three catches.

Unpredictability isn’t worth very much in this case. The Bears have the fewest yards passing in the NFL by far (169), fewest passes (28), the second-worst passer rating (69.2) and the lowest completion percentage (53.6).

“Let’s feed the guys that have skill that can take a short throw and turn it into a big gain,” Eberflus said. “And we have a good deep ball thrower, so we should utilize that, too. We’re going to look at all aspects of that.”

That’s not a real answer if it never gets implemented. Matt Nagy knew every Monday what his team should’ve done the day before, and that got him nowhere.

Is the real issue that the Bears are deliberately going ultra-conservative offensively to minimize what they ask of Fields? Eberflus said no, but it seems highly likely. And if that’s by necessity, it’s a troubling sign in his second season.

Is the offensive line so shaky that Kmet has become indispensible as a blocker? All Eberflus offered was, “We’re looking into that,” but Kmet has run routes on just 26 snaps so far, and that’s not how teams typically use their best pass-catching tight end.

There’s too much at stake and Fields’ development is too urgently important for this to go unsolved. They can’t just be endlessly looking into it. By the time the Bears establish the panel to appoint a committee to form a task force to determine why they aren’t making the most of Mooney and Kmet, the season will have gotten away from them.

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Outfielder Seiya Suzuki’s first major-league season has had its ups and downs, but an upswing in the last month has positioned him among the better Cubs rookies of the expansion era, which started in 1961.

Suzuki, who is in Japan on paternity leave, has a .769 OPS, 115 weighted runs created plus and 1.7 Fangraphs WAR in 417 plate appearances.

That sits comfortably among Cubs position players who won National League Rookie of the Year awards. It’s not in the ballpark with 2015 winner Kris Bryant (.857, 136, 6.1) or 2008 winner Geo Soto (.868, 120, 3.0), but it compares favorably to 1989 winner Jerome Walton (.720, 103, 2.0), 1961 winner Billy Williams (.822, 110, 1.2) and 1962 winner Ken Hubbs (.645, 70, minus-0.6).

Among notable non-award winners, Adolfo Phillips put up a 3.4 fWAR in 1966, second among expansion-era Cubs rookie position players; Mel Hall, who appeared in 12 seasons with a 7.0 career fWAR, had 2.9 of it with the Cubs in 1983; and middle infielder Addison Russell, who had a 2.6 fWAR in 2015, did it with defense despite a 90 wRC+.

Suzuki won’t win NL Rookie of the Year. A pair of Braves figure to be the leaders, with pitcher Spencer Strider (11-5, 2.67 ERA, 4.9 fWAR) the favorite over outfielder Michael Harris II (.305/.344/.541, 18 home runs, 4.4 fWAR).

For Suzuki, however, getting to this point has required a turnaround. He bottomed out at a .717 OPS on Aug. 20. He was hitting .241/.315/.402 for 100 wRC+ and a mere 0.8 fWAR. A 100 wRC+ signifies a league-average hitter, and league-average offense isn’t particularly valuable from a corner outfielder.

But Suzuki has been a different player since Aug. 21, hitting .337/.406/.545, with his 96 plate appearances including four of his 13 homers. His star-level 164 wRC+ is 24th in baseball for that period, and he has tacked 0.9 on to his fWAR.

During the hot streak, 25% of Suzuki’s batted balls have been line drives. Before Aug. 21, only 17% were liners. According to Fangraphs data, in the earlier period, Suzuki generated soft contact on 20.1% of batted balls, medium on 51.5% and hard on 28.4%. Of late, there has been much more hard contact, with soft on 16.2%, medium on 39.7% and hard on 44.1%.

The season has gone in the opposite direction for the Cubs rookie with the next-highest fWAR. Man of many positions Christopher Morel is at 1.4 fWAR for the season, with 104 wRC+ and a .727 OPS.

When Suzuki bottomed out, Morel was riding high with a .788 OPS, 120 wRC+ and 1.7 WAR. Since Aug. 21, the numbers have nosedived to a .459 OPS on .141/.225/.234 hitting, 33 wRC+ — one-third that of an average hitter — and minus-0.4 fWAR.

The cold streak is only 72 plate appearances, and Cubs fans can hope it’s no omen. Worrisome is a 40.3% strikeout rate that has rocketed after 30.5% in the earlier period.

For Suzuki, however, the arrow is pointing up when he returns to Wrigley.

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Bears offensive coordinator Luke Getsy’s developmental plan for quarterback Justin Fields is all about incremental, steady growth — stepping stones to success instead of a flip-the-switch, breakthrough moment. He just wants Fields to get better from game to game.

It’s a textbook plan to develop the talented Fields into an elite quarterback. But it’s unlikely to happen 11 passes at a time.

That’s the challenge facing Getsy after two weeks of his first season as an offensive coordinator. Fields threw just 11 passes (plus three sacks) in the Bears’ 27-10 loss to the Packers on Sunday night at Lambeau Field — a game in which the Bears were trailing for 48:50 out of 60 minutes.

Fields completed 7-of-11 passes for 70 yards, no touchdowns and one interception for a 43.8 passer rating. Getsy instead leaned on the running game. David Montgomery had 15 carries for 122 yards (8.1 avg.) and Khalil Herbert added four carries for 38 yards as the Bears rushed for 180 yards on 27 carries –averaging 6.7 yards per carry.

“We were going with what was working,” Eberflus said. “We were hitting some big runs and it was working for us and it [could have] put us into a one-score game [with] eight minutes [left].”

Eberflus said it’s not because the Bears don’t have faith in Fields. “We trust him for sure.” But 11 passes in a game the Bears are trailing by two touchdown for the entire second half says otherwise.

Let’s face it, the Bears aren’t ready to lean on Justin Fields right now. He’s not good enough. He’s running an offense that still has training wheels on. He’s can’t lift a team on his shoulders against a formidable defense. Not with this supporting cast. Not yet. He doesn’t have a Jaylen Waddle and Tyreek Hill. He doesn’t have a Justin Jefferson. His offensive line has now played two games together.

The Bears are paying the price for putting everything on Getsy to devise and install a scheme that will make the most of Darnell Mooney, Cole Kmet, Equanimeous St. Brown and Byron Pringle. General manager Ryan Poles watched Sunday night’s game from the Lambeau Field press box with his eyes wide open.

This was by Poles’ design. He sees a bright future. Everyone else sees Mooney and Kmet with a combined two catches for four yards after two games, and shudders. And you can’t blame them. At this point we have no more confirmation that Fields eventually will make than we ever had about Mitch Trubisky.

But it’s Week 3.

Through two weeks of the regular season, Getsy’s approach to developing Fields is almost the polar opposite of Matt Nagy’s approach with Trubisky. In two games, Fields is averaging 14 passes. In his first season under Nagy in 2018, Trubisky averaged 31.8 passes a game.

There has to be a happy medium, and Getsy surely will be looking for that. Eberflus is.

“I think you need balance,” Eberflus said. “We’d like to be 50/50 [run-pass] in a game … because that keeps the defense honest.”

The Bears didn’t get that balance against the Packers — officially a 66/34 balance with 27 running plays and 14 passing plays. The next move is Getsy’s, starting Sunday against the Texans at Soldier Field. When Nagy was lambasted for running the ball just seven times against the Saints in 2019, he overcompensated by running the ball 38 times against the Chargers the following week — and lost, 17-16.

Coming off a disappointing loss to the Raiders in London, that Saints-Chargers episode was one of the first significant red flags about Nagy’s ability to develop a sustainable offense. It’s a little too early to start defining Luke Getsy, but Sunday’s game will go a long way to quelling some early nervous skepticism about yet another Bears offense.

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The Bears’ most veteran player had advice for a young team one day after the Bears’ 27-10 loss to the rival Packers at Lambeau Field.

“Don’t get used to the feeling of losing,” defensive end Robert Quinn said Monday at Halas Hall. “At the end of the day, as individuals, we’ve just gotta be consistent. Do our assignment and try not to worry about anyone else’s. Keep things simple. … Do your job and everything should fall into place.”

The Bears began the season with 15 rookies. None had lost an NFL game until Sunday. Few were as much a part of the defeat as rookie cornerback Kyler Gordon. The second-round pick knew the Packers were picking on him even as they did it; he gave up 10 catches on 13 targets for 162 yards and one touchdown, per Pro Football Focus.

“There’s a lot of learning,” Gordon said.

Coach Matt Eberflus huddled with Gordon Monday afternoon.

“It’s everything I say to every young player that I’ve ever played that’s gone through these moments: There’s going to be ebb and flow over the course of a rookie season, and that’s the way it is,” Eberflus said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re dealing with a guy that’s rookie of the year or not, there’s going to be those things.

“And what you tell them is ‘Hey, take one experience at a time and put it in your file.’ You have to learn from that. So, go back and look at all the plays that you made, all the plays that you want to correct and then put them in a file. … And say, ‘What would I have done and put those to memory?’ And making sure you study those things and visualize those things as you go during the course of this week coming up, so you can make those corrections. Because a good pro doesn’t make the same mistake twice.”

Right guard rotation

The Bears have split their right guard rotation almost exactly evenly this season. One week after Teven Jenkins played 53 percent of the snaps against the 49ers, Lucas Patrick played 54 percent against the Packers. Jenkins has played 50 snaps at right guard and Patrick 49.

Asked if he’d settled on a right guard yet, Eberflus left open the possibility Patrick’s right thumb would be healed soon, so he could return to center.

“It depends on where we have Lucas … depending on what he can do with his thumb,” Eberflus said.

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HOUSTON — The Houston Texans have done a lot of good things through the first two weeks of the season.

The one thing they haven’t done is find a way to finish a game, and that has them without a win heading into Sunday’s trip to Chicago (1-1).

The Texans (0-1-1) led entering the fourth quarter for a second straight week Sunday against the Broncos, but didn’t score after that in a 16-9 loss. That defeat comes after Houston was up 20-3 to the Colts entering the fourth in the opener before Indianapolis scored 17 unanswered points in a 20-20 tie.

“To me, finishing means you’re out there doing right longer,” defensive end Rasheem Green said. “So I felt like we were doing right for a large amount of the game, but we’ve just got to do it longer and better.”

Green, who joined the Texans after spending the previous four seasons with the Seahawks, said it’s difficult for teams that haven’t won much to learn how to win.

“We’ve got a team that is on consecutive losing seasons,” he said. “You kind of lose a sense of how to finish out those games because results start going the opposite way. But yeah definitely, just continue to do the same thing that we did that got us to that point, just execute and finish it out.”

The Texans had a shot to regain or cut into the lead after Denver went up 13-9 early in the fourth quarter on a TD pass by Russell Wilson. But quarterback Davis Mills was sacked for a 7-yard loss on third-and-7 to force a punt.

The Broncos added a field goal on their next drive and Houston had two more possessions to try and tie it. During the first drive, Mills was sacked again and fumbled. The Texans recovered but he threw incompletions on two of the next three plays to turn it over on downs.

Houston got the ball back one last time with about a minute left, but Mills threw three straight incomplete passes to give the ball back to the Broncos and allow them to run out the clock to secure the win.

“We stalled,” coach Lovie Smith said. “We’re not there yet. It’s kind of simply that. We show flashes of what we can be … in games, you’ve got to (be) able to pass the ball. At the end it went down by seven. It was going to be a passing game and we weren’t able to come through.”

WHAT’S WORKING

Houston’s defense has given up a lot of yards through the first two games, but has been able to bear down in the red zone and limit scoring. Entering Monday, the Texans rank 11th by allowing just 18 points a game after giving up more than 26 a game last season.

“There are some bright moments,” Smith said. “Defensively we’ve played two games (and) we’ve given up three touchdowns. That’s hard to do.”

The unit has also done a good job of forcing turnovers so far and has three, with two interceptions and a fumble recovery.

WHAT NEEDS HELP

Mills needs to move the ball more effectively and consistently. The second-year player has shown flashes of improvement this season, but has been unable to move the ball in crunch time through the first two weeks.

“We needed to make more plays and just capitalize on our opportunities,” he said. “The plays are there, we just have to make them.”

STOCK UP

Rookie RB Dameon Pierce had 15 carries for 69 yards and was solid in pass protection a week after managing just 33 yards on 11 carries in his NFL debut.

STOCK DOWN

CB Derek Stingley Jr., the third overall pick in this year’s draft, had two pass interference penalties, including one for 42 yards that helped Denver to its first score Sunday.

INJURIES

Houston LB Kevin Pierre-Lewis (groin) and TE Brevin Jordan (ankle) were injured against the Broncos and Smith said they’d know more about the severity of the injuries later in the week.

KEY NUMBER

8,000. WR Brandin Cooks, who is 28, had four receptions for 54 yards Sunday to give him 8,053 yards receiving in his career, making him the 10th player in NFL history to reach 8,000 yards receiving before his 29th birthday.

WHAT’S NEXT

The Texans need to clean up their mistakes and find ways to move the ball better late if they hope to get their first win of the season against the Bears.

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In Week 1, Bears quarterback Justin Fields showed such awareness that he was able to scramble left, look 30 yards downfield and almost completely across it — from one set of field numbers to the other — and find Dante Pettis for a 51-yard touchdown.

In Week 2? Fields sprinted three yards past the line of scrimmage on third-and-10 Sunday — and then decided to throw the ball. Was he thinking of scrambling first? Just unsure where he was on the field? Either way, he was flagged, the Bears punted, and the Packers scored again.

“I saw it afterwards, and I was just like, ‘Dang,’ Fields said after the Bears’ 27-10 loss at Lambeau Field. “I just have to get the ball out earlier –or just run it.”

Breaking down the Bears’ discombobulated rivalry game:

A shotgun?

The Bears needed 1 yard to pull within seven points with 8:13 left.

After Fields fell just short diving right pylon, the Bears faced fourth-and-goal. Rather than handing off to David Montgomery, who had 68 rushing yards on six rushes that drive alone, the Bears decided to let Fields keep the ball himself. That was defensible — the Bears trust Fields to run — but the formation was not.

The Bears put Fields in the shotgun, meaning he caught the snap at the 5–and needed to run about five times as far to score as he would have from under center.

The Bears put tight end Cole Kmet to the left of tackle Braxton Jones and had two receivers split right and another one left. Montgomery was lined up to Fields’ left.

The Bears ran quarterback power to the left, with Fields running behind pulling right guard Lucas Patrick and Montgomery, who blocked outside linebacker Preston Smith to Kmet’s left.

Hit by De’Vondre Campbell, Smith and others, Fields couldn’t break through the line.

The fact the Bears drove the field exclusively via the run in the fourth quarter and down by 14 points — with the Packers happily letting the clock run — was bad enough. But really, a shotgun snap?

“You are using your quarterback as a runner and you have an additional blocker and so you like your numbers in the box there,” head coach Matt Eberflus said. “So that is why we called it. It was the best play we had there at the time.”

At the snap, the Packers had four linemen, plus Smith, at the line of scrimmage. The Bears had five offensive linemen and Kmet.

“It’s just the trenches,” Fields said. “Our O-line versus the D-line. We’ll never know if I got in or not.”

The Bears challenged– Fields thought the ball crossed the goal line –but the play was upheld.

“I think whatever way the officials ruled it, it would have stood,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said. “And I think a lot of times those [challenges] are tough to overturn.”

Tunneling out

The Packers scored three second-quarter touchdowns, but no play was more important than a screen pass thrown near midfield.

“You could argue,” LaFleur said, “that might’ve been the most pivotal play of the game.”

Eberflus said “It was a big sequence for us.”

A holding penalty made it first-and-20 for the Packers on the Bears’ 34. Trevis Gipson’s sack of Aaron Rodgers made it second-and-28. Down three points, the Bears were two plays away from getting the ball back in the second quarter.

The Packers split three receivers left and two right. Rodgers took a shotgun snap and threw a tunnel screen to rookie receiver Romeo Doubs, who was split furthest left. When he caught the ball, he had two receivers — Randall Cobb and Allen Lazard — and three offensive linemen between him and the closest Bear.

Rookie cornerback Kyler Gordon took on Cobb to force Doubs inside, but only for a second. Once Gordon was knocked to the ground, he kicked the screen back outside the numbers. Doubs split linebacker Nicholas Morrow and cornerback Jaylon Johnson, who were occupied by blockers, before being tackled by safety Eddie Jackson.

Rodgers then completed a nine-yard pass on third-and-8. Two plays later, he shoveled to Aaron Jones for an eight-yard touchdown pass.

The Bears weren’t surprised by the screen — “That is a common play that people run in that ‘get back on track’ situation,” Eberflus said — but couldn’t stop it. Morrow couldn’t get across his blocker in time to turn Doubs back inside, where the Bears had help from their linemen chasing the ball. Eberflus calls it “cupping the ball.”

“You have to hammer, hammer, hammer –and then turn it back to the defensive linemen that are coming inside out,” Eberflus said. “The play hopefully gets six or seven yards at worst. But when you don’t get the guy over the top, sometimes they cut the ball back inside or take the ball outside …

“The guys on the second level have to get on top of those blocks and turn it back to the defensive linemen that are running inside.”

TD run

The Packers were in second-and-11 at the Bears’ 15 on the first play of the second quarter when Rodgers pitched right to Jones. Lazard had gone in motion from right to left, stopped in the slot and targeted the Bears’ linebacker best player, Roquan Smith, on a crackback block.

Smith tried to shoot to the inside of Lazard, who shoved him just enough to create a running lane for Jones. Right guard Royce Newman kicked out cornerback Kindle Vildor, Center Josh Myers pulled and popped linebacker Nicholas Morrow. The Bears didn’t lay a finger on Jones until the 2, when safety Eddie Jackson and Morrow lunged for him.

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The White Sox found a gem in Johnny Cueto

Originally brought in as an insurance policy for White Sox starting pitcher Lance Lynn, Johnny Cueto has quietly been one of the White Sox best pitchers this season and one of the reasons they are still in the playoff hunt.

Johnny Cueto was signed by the White Sox at the start of the 2022 MLB season on a minor league deal worth a maximum of $4.2 million dollars all because Lance Lynn was going under the knife. Cueto has been worth every penny of his contract for the White Sox in 2022. Cueto has a 7-8 record with a 3.09 ERA and even notched a pitcher of the week award for the Sox. Cueto has had 16 quality starts this year for the White Sox including a stretch of 10 in a row. He has done nothing but provide high quality depth and veteran experience for the team.

Watch highlights from Cueto’s best start as a White Sox

The White Sox need to re-sign Johnny Cueto

Although Johnny Cueto is a free agent at the end of the season, the White Sox should bring him back. Especially since there’s still question marks at the end of the Sox rotation. He has locked down his spot in the White Sox rotation with his performance this season and I think he has pitched well enough to earn a spot in next year’s rotation as well. Cueto will also be significantly cheaper as he will no doubt command way less money than some of the other free agents hitting the market this winter. It’s a low risk high reward situation that the White Sox should definitely capitalize on like they did so this season.

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Chicago Bears fans took Justin Fields’ comments out of context

Justin Fields and his Chicago Bears teammates were disappointed after losing in Week 2 against the Green Bay Packers. The locker room should have been dour. The offense looked awful in passing the game. The defense was gashed by the Packers’ rushing attack.

After the game, Fields addressed the media to talk about the game. Fields was asked if the loss stung more to Fields because of the Bears/Packers rivalry and what it means to the fans. Fields answered that the hurt impacted him more directly by his and his teammate’s feelings than with fans.

“It hurts more in the locker room than to Bears fans,” Fields said. I mean, at the end of the day, they’re not putting [in] any work. I see the guys in the locker room every day. I see how much work they put in.”

Justin Fields didn’t articulate himself well as an ambassador of the Bears. The comments come off tone-deaf after a deflating loss to the Packers. Public relations is a significant duty of a first-round quarterback pick. Not surprising Bears Twitter was not happy with Fields’ comments. They took his quote as an insult to Bears fans who pride themselves in cheering for their team.

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Follow us on Twitter at @chicitysports23 for more great content. We appreciate you taking time to read our articles. To interact more with our community and keep up to date on the latest in Chicago sports news, JOIN OUR FREE FACEBOOK GROUP by CLICKING HERE

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