What’s New

CLEVELAND — There’s little joy in picking through the scraps of the Bears’ 26-6 loss to the Browns on Sunday, but here are three under-the-radar observations from the debacle:

Quinn’s comeback
The Robert Quinn signing looked like an absolute dud last season, but he’s back thanks to a better offseason and collaboration with defensive coordinator Sean Desai. Quinn had 1.5 sacks Sunday, raising his total to four. He’ll be in double figures by the end of the season if he stays healthy.

Tight ends empty
The Bears continued to get minimal production from their tight ends Sunday, with their only catch coming an 11-yard pass to Cole Kmet. Through three games, the tight ends have been targeted just 12 times and they have a collective eight catches for 64 yards.

Montgomery stuck
Quarterback Justin Fields wasn’t the only one struggling behind the Bears’ offensive line. Running back David Montgomery managed just 34 yards on 10 rushes. His longest run was 16 yards, meaning he averaged two per carry the rest of the afternoon.

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CLEVELAND — To commemorate the 75th anniversary of their franchise’s founding, the Browns turned their scoreboards retro Sunday, using graphics that looked like the old yellow bulbs on a black screen. The Bears went along with the theme and posted an offensive display that would have been at home in 1946 — 47 yards on 42 plays — in a 26-6 loss.

At the center of the offense was quarterback Justin Fields, the rookie making his first start. At no point in his life, at any level, had his offense been so thoroughly dismantled.

Afterward, he searched for the words to describe how it felt and settled on this: a dark place.

He needs to use every bit of his 4.4-second 40-yard dash speed to run to the light. Because the only thing more disturbing than the Bears’ offensive performance Sunday was the harm it could do to the first-round pick’s development.

Fields was sacked nine times, tied for the second-most in Bears history, and hit 15 times. It wouldn’t be surprising if, in his dark place, Fields still sees shadows of Browns edge rushers Myles Garrett and Jadeveon Clowney racing to tear him to the ground.

“Kind of like, you’re in a dark place,” Fields said. “You just want to do everything you can to just get a win, like no matter what it is. Like no matter how long I have to stay in the facility and no matter what, you just want to come out and after the game on Sunday, you just want to come out with a win, no matter what you have to do.”

Adding injury to insult, Fields had X-rays on his throwing hand after the game. He said they came back negative and that he was fine.

On the sideline, veteran quarterbacks Andy Dalton and Nick Foles tried to tell Fields that bad days happen. Fields refuses to think that way, even if the offense was more a failure of its play-caller and blockers than its first-time starting quarterback.

At Ohio State, Fields went 20-2 — and both losses came in the playoffs. Asked how he’ll try to bounce back, Fields referenced his history.

“The way I feel right now — I’m not used to this,” Fields said. “I don’t like feeling like this. Just me not wanting to feel like this.

“And literally while I’m saying this, I’m getting goosebumps. Because I just don’t like feeling like this. So I’m just going to get back and I’m going to work. That’s it.”

It’s unclear to what end. Coach Matt Nagy wouldn’t engage when asked whether the Bears were planning on starting Fields next week against the Lions, saying he needed to know more about any progress Dalton was making from his knee injury.

“It’s not going to damage his development because I know who he is and, again, on the sideline, how he was,” Nagy said. “I think when he watches and sees, let’s see as we go through it what the whys are, whether it’s a protection or a timing element. Whether it’s something in the run game. Whatever it is, let’s use this to try and help you get better and see where things are.

“He’s very coachable. He cares. I think that he’ll definitely do that.”

Sunday was not an isolated incident, though. Fields replaced an injured Dalton in the second quarter against the Bengals and led the offense to just 101 yards on 39 plays. Over the past two games, the Fields-led offense has averaged 1.83 yards per play — or about 5 1/2 feet.

After the Bengals game, the Bears used the built-in excuse that Fields hadn’t practiced with the first team before that game. Last week, he did.

It’s unclear if Fields will be given that chance this week, too.

“When things don’t go your way, it shows who you truly are on the inside,” Fields said. “Just the way you bounce back and the way you react to those moments.”

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CLEVELAND — Not long after Sunday’s 26-6 loss to the Browns, tight end Jimmy Graham went on Twitter and retweeted a stat published by CBS about the Bears’ woeful offense. The tweet said that the Bears’ average of 1.1 yards per play against the Browns were the second-fewest by any team this century.

It’s unclear what message Graham was trying to send, but it doesn’t figure to be a good one. Graham has been a role player in the Bears’ offense this season. He’s gone the last two games without a catch. Sunday, he had one target.

He played about one-fifth of the Bears’ snaps in Week 1 and about one-third of the Bears’ snaps in Week 2. Last week, head coach Matt Nagy said that the team had been clear about Graham about his role with the team, which was to help mentor starter Cole Kmet and be a red-zone weapon.

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When the Cubs and Cardinals met at Wrigley Field just before the All-Star break, both teams were under .500. Since then, they have gone in divergent paths.

St. Louis, left for dead by most baseball pundits, set a franchise record with its 16th consecutive win after Sunday’s 4-2 victory over the Cubs and rocketed to a possible National League wild card spot. The way they’re playing, the Cardinals are no one’s desired opponent in the playoffs.

In the Cubs clubhouse, the Cardinals’ success this September has been a teachable moment.

“That’s a nice lesson for me of, it’s a [162-game season], it’s not the All Star break, it’s not the trade deadline, it’s not into September. It’s the entire season,” manager David Ross said.

As his team goes into the offseason and prepares for next spring, Ross will be holding on to what the Cardinals have accomplished these last few weeks.

“I’ll be using that as an example, for sure,” he said.

Ross believes the Cardinals are a great example of heading into a season with faith in who is on the roster and being willing to ride with that group whether they go up or down in the standings.

Other than filling a few small holes on the roster with bargain veteran additions, St. Louis was not especially active at the trade deadline. Ross thinks there’s value in assembling your group and then having the confidence to stick with them.

In the next few months the Cubs’ front office will start answering questions about what the 2022 roster will look like. Ross does not take a driver’s seat role in building that roster, but he said there are players who have gotten his and the front office’s attention.

“Guys are making names for themselves,” Ross said.

He points specifically to Patrick Wisdom and Frank Schwindel along with role-player types like Rafael Ortega. Wisdom has set a new rookie record for home runs in fewer at-bats than Kris Bryant needed in 2015, and Schwindel has a good chance to lead the team in wins above replacement by the season’s end.

“I don’t know that there’s anything that I can put my finger on that is stamped into next season,” Ross said. “Big picture-wise, for the young guys, there’s a lot of holes to fill and depth to get, and how that plays out is going to tell us a lot about what kind of roster we’ll have next year.”

They might have the greatest need pitching-wise. Since the trade deadline, the offense has actually been better than the months prior. From opening day to July 30, the bats hit a collective .227 with a well below average wRC+ (theirs was 88, average is 100). Since July 31, those numbers are .249 and 96.

With the stable of young arms the Cubs have, the front office and coaching staff will have the winter and spring training to work on sorting out the best roles for those pitchers. For now, what Ross and pitching coach Tommy Hottovy value most is their availability and flexibility because that creates options for free agency and the trade market.

“The more options you have, the better it is for the front office to go out and be flexible in the pieces they can get to fill out their team,” Ross said.

Whatever those pieces are, seeing what the Cardinals have done since being essentially written out of the playoff conversation in July and August has left an impression on Ross.

That’s an impression he hopes to carry over into 2022 and use to remind himself and his players that things like prolonged losing streaks don’t always mean you’re out of contention.

“Baseball is weird like that,” Ross said of the Cardinals. “You get a little bit of momentum and the schedule plays out sometimes in your favor and you gain confidence, and you see what confidence does.”

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Jeremy Colliton made it clear at the start of training camp that he doesn’t own the Blackhawks’ new defensemen — “It’s not like I put my name on them,” he joked.

But the remade unit is certainly catered to his liking, with the hope Colliton’s much-debated defensive system will finally click with the right personnel.

“The size and mobility of our back end [will] allow us to be more aggressive in the ‘D’ zone, which we’d like to be to get out [successfully],” Colliton said. “That’s been a focus for us.

“We want to be aggressive and physical, get stops when we can, get going the other way, and use that mobility on the back end — once we do get it back — to create something in transition. We have enough speed back there that we should be able to create some good situations in transition.”

Through the first three days of camp, the defensive pairings have been stable: Seth Jones with Jake McCabe, Connor Murphy with Riley Stillman, Calvin de Haan with Wyatt Kalynuk and Caleb Jones as the seventh defenseman.

Colliton sees Seth Jones and Murphy — both right-side defensemen — as the anchors of the unit, the two “big, strong, great-skating, physical defensemen who are going to…play a lot of minutes.”

The question is which of the Hawks’ three left-side defensemen — McCabe, de Haan and Stillman — will pair with each of them come opening night. The process of determining that is just starting, despite the lack of experimentation so far.

“McCabe, he’s very reliable — he’s going to play on the left side with one or the other,” Colliton said. “I don’t think we’re stuck on anything yet, but we want him to get some chemistry and we’ll see how it goes in exhibitions… We want to give it a bit for them to get used to each other, and then we’ll just reevaluate after a few games.”

No matter how the pairings shape up, however, the Hawks should be stouter defensively than they’ve been the past few years. It’d be difficult to not be, after all: the Hawks ranked either 30th or 31st in both shots on goal and scoring chances allowed at even strength each of the last three seasons.

All seven of the aforementioned defensemen are 6-1 or taller, and the core three — Seth Jones, Murphy and McCabe — are all 204 pounds or heavier. The Hawks believe that added across-the-board size, something they didn’t have as much when Adam Boqvist, Ian Mitchell and Nicolas Beaudin were playing heavily last season, will make a difference.

“When you aren’t as big back there, it’s tough,” Colliton said. “You’ve got to be more patient and you spend a little more time in [the defensive zone] because you don’t want to [attempt a breakout] when you’re exposed.

“[Now], the first guy’s going to make a stop and then the second, third guy can be more aggressive about joining, winning a loose puck or just getting things under control. Because you know even if it’s not perfect, you’re going to knock the guy off balance or create a loose puck. And then we’re out. That’s something we’re excited about.”

The full training camp also gives Colliton more time to explain precisely to the defensemen how he wants them to operate.

Stillman, who was thrust abruptly into the fire last season, said the film sessions and practices this September have given him “a better feel for how we want to play.” And he sees his teammates getting more comfortable, too.

“It’s going to be a lot better this year,” he said. “We’re just that much further ahead than we were last year. The different look on the back end…is going to allow us to make that next step.”

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Ryan Pace should have called a press conference immediately after the Bears’ 26-6 loss to the Browns.

The Bears general manager should have apologized for putting together an offensive line that couldn’t have blocked an offensive tweeter Sunday, let alone a Browns pass rusher. He should have apologized to rookie quarterback Justin Fields, who was lucky to get out of Cleveland with his life after his first NFL start. He should have apologized to coach Matt Nagy, who was taking a public bashing for his play calling against the Browns, never mind that Vince Lombardi couldn’t have succeeded with this O-line.

Pace should have resigned on the spot, but of all the things that weren’t going to happen Sunday – a Bears victory, a good Fields game, a Pace press conference – that was the unlikeliest thing of all. You don’t quit a cushy Bears job. You wait until ownership fires you two or three years too late.

The Browns sacked Fields nine times, tied for the second-most sacks allowed in Bears’ history. Myles Garrett sacked him 4.5 times, which means that Garrett can tell you what deodorant Fields wears and at least the first five numbers of Fields’ Social Security number.

It wasn’t all bad. Fellow Bears quarterbacks Andy Dalton and Nick Foles did have some wise words for Fields.

“They were just telling me there’s going to be days like this and of course games like this,” Fields said.

Days and games, plural. With this drafty, threadbare offensive line, it was a perfect, if unintended, observation.

I’m not sure what Fields could have learned on an afternoon like this. How to get your head kicked in? What the sky looks like when you’re on your back?

What happened Sunday wasn’t Fields’ fault, though, remember, his many legions of supporters did say that the kid’s athleticism would help hide the offensive line’s deficiencies. Those of us who argued that playing behind this line wouldn’t be good for Fields’ development or his brain cells were dismissed as misguided or soft. The best thing that came out of Sunday’s game was also the luckiest thing: Somehow, Fields walked off the field under his own power.

How good a quarterback is Fields? Who knows?

But now you understand why Nagy wanted Dalton, sidelined with a knee injury, as his starting quarterback for a while this season. Surely you can see that the coach was trying to protect the Bears’ 2021 first-round pick from a debacle like Sunday. That doesn’t absolve Nagy of his ongoing sins as a play caller, but it does mean that the cleverest plays in the world would have been dandelion puffs against the Browns’ cruel pass rush. Could Nagy have called more running plays for Fields? Could he have called more play action? Moved Fields out of the pocket? Yes to all that. But it’s hard to believe it would have made any difference Sunday with this offensive line.

“We believe in our guys,” guard Cody Whitehair actually said of the line afterward.

Early in the game, Fox announcer Greg Olsen, the former Bears tight end, suggested that Nagy needed to open up the offense for Fields. Let his pure talent take over, Olsen said. Immediately after that statement, the Browns sacked Fields twice in a row. Yeah, well, never mind.

As punishment, Pace should been made to suit up, play quarterback and say hello to Mr. Garrett.

Fields completed six of 20 passes for 68 yards. His passer rating was 41.3. He’s clearly limited in his knowledge of the pro game. Also clear: The Bears would have been able to adjust better with a veteran like Dalton under center.

The best play of the afternoon for the offense was a pass-interference call in the third quarter. Throw it up and hope the defense makes a mistake – that’s been the franchise’s fingers-crossed approach for years, from Rex Grossman to Jay Cutler to Mitch Trubisky.

Right tackle Germain Ifedi had a false start on a third-and-1 in the second quarter, which, if I’m not mistaken, was the Bears’ 1,000th straight game of doing such a thing.

“I obviously as a head coach did not do a good enough job of getting this offense ready to go,” Nagy said.

The final score was 26-6, which also happened to be the first-down discrepancy Sunday.

“You almost can’t even make it up – it’s that bad,” the coach said.

I felt bad for Nagy. He took the blame for everything Sunday. If someone had blamed him for government corruption in Yemen, he would have said he should have spoken up.

Pace, meanwhile, was nowhere to be seen or heard, leaving Nagy to absorb all the hits for an offensive line his general manager gave him. Cruel but not unusual punishment. This is Pace, who is allergic to the media. And these are the Bears.

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DETROIT — Justin Tucker set an NFL record with a 66-yard field goal, bouncing it through off the crossbar as time expired to lift the Baltimore Ravens to a 19-17 win over the Detroit Lions on Sunday.

The kick topped the 64-yard field goal Matt Prater made for Denver against San Francisco on Dec. 8, 2013.

Lamar Jackson threw a 36-yard pass to Sammy Watkins on fourth-and-19 to get the Ravens across midfield with 7 seconds left. The superstar quarterback spiked the ball and threw it away on the next two snaps. Then Tucker — who made a 61-yard kick to beat the Lions in Baltimore’s previous visit to Detroit eight years ago — came out and made the record-breaking attempt.

Baltimore (2-1) went into the fourth quarter with a 16-7 lead and ended up trailing in the final minute.

Ryan Santoso made a go-ahead, 35-yard field goal with 1:04 left, giving coach Dan Campbell an opportunity to win his first game with the Lions (0-3). Santoso was promoted from Detroit’s practice squad on Saturday after kicker Austin Seibert went on the COVID-19 reserve list.

Jackson was 16 of 31 for a season-high 287 yards with a touchdown and an interception. His teammates dropped at least four passes that could have potentially turned the closely contested game into a rout.

Mark Andrews had five receptions for 109 yards for the Ravens, who have won 11 straight games against NFC opponents.

Detroit’s Jared Goff was 22 of 30 for 217 yards and D’Andre Swift had 107 yards of offense and a score.

Early in the second quarter of the scoreless game, the teams had combined for just six first downs with six punts and six penalties.

Jackson perfectly placed two passes on one drive that should have been touchdowns, but Watkins and Marquise Brown failed to catch the football. Brown also dropped two passes on a single possession late in the first half, forcing Baltimore to punt.

The Ravens often had to settle for field goals, and they’re fortunate to have one of the best handling that job for them.

Tucker, who was wide right a 49-yard field goal in the first quarter, made a 39-yard kick with 10:05 left in the first half to put them ahead 3-0. Tucker made two field goals in the third.

The Lions, as they did in a season-opening loss to San Francisco, came back to give themselves a chance to win and came up short again.

Swift ran for a touchdown in the third quarter. Jamaal Williams scored on the ground in the fourth, on a TD that was granted by a replay overturn, to pull Detroit within two points.

Jackson gave the Lions the ball back late in the fourth, throwing a pass up for grabs on third-and-10 from midfield that was intercepted by Amani Oruwariye at the Detroit 21.

Goff led a nine-play, 62-yard drive that took 4:21 off the clock to set up the go-ahead field goal.

The Lions, though, left Jackson with too much time to direct a game-winning drive.

INJURIES

Ravens: Rookie LB Daelin Hayes (ankle) and S DeShon Elliott (quadriceps) were hurt during the game. That was another blow for a unit that started the game without DE Derek Wolfe (back, hip injuries) and with LBs Jaylon Ferguson and Justin Houston and DL Brandon Williams and Justin Madubuike going on the reserve/COVID-19 list Friday.

Lions: LB Trey Flowers (shoulder, knee) was inactive.

UP NEXT

Ravens: Play at Denver next Sunday.

Lions: Play the Bears at Soldier Field next Sunday.

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The score sent shock waves around the city’s high school football community on Friday: St. Ignatius 27, Mount Carmel 0.

Forget Monday’s usual Four Downs. This upset is big enough to draw in all of the focus from the weekend. The Wolfpack’s last win against Mount Carmel was in 1928. The teams tied in 1960.

The history is a little misleading because St. Ignatius didn’t have a football team from 1964 until 2005. But that also adds to the Wolfpack’s accomplishment. They’ve been building a program up from scratch.

“It’s been two days and I’m still trying to process it,” St. Ignatius junior Vinny Rugai said. “I’ve been going to Mount Carmel games since I was born and I don’t remember seeing them get shut out or lose by more than 14 points. They just came out flat. We were confident heading in and knew we could take it to them and knew they might underestimate us.”

Rugai plays linebacker and running back for the Wolfpack. He had 12 tackles and 14 carries for 94 yards and a touchdown against the Caravan.

Rugai’s been going to Mount Carmel games for so long because his dad played quarterback for the Caravan.

“He was happy for me and was definitely rooting for St. Ignatius,” Rugai said. “But it meant a lot more to beat them because he played there and Mount Carmel football has been such a part of our lives.”

The Wolfpack runs the triple option. Coach Matt Miller says the running game, behind a line of Damian Lassak, Will Mulchrone, Jake Rothgery, Emmett Rhoades, Drew Steigleder, had 335 rushing yards against the Caravan.

St. Ignatius has had about eight players going both ways before this season. Rugai is now the only player starting on offense and defense, which is sign of growth for the program.

“Rugai is all over the field and a really good leader too,” Miller said. “Jack Molloy’s dad is also a Mount Carmel alum. He had 10 carries for 87 yards and a touchdown and caught our only pass.”

St. Ignatius opened the season with wins against Von Steuben, Bremen, St. Laurence and Marmion. That’s a nice start but it gave no indication of what would happen against the Caravan.

“The Marmion game was tough for us,” Rugai said. “We were down 16 going into the fourth quarter and won. So after that we weren’t celebrating during the game against Mount Carmel. We knew anything could happen.”

Mount Carmel was ranked No. 2 last week and has beaten St. Rita, Phillips, Notre Dame and Marist this season.

“I didn’t know what to say to the team right after the game,” Miller said. “I was shell shocked.”

The St. Ignatius community reveled in the victory all weekend.

“I got a message from Tony Harris, who started the program in 2003,” Miller said. “Then I heard from a lot of the players that went through the tough parts early on, the 1-8 seasons. When you think about how much it means to so many people it really starts to build and you see the gravity of the win. Mount Carmel has been dominant for so long. We have yet to win a playoff game.”

That’s the next step for the Wolfpack. They have four winnable games to finish out the season: De La Salle, St. Viator, DePaul Prep and Fenwick. St. Ignatius will likely enter the Class 6A playoffs with a lofty seed.

“A win like this changes the mindset of everyone around you,” Miller said. “We keep making the playoffs and then taking some lumps. This was a really big one for us to take a step forward.”

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The Fire had a field problem Sunday.

The 0-0 tie with Nashville SC in front of a season-high crowd of 15,915 was played on a Soldier Field grass surface with football markings more than visible. A day after Notre Dame beat Wisconsin, the game’s “Shamrock Series” midfield logo was covered over with green paint but easily detectable, as were the schools’ colorful end zone designs. The white gridiron lines had dulled, but not very much.

Beyond the optics – which aren’t good for a franchise trying to market its product – the grass has been busy recently. Last Sunday, the Bears beat the Bengals at Soldier Field, Wednesday saw the Fire lose to New England and then the Notre Dame-Wisconsin game was played Saturday. And the field was clearly worse for wear, with divots and pock marks around the entire playing surface, contributing to a forgettable 90 minutes of soccer.

Nashville SC coach Gary Smith brought up the playing surface before taking questions from the media. Smith said the field was “incredibly difficult” after Saturday, giving both teams fits when they tried to manage the ball.

Smith said it even influenced his decision to rest attacker Hany Mukhtar, who had a hat trick against the Fire earlier this year. Nashville also plays on a grass surface at an NFL stadium, but on Sunday, Smith was “shocked” by the condition of the Soldier Field pitch. The grass was too long, there was unnatural movement of the ball and Smith didn’t think it was watered enough, while the football paint was “acoustically” bad but not a problem.

“I’ve got to say, that’s the worst grass field I’ve been on in a long, long time at this level,” Smith said.

Fire coach Raphael Wicky was less harsh but also blunt in his assessment of the playing surface. He deferred questions to players about how the football lines and markings affected things, but echoed what Smith said about the grass itself.

“The divots, the holes, the bumps, the long grass not wet, that affects the players a lot to play [soccer],” Wicky said. “It is what it is.”

For the Fire (6-15-6, 24 points), the grass is a fall problem as long as the Bears and other football teams hold games at the venue.

Fire goalkeeper Gabriel Slonina was diplomatic, saying the conditions and marking didn’t affect the game because it was the same for both teams, adding that the crew did the best it could.

“The grass is green anyway,” Slonina said. “The green paint is not much of a problem.”

As Slonina met the media, there was green paint on his arms.

NOTE: The Fire honored the Chicago Sting on the 40th anniversary of their 1981 North American Soccer League Soccer Bowl ’81 championship. Fire players wore Sting t-shirts when they arrived at Soldier Field, and Wicky wore one during the match. Members of the Sting were also recognized at halftime and received warm applause from the fans.

“It’s a special day,” 1981 Sting defender Rudy Glenn said. “When you think about it 40 years later, we made history that evening and we’re still around, still thought about, which is pretty amazing. And it’s because of the fans like today. For them to even acknowledge us is just amazing.”

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