By Scott Kacsmar
The Chicago Bears are in an interesting spot leading up to the 2023 NFL season. Despite finishing 3-14 and trading the No. 1 pick in the draft to Carolina, some feel the Bears have playoff potential because of a perceived weak division now that Aaron Rodgers has gone to the Jets and there is a lack of trust in the Vikings and Lions.
Quarterback Justin Fields is reportedly getting more bets for the MVP award than any other player with fans hoping for a third-year breakout for the running quarterback.
But the sportsbooks are less optimistic. You can find the Bears either last or tied with Green Bay for last in the odds to win the NFC North. The Bears are no better than +5000 to win the Super Bowl anywhere, and their over/under win total is just 7.5 wins.
Chicago can double last year’s win total and still finish under its win total with room to spare. Is that the right call on this team, or is there something to this breakout? We look at their 2022 finish, the key offseason changes, why it is so hard to expect a big improvement, and what the best Bears bets are for 2023.
2022 Season Recap: Run, Run, Lose
The Bears were already in a sneaky good position to improve last season, because a second-year quarterback getting a new coach and offensive coordinator is usually ripe for improvement. However, the Bears fell from 6-11 in Matt Nagy’s last year to 3-14 under rookie coach Matt Eberflus, who was supposed to be a defensive specialist yet watched the Bears finish dead last in points allowed and other important categories.
Perhaps even worse, Justin Fields was the least valuable passer in the league by most metrics. His saving grace was his rushing, which has already established him as one of the best runners to ever play the quarterback position in the NFL. He became the first quarterback ever to rush for over 140 yards in consecutive games, yet the Bears still found a way to lose both games.
The 2022 Bears were the first team ever to rush for 230 yards in 5 consecutive games. But they were also the first team in NFL history to lose 3 straight games when scoring at least 29 points.
There was no complementary football played in Chicago last year. The defense did not have the offense’s back, and vice versa as the Bears lost a 12-7 game to Washington on a Thursday night.
But nothing may sum up the problems with Fields better than the fact that he produced 30 net passing yards on 28 pass plays against the Lions in his final game of the season. In the same game, he had a 60-yard run. You can guess which one made the highlight reels, but in the end, the Bears lost 41-10.
While the Bears started the season passing fewer times than any NFL offense in over 40 years, they still were not an adequate passing team by season’s end. Fields also did not excel in late-game situations as the Bears could not even get into field-goal range in close losses to the Dolphins, Lions, and Falcons.
It did not help that the Bears lost No. 1 wide receiver Darnell Mooney to a season-ending injury, though he still played in 12 games and only averaged 41.1 yards per game. The team traded a high second-round pick to Pittsburgh for Chase Claypool, but he only had 14 catches for 140 yards in 7 games. No one on the Bears had 600 receiving yards last year.
The Bears had a lot of holes to fix, and one offseason is likely not enough to accomplish that.
Offseason Review
Time will tell if sticking with Fields was the right move for this franchise, because the No. 1 pick did provide an option with Bryce Young or C.J. Stroud. But if the Bears were not taking a quarterback, then there was no reason to keep that pick. They made a solid trade with Carolina, who took Young, and the Bears also picked up D.J. Moore in return.
Do Not Exaggerate D.J. Moore’s Impact
Moore will be the new No. 1 receiver for Fields. This is an improvement, but we need to slow down the expectations as Moore has never been a stud, and he did not elevate the Carolina offense, which also struggled with quarterback play and winning close games.
In Carolina, Moore played with 7 quarterbacks who threw at least 40 passes to him. None of those 7 players had more touchdowns than interceptions when targeting Moore, who has 21 touchdowns to 28 interceptions when targeted in his career. He also caught just under 60% of his targets.
Fields getting Moore is not the same as Josh Allen getting Stefon Diggs in Buffalo, or Jalen Hurts getting A.J. Brown in Philadelphia, or Tua Tagovailoa getting Tyreek Hill in Miami. Those receivers were much more impactful.
With that said, this is the best collection of skill players around Fields in three years. Moore, Mooney, and Claypool are the top wide receiver trio, and Cole Kmet is a solid tight end who could use more targets too. David Montgomery is gone at running back, but the team added D’Onta Foreman from Carolina, and Khalil Herbert may be their most effective running back anyway.
New Offensive Tackle
The Chicago offensive line was not great by consensus last year, but some metrics will say it was actually very good, such as ESPN’s Analytics that had the Bears ranked in the top 5 for both pass block and run block win rates.
The Bears drafted right tackle Darnell Wright in the first round this year and he will be a Week 1 starter. Cody Whitehair will move back to center where he had his best seasons. The line has real potential to be better this year, but it will still come down to Fields getting rid of the ball faster and not taking an egregious number of sacks, which quarterbacks do tend to have more control over than their line.
More Pass Rush
Think the defense needed help? The 2022 Bears had a league-low 20 sacks and allowed a league-worst 31 rushing touchdowns. They were getting pushed around in both phases of the game last year.
The Bears traded linebacker Roquan Smith to the Ravens last season, but they picked up Tremaine Edmunds from Buffalo this year. That should be at least a lateral movement as neither player has quite lived up to their first-round hype in this league. If they did, they would still be on their original draft teams.
But as for the actual improvements to a pass rush that saw no player notch more than 4 sacks last year, the Bears did not do a ton in the offseason. They brought in defensive end DeMarcus Walker from the Titans, who had a career-high 7.0 sacks last year. They drafted a couple of backup defensive tackles in the second and third rounds who could be starters down the road.
The big move may actually prove to be an August signing of defensive end Yannick Ngakoue, who has one of the most mysterious careers in NFL history. Here is the full list of players to have at least 8 sacks in each of their first 7 seasons since 1982: Reggie White, Derrick Thomas, DeMarcus Ware, Aaron Donald, and Yannick Ngakoue. Amazing, Hall of Fame company.
But why does no one keep Ngakoue around beyond one season, and why was he available in August? He had 9.5 sacks for the Colts last year, and the Bears will be his sixth team since 2019. He will probably lead the Bears in sacks and move on to another team in 2024, so enjoy his contributions while they last if you are a Bears fan.
This Year’s Area of Interest: How Much Can a Team Improve in One Year from the Bottom?
The Bears are good proof that passing is what drives scoring and winning games in the NFL. Passing offense is especially important, but being a great passing defense can also help.
Last year, the Bears were terrible at both. Chicago ranked 32nd in net yards per pass attempt (NY/A), which includes sacks, on both offense and defense. That led to the defense ranking 32nd in points allowed.
This combination of being last in NY/A on offense and last in points allowed on defense is very rare. Since the 1970 merger, only four teams have pulled off this combination of being last in both. Here is how they did the following year:
- 1970-71 Patriots: From 2-12 to 6-8 (20th in NY/A, 21st in points allowed)
- 1985-86 Falcons: From 4-12 to 7-8-1 (22nd in NY/A, 6th in points allowed)
- 2005-06 Texans: From 2-14 to 6-10 (27th in NY/A, 25th in points allowed)
- 2022-23 Bears: To be determined
This is a tiny sample size of teams but notice that none of them improved higher than 20th in passing, and they all were still under 8 wins, only improving by 3.5 or 4 wins total.
What if we expand our search to teams since 1970 who finished in the bottom quarter of the league in both offensive NY/A and points allowed? That returns 144 teams and in the following season they averaged 6.1 wins, ranked 19.8 in NY/A, and 18.7 in points allowed. Only 22.2% of the teams had a winning record the following year.
Only the 1999 Rams, who had an all-time rags-to-riches story in MVP quarterback Kurt Warner, improved to 13-3. They also drafted Torry Holt and traded for running back Marshall Faulk. Only the 1980 Falcons finished 12-4, which was a weird season given Browns quarterback Brian Sipe was MVP, and Atlanta would not win 8 games again in a season until 1991.
If we sharpen our focus to the 32-team era and look at 2002-2021, there are 63 such teams, and they averaged 6.3 wins the following year. Only four of them won 11 games:
- 2003-04 Falcons (5-11 to 11-5): Michael Vick tore his ACL in 2003 and was back in 2004 with new head coach (Jim Mora Jr.)
- 2007-08 Dolphins (1-15 to 11-5): Chad Pennington was the new quarterback for new coach Tony Sparano
- 2011-12 Colts (2-14 to 11-5): After missing Peyton Manning for the entire 2011 season, the Colts ushered in a new era with Andrew Luck and head coach Chuck Pagano.
- 2012-13 Chiefs (2-14 to 11-5): The Chiefs started a winning run by acquiring quarterback Alex Smith and hiring Andy Reid from the Eagles.
Do you still think Fields is a good MVP bet when 29 of the last 33 quarterbacks to win MVP won 12-plus games? No quarterback has ever won MVP while winning fewer than 11 games in a season that was at least 16 games long.
Keep in mind, these are the only teams in the bottom quarter of passing and points allowed in the last 20 years that were able to win 11 games. They all hired a new head coach and everyone got a new quarterback except for the Falcons, who got their franchise player back healthy.
This is why it is hard to trust the Bears to make significant improvements, because they brought back Fields for the same coach, the same offensive coordinator, and the same defensive coordinator while only adding marginal upgrades to the roster like a fringe top 20 wide receiver (D.J. Moore), a rookie right tackle (Darnell Wright), and a pass rusher still available in August (Yannick Ngakoue).
Thanks to Josh Allen breaking out in Year 3 in Buffalo, we have to hear how every quarterback who underperforms for two years is just a season away from being the next star. But that is rarely how it works as most quarterbacks who are good show their worth in their first or second season of playing. Fields is 0-for-2, and this defense also has a lot to prove before we can trust it like we could in the past for Chicago. Eberflus was much closer to getting Marc Trestman results than Mike Ditka or Lovie Smith last season.
But most quarterbacks do not pan out in the NFL. With the way the first two seasons have gone for Fields, the odds of him breaking out are stacked against him. Even Allen was a better passer in 2018-19 than Fields was in 2021-22.
Best Bets for the 2023 Bears
By all conventional measures, the Bears should be an improved team in 2023, but not a good team. It is just not realistic for a team that did not change coaches or quarterback, that was so bad at passing and defense, to improve to a win total that would justify a division title or MVP award for the quarterback.
However, the state of the NFC and the schedule can be great equalizers for the line of 7.5 wins. The Bears will have several winnable games at home, including the Raiders, Broncos, Panthers, Falcons, and Cardinals. That’s without even getting into the divisional games.
On the road, the Bears definitely have a shot in Tampa Bay, Washington, Cleveland, and you never know when the Chargers will go into Chargering mode.
The final win total is likely going to be close to that line of 7.5 wins. But as someone who does not believe in Fields becoming a legitimate passing threat, I am going to stick with history and for the Bears to stay under 7.5 wins this year. This is not your classic Chicago team that can get by on defense and running alone.
Do not waste any bets on Fields for MVP either.
NFL Pick: Chicago Bears Under 7.5 wins (+100 at FanDuel)
