We’re a few days removed from the Bears’ frustrating loss to the Houston Texans. In the last 48-plus hours, I’ve had time to digest the All-22 and watch a couple of rewatches of the game, so I want🅷ed to revisit my instant grades from Sunday, see if there were any marks tꦛhat I felt differently about, and provide some context to their performance.
Offense
QB Caleb Williams | C- (Original Grade C+)
I’m not even mad about Williams’ interceptions. What was he supposed to do? He has zero help. The line stinks, the play-calling stinks, the personnel usage stinks; it all stunk around the rookie tonight. For all the talk of the incredible situation that Williams was walking into, it sure hasn’t looked close to as advertised. When Williams had time to throw in structure, he was damn good tonight. Even when he didn’t, he wasn’t bad.
Additional Context: It was a really good first half, with too much 🐻hero ball when things began to unravel for the offensive line in the second half.
Williams was pressured in under 2.5 seconds on 11 dropbacks on Sunday night and sacked seven times. Why is 2.5 seconds i𝔉mportant? That’s the designed time a route should take to be open. Williams was 15 of 18 for 95 yards when throwing the football under that threshold. That’s good for a CPOE (Completion Percentage Over Expected) of +4.2 percent. When he had the ball l𝄹onger than 2.5 seconds, he was 8 of 19 for 79 yards and two interceptions (-11.2% CPOE).
Houston’s pressure created some one-on-ones in the second half, and Williams has to be more accurate on those moving forward.
Still, the sky is not falling when it comes to Williams. Take a breath, relax. He’s going to be fine.
RB D’Andre Swift | D
Money well spent … not.
Additional Context: Swift’s grade has not changed, but the tape shows that he could have benefitted from better play-calling from his OC. Waldron’s determination to continue running the ball outside when the offensive line was late to their block all night because of the noise and silent snap count did Swift no favors.
WR DJ Moore | A
Ten targets, six catches, and almost nine yards per reception. DJ did his job, although he wasn’t used correctly tonight against a Houston secondary with a glaring weakness against the deep ball.
WR Rome Odunze | D (Original Grade A)
I will venture to say that when I re-grade my instant grades mid-week, there will be few and far between where I give someone a drastically different grade than they originally received. More often than not, the tape provides much-needed context to things I already believed to be accurate, bu🐽t sometimes, it shows us an entirely different thing. Rome Odunze’s performance ✨last night and my initial grade will be one of those exceptions to the rule.
Credit to Rome for toughing it out and playing most of the snaps, let alone playing with an MCL sprain, but he might as well have taken the night off. He dropped a touchdown in the end zone that was absolutely catchable upon review, and he didn’t get much separation all game, which could be due to the knee injury, but if that’s the case, he ꧟shouldn’t havꦑe played.
TE Cole Kmet | B
It was nice to see thatꦆ Shane Waldron remembered that Cole Kmet pജlayed on this team.
Additional Context: Many people were sour over this blocking effort by Kmet, and by no stretch 𝄹of the imagination is it good. However, this is just one example of the weird, galaxy-brained designs that Shane Waldron has deployed in the first two weeks. Why would we think that having Kmet try to slide over and block Will Anderson Jr. with a head of steam was a good idea?
Gerald Everett | F
Have you ever had a coworker with whom you don’t know what they bring to the table, but the bosses still love them? That’s Gerald Everett.
Offensive Line | F
This group has serious issues that have to be corrected quickly. To steal a joke from Matt Rooney, at some point, we have to consider that is pulling a “Costanza” and trying to get fired.
Additional Context: Darnell Wright looked much better in the first half than the second, and while there were some mind-bogglingly bad reps for Darnell Wright, there were a few bright spots when the run game was going downhill. Perhaps it’s time to consider moving Teven Jenkins back to right guard and creating a nice wall on that side with Jenkins and Wright.
Defense
Defensive Line | A
Sacks, pressures, and everything in between. What was once seen as a glaring weakness for the Bears, this unit has held their own and then some in the first t▨wo games of the season.
Linebackers | A
The open-field tackling continues to be incredibly impressive. Chicago has two professional and reliable linebackers, so it’s a nice call back to the Urlacher and Briggs days. Sanborn has also been an excellent changeup for the Bears when on the field.
Secondary | A
It wasn’t perfect, but this unit stood tall against one of the best passing attacks in football and made excellent adjustments as the game went on.
Special Teams
K Cairo Santos | A
Perfect night, perfect grade.
P Tory Taylor | A
Anoth🧜er magnificent night for the rookie๊ punter tonight in Houston.
Coaching
Matt Eberflus | D
Going 0-for-2 on challenges is bad enough, but the two challenges that Eberflus lost were brutally bad decisions. One of them, Eberflus, was standing right in front of the play — an inexcusable way to lose two timeouts. He would have gotten an F if he weren’t calling plays on defense.
Shane Waldron | F
If there were a worse grade, Luke Getsy would have gotten it tonight. His playcalling was abysmal. (Yes … I did that on purpose)
Eric Washington | A
How could I complain about Washington when the Bears defense played as well as it did against a top-10 offen✱sive unit?
