The 2015 Bears allowed an unacceptable 24.8 points (20th) and 345 yards (14th) per game. Accordingly, that side of the football was a focus, with personnel additions via free agency and the draft. The Bears have improved statistically in just about all areas and done it in spite of some costly lost playing time to central figures, particularly in the front-seven.
Prominent among those were rush-linebackers Leonard Floyd, the team’s No. 1 draft choice, and Pernell McPhee, recovering from offseason knee surgery and unable to play before the Green Bay game. Both had sacks in the win over the Minnesota Vikings and signaled a possible beginning of the kind of pass rush needed to help a young secondary that has struggled with three different starters at cornerback in eight games opposite Tracy Porter.
“[We] went through a stretch where we had different guys,” said coach John Fox. “Losing Lamarr [Houston] was a setback earlier in the season but getting those two guys [Floyd and McPhee] back out there increases our depth and really kind of keeps us fresher as far as guys we're rolling through there, in what we call a wave. The more they're out there and the more experience they get, the more things they can handle.”
The numbers
| Yds/game | 9th |
| Scoring | 16th |
| Sack/pp | 12th |
| Rush avg. | 9th |
What’s gone wrong?
Defensive statistics are in fact respectable – even more than respectable given some of the hurdles faced by the bedrock phase of the Fox philosophy. The offseason additions of linebackers Jerrell Freeman and Danny Trevathan behind massive lineman Akiem Hicks, plus the trade up to snag rush-linebacker Floyd and the overall unit entering its second season under coordinator Vic Fangio – all flowed together into forecasts that the Bears could be fielding a top-10 defense in 2016.
The numbers say the defense is at least close to that. But the ankle injury to nose tackle Eddie Goldman and season-ending knee injury to linebacker Houston left gaping wounds, added to by Floyd and Trevathan each losing two entire games with physical issues of their own.
Opponents have outscored the Bears in the aggregate in every quarter this season. The totals for the fourth quarter, however, are ominous: 79 of the 179 points allowed this season – more than 44 percent – have been given up in fourth quarters. The Bears have lost two of the three games in which they led at halftime. The Bears led the Packers in the third quarter, and lost. The Packers scored 13 points in the fourth quarter; the Jaguars, 17; the Colts, 10, the Texans 10.
If there’s a positive it lies in that the Vikings did score in the fourth quarter last Monday but it came with less than six minutes remaining in a game in which the Bears held a 20-3 lead.
“I think that you’ve seen as the season has gone along, that’s something that’s hindered us throughout this entire season, just being able to put two halves together, playing 60 minutes of great football,” Hicks said. “We’re watching some of our earlier-season tape and watching how dominant we’ve been for 30 minutes of the games, 35 minutes of the game. we need to make that the whole 60 minutes. It’s as simple as that.”
[SHOP: Gear up Bears fans!]
What needs to happen?
Hicks’ assessment of the need for 60 good minutes is in fact as simple as that. Or as simple as the NFL can be, where individual matchups can be tipping points. The Bears badly need McPhee’s recovery to allow him increased playing time (19 snaps at Green Bay, 25 vs. Minnesota), Floyd’s development to accelerate (three sacks, five tackles past two games) and takeaways to increase (seven; only three teams have fewer through eight games).
The forgotten man has been Goldman, who is the anchor of the defense but was lost with an ankle injury in the Philadelphia game. Goldman is the key to the run defense and an underrated force as a pocket-pusher.
Players have stated that only the Dallas Cowboys (31 points, 447 yards) physically blew out the defense, that being the game after Goldman went down and in which Dallas ran 41 times for a total of 199 yards. With the return of pieces already on the roster, that kind of game is expected to become a decidedly less likely occurrence.
“I think we’ve had some pretty decent performances early on,” said defensive coordinator Vic Fangio. “We got beat up pretty good in Dallas, but it seems like everyone has been lately.
“I think we’re progressing. It’d be nice to get everybody back and get guys playing and contributing in the roles you have envisioned for them and not be having wholesale changes before and during the game. The ones during the game are even a little bit harder to deal with. But I think there’s progress being made.”
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