The Chicago Bears season has officially gone off the rails. After a pair of inexplicable loses, Chicago one-upped itself on Sunday with a disastrous performance, as the lowly New England Patriots embarrassed Matt Eberflus and the Bears 19-3 on Sunday in Chicago.
The offense continued its bizarre downturn since looking like a competent unit at minimum just over a month ago. The Bears haven't scored a touchdown in two games now as Caleb Williams and company search for anything that will stick.
The way things are trending, this could be Eberflus' final few weeks with the Bears, and offensive coordinator Shane Waldron might not be far behind him. Eberflus' seat is rapidly heating up, and the Chicago media is fed up. On Monday, ESPN radio host David Kaplan let Eberflus hear it after his phone cut out during an interview.
“If last week wasn't a crisis, you are in crisis,” Kaplan said. “Kevin Byard says ‘I'm not gonna go there' when asked if these coaches still have the room. Cole Kmet three weeks ago is talking about the preparation. Jaylon Johnson, DJ Moore, you're in crisis. Just say it! Yes, this is a freakin' crisis, and we better close ranks and find a way to fix this. Cause it's freakin' embarrassing to have a charter franchise look that God awful, unprepared, uninspired, and it falls at his feet. It does!”
How much blame does Caleb Williams deserve for recent slide?
Caleb Williams has seen his play drastically fall off over the last three weeks, but the statistical decline doesn't tell the whole story of how the rookie quarterback is playing.
Williams is not without fault in this situation, and it's hard to imagine any quarterback getting off scot-free when an offense is performing this badly. Williams is seeing ghosts a little bit behind a horrendous offensive line, but he's not seeing things very quickly right now and his accuracy issues are certainly a big problem in the offense.
However, Williams is far from the top of the list of problems. The offensive line is truly one of the worst in the league, giving the Bears almost no chance in the run game or the pass game. The running backs aren't helping out at all in pass protection either; D'Andre Swift has a viral pass protection breakdown seemingly once per half.
The Bears also haven't been able to run the ball efficiently over the last few weeks, putting the entire burden of the offense on Williams to make plays. Shane Waldron hasn't found a way to use Williams' running ability to take any pressure off of the running game, making that part of the unit very difficult.
Waldron's receiver usage has also been bizarre. None of the Bears' talented wideouts are being allowed to play to their strengths, and that makes things so much harder for Williams and the offense. Keenan Allen isn't being asked to do any work underneath and over the middle like he was with the Chargers and DJ Moore isn't being given very many chances to make plays in space after the catch.
Williams has things he must improve at, there's no question about it. However, he is far from the biggest problem on a unit that seems like it's only going downhill from here.
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