Every week in the NFL is an opportunity for a team to measure itself, and Week 3 for the Bears will be no different. They’re taking on a Texans team that’s constructed similarly, runs a defensive scheme from the same family tree, and wants to win following a similar script. On Sunday, the Bears have a chance to show that they’re farther along in their development compared to the rebuild that’s underway in Houston. They also have a chance to measure their resiliency for the first time. The Bears are coming off a humbling loss on Sunday Night Football, but in the following week of practice, no one on the Bears has seemed demoralized. Instead, they seem confident that they know where they screwed up, and how to fix their problems. Now we’ll see if they can execute on those corrections.
CLEAN UP THE TACKLING ON FIRST AND SECOND DOWNS
The Packers made it very clear that they were going to focus on getting their running game established in Week 2, and the Bears still weren’t able to stop it. They weren’t disciplined in their run fits, nor did they use the proper technique coaches have been teaching all summer. That allowed the Packers to do essentially whatever they wanted on offense. The Texans are going to come out with a similar plan. Dameon Pierce and Rex Burkhead are not Aaron Jones and A.J. Dillon, but if the Bears don’t clean up their fundamental mistakes from last Sunday, they’ll still have a hard time stopping the Texans duo. And if the Bears can’t stop Pierce and Burkhead, it will play right into the Texans’ gameplan.
DON’T ABANDON RUN TO SIMPLY INCREASE PASS ATTEMPTS
Arguably the No. 1 talking point around the Chicagoland area following the Packers game was the lack of Justin Fields pass attempts. Fields left Lambeau having thrown only 11 balls, but throughout the week the Bears clarified that several called passes turned into runs based on either what the Packers defense showed the Bears, or what Fields decided to do with the football. Further, the Bears went into the game planning to run the ball, and had the most success when they leaned on David Montgomery. What the Bears can’t do now, is skew too far in the other direction in service of trying to jump start the passing attack. Yes, the Bears need Fields to throw more for their offense to take the next step, but Montgomery remains the most effective part of their offense and still deserves to be highlighted. Last week the Bears got away from Montgomery in the middle portions of the game, only to return to him in the fourth quarter. If anything, the Bears need to be more consistent about getting him the ball throughout the day.
STRETCH THE FIELD MORE
Through two weeks, Fields has only attempted 11 passes of greater than 10 yards. He’s attempted 12 passes that traveled less than five yards. Nine of those passes weren’t even beyond the line of scrimmage. Obviously the small number of total plays affects the amount of deep shots the Bears can take, but as it stands now defenses shouldn’t feel threatened for big passing plays. We’ve seen both the 49ers and Packers stuff the box to try to snuff out runs, and short throws, and that will likely continue until the Bears can prove they can hit on explosive pass plays. Of course hitting on explosive plays will help them get into the red zone, where they’ve actually been effective.
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FINAL SCORE PREDICTION
This feels like a get-right game for the Bears. They’re confident in their ability to correct the mistakes they made in Week 2 to improve moving forward. This is also a rare week when the Bears can say they’ve got a more talented roster than their opponent, and they should take advantage. Not gonna say it’ll be pretty, but the Bears should get the win.
Bears: 17, Texans: 13