Before the season, ESPN did a ranking of the top 100 players in the NFL. If the Bears were even an average team, they should have had three players on that list. They had one. DJ Moore.
It really threw cold water on my hopes for the season. And they have turned out not to be wrong.
We had three…if you are counting DJ Moore then you have to count roquon, then fields for some reason.
I actually feel the other way around: our roster is worse than our record. When I look at Arizona and Carolina, I don’t think their rosters are worse than ours outside of QB (and that’s with Murray out). I struggle to find a team in the league I would not swap rosters with.
We have a bunch of okay starters at some positions that would be great fillers for teams with holes. Those are our best players. The rest of our roster is well below replacement level.
Even our clearly best player, DJ Moore, is not a top 10 WR.
You’re as good as your record says.
Short answer: No. Long answer: Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnooooooooooooooo. But seriously, i think the roster is better than the record mostly because i think our scheme are doing no one any favors. I dont think this is a legit roster that should be vying for a Super Bowl, but i think its more of a .500 roster as it stands but our coaches are among the worst in the league.
Ryan poles believes is quantity not quality players. Got have studs to get better.
No.
Yes. Hands down, everyone is improving, and we are learning which young guys will be around and which ones won’t come 2024.
I’m not a doomer. So I’ll note that people don’t really respect how shitty we were 3 seasons ago and how bad our defense really was.
No
No, they’re a bottom 5 roster and it’s reflected in the record.
I think so. We lose a lot of games almost exclusively due to poor coaching. Injuries have played a part as well to be fair. But in terms of talent, we have multiple pro bowl caliber players on both sides of the ball.
Defensively, with a line backing core of Edwards, Edmunds, and even Jack Sanborn, we should have way better results than we do. Those are some talented guys out there. Not to mention the addition of Sweat. Our secondary has good players too, Eddie, JJ, Brisker when healthy… I always struggle to find a reason we have struggled so much defensively given our roster.
We have plenty of talent on offense as well. We have a great RB room, a top 10 WR, and a surprisingly solid OLine (again, when healthy) that maintains one of the best rushing attacks in the league and has drastically improved their pass protection
I think you add a few first rounders and maybe a free agent or two and suddenly we have a very good roster. The problem has been and will continue to be the coaching.
No. I feel like we’re almost worse. Last year you could definitely say that, but not this year. Maybe it was just Fields who was better than 3-14, but so what. We stink this year
There is no such thing as “better than your record”. If you were better than your record, you’d have a better record.
N-O
I would say they 100% should have beaten Denver. That would put us at 3-6. Based on how Eberflus prepped the team for week 1 vs Packers (or lack thereof), that game was at least winnable. The fallout from losing vs GB was a clear distraction heading into Tampa.
Momentum in the NFL is underrated. The team was in total disarray heading into KC. We do not beat KC with the roster we have, I'm not saying that at all. However, coming off a beating but still 2-1, the mood would be considerably different than it is being 0-3.
The reason we started so poorly was how little the 1st team played in the pre-season. Anyone saying this is a playoff team is probably wrong. However the NFL is so fluid that anything can happen. Getting into the WC weekend should have been at least on the table.
Look at Cleveland beating the 49ers in week 6. SF was undefeated and Cleveland was starting a QB we determined wasn't good enough to make our roster. Anything can happen, so if the Bears back into the playoffs, then 60 minutes later we all find out.
This team should not be 2-7.
Kmet is stepping it up from what I can tell.
Bagent gave away 2-3 games himself
The truth is, the talent Poles has put on this roster means either a lot of players regressed or the coaches and scheme are creating negative EPA via osmosis.
I’m neutral on replacing Fields, if only for the opportunity cost of two studs, but firing Fluss and Getsy will be the biggest automatic plus. Even if we replace Fluss with another defensive HC… a new OC is likely better than Getsy.
It is better than the scheme
So the real question here is are the coaches not using the players they have effectively? I think great coaching staff could have the team 4-5 or maybe 5-4, an above average staff 3-4 wins. So there is definitely a lack of talent, but Flu and co definitely compound the problem.
I hate this question. Their roster directly reflects their record. I'm sorry.
Not to get pedantic, but isn't just about every team's roster better than its record? I read the question as another way of asking "absent injuries and poor coaching and scheming (i.e. if the full potential of each player was maximized), would the Bears have a better record?" I think the obvious answer is yes, and that's the case for most teams.
If the Bears had their starting O-line and Secondary healthy all year, and if they had better game plans and schemes to do things like create pressure on opposing QBs, open up the downfield passing game, and do creative stuff on special teams, they undoubtedly have a few more wins.
At full-health and with optimal coaching, this is a middle-of-the-road team. They're not dreadful. But they have a long way to go before being in contention for anything. Their record is a reflection of abnormally high numbers of injuries with sharp dropoffs to backup players, and unimaginative coaching and scheming (not to mention all that internal drama with their DC and now RB coach) - to go along with an overall lack of elite talent at enough positions.
They're still very much a work in progress. Poles's leash is getting tighter. With the cap space and upcoming draft positions, if next year doesn't show dramatic improvement, Poles could be gone-zo (or at least probably should be).
No….if anything our record is better than our roster.
I think we are much better than our record.
It's worse.
Let's go through the roster
Qb: bottom 3 qb
Hb: dime a dozen
Wr1: top 8-15
Wr2: wouldn't start on a competent team
Wr3: wouldn't start on a competent team
Te: dime a dozen starting te who is a lazy blocker
Lt: horrible. Near the top of the league in penalties despite playing 3 games. The other can't block
Lg: horrible, had 1 good game against one of the few defenses who gets less pressure than we do
C: horrible
Rg: could be good if he stayed healthy maybe
Rt: rookie doing rookie things. Plenty to point to bring better or worse than you think he is
Edge: see above about being one of the worst at pressuring the qb. Sweat is a top 15-25 edge we paid top 5 money and a high 2 for. He's not a bad player but he's not a game wrecker like the bosas or watt or garret or even old mack like he's being paid at.
Dt: see above about no pressure. Qbs can always step up on us. We are doing well against the run though, but that only matters when you aren't a liability in pass.
Mlb: mid at best despite high pay. Sanborn is a nice story. But he's just a guy
Olb can't do anything well
Cb1: top 7-15 at his position
Cb2 mid
Cb3 bad
Ss okay
Fs stopped wanting to tackle years ago and lost the ability to get turnovers.
We're a bottom 5 roster with a bottom 5 record. If we had a better qb we could over achieve like the texans. But we don't. So back to back earned top 5 picks is what we are. Fans will have their bias and think everyone is better than they're and convince themselves we're just a qb and center and someone on defense. Then coaching will fix everything. Like how we just needed coaching to fix nagy...then suddenly the team was so bad we couldn't possibly do anything other than earn the #1 pick because we traded mack for pennies.
And it's not looking good about keeping our corner right now with poles bundling yet another negotiation.
Imo the only way to see how is with a different coaching staff
I'm going to go with yes, and one of the major issues is coaching/adjustments. There have been a handful of games so far where even when we were behind, the game extremely close. Then halftime hits, the other team makes adjustments and the Bears do not and then the second half is a complete disaster.
To me, this paints the story that the team is more talented than the end result would have you believe, but the lack of adjustments and creativity really skews it.
Maybe by a win or two
Probably considering our coach is absolutely terrible. Would they perform better and win more games if Andy Reid were the coach instead? Absolutely
We have a lot of talent on this roster, it’s just horribly mismanaged. We are spending a ton of money and draft capital on defensive players that have previously been good and are now bad and that’s almost certainly a coaching problem. The offense has good guys all over the place besides Center.
This question is a great way to see who is an actual doomer.
Easily. We've seen glimpses of both the offense and the defense playing at a high level this year. They're just lacking the consistency. We've just yet to see everything click all at once.
But the talent is definitely there.
I think so to a degree. Better QB play and a center probably has us at 5-4. We beat Denver, Minnesota and New Orleans with better QB play.
No, we still have a lot of work to do.
I'm still a huge fan and am going to watch every game, but I think we have one of the worst rosters in the league lol.
We need all the early-round draft picks we can get.