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Cowboys 31, Bears 17 – Recap

Box Score

Grading Primer (I wrote this about Michigan, but the grading procedures are still relevant.)

The Bears got off to a lousy start in Dallas and thought the fought in the second half, it wasn’t enough and the team fell to 0-3. The defense was missing key pieces Lamarr Houston, Danny Trevathan, and Eddie Goldman. The offense was missing Jay Cutler.

Player Grades

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How’d they do?

Ratings are out of 100 and should be read similar to Madden ratings. Overall ratings for the season and the change in that number from the previous week are in parentheses.

QB: 73 (Season: 74, Change: -3)

Brian Hoyer was okay, but okay was about it. He made most of the routine throws, but airmailed a few deeper passes. The fumble was his only major mistake. John Fox would say for sure that Cutler will be the starter again once he’s able to play again; to me, that’s just ridiculous. Things don’t look very good for the team as a while right now, but you’re not going to win many games with Brian Hoyer. In any case, the Bears absolutely have to find Cutler’s successor this off-season.

RB: 89 (Season 83, Change: +3)

Jeremy Langford injured his ankle in the game and could miss some time. Jordan Howard had a very nice showing, so I think the position will be fine even if Langford and Carey are out. Howard appears to be better as a receiver out of the backfield than Langford is and displayed impressive vision and cutting ability. The Bears signed former Lion Joique Bell this week. We’ll see what his role is.

WR: 93 (Season: 91, Change: +1)

Alshon Jeffery had another fine game. Kevin White looked better than he graded out. He had a couple big biffs that put a dent in his overall grade: a drop on a deep ball and a missed block. He began to show his promise as a receiver. Eddie Royal had a solid outing. Cameron Merdeith caught a -2 on the fumble, but was otherwise fine.

TE: 96 (Season: 86, Change: +9)

Zach Miller had an excellent game, both as a receiver and a blocker. Hoyer got him more involved in the passing game than he had been. We didn’t see Logan Paulsen as much; when we did, he wasn’t great. If Miller can continue playing like this, it will really help open up the offense, as the team won’t require a dedicated blocker on the field as much. Given that the team waived Paul Lasike after last week’s game (he was later re-signed to the practice squad), this seems to be the direction they want to go. As receivers go, Royal is a capable blocker out of the slot, so that should work fine. Greg Scruggs was waived earlier this week.

OL: 80 (Season: 77, Change: +1)

The interior linemen certainly looked better than they graded out. Long, Whitehair, and Sitton (in that order) had the Bears’ three highest grades on offense from PFF. Here, this was a case of pass pro not showing up well in grading. Long’s score was a result of a few big biffs rather than being shaky all game long. The tackles showed up for this one. Things look a little more encouraging for the group; they appear to be starting to gel as a unit.

DL: 75 (Season: 80, Change: -2)

Jonathan Bullard had an awfully rough day. He’s a rookie going up against an awfully good defensive line, I’m not going to worry too much until it becomes a recurring theme. Corneilus Washington played well when he saw the field. Akiem Hicks was fine. Will Sutton was just okay in Eddie Goldman’s stead.

OLB: 87 (Season: 88, Change: -1)

Wille Young had a good outing. Sam Acho performed well in a larger role following Houston’s injury. Leonard Floyd didn’t appear to make a huge impact, but that was more a result of being used in coverage a good bit.

ILB: 84 (Season: 88, Change: -3)

Jerrell Freeman was excellent. Nick Kwiatkowski looked pretty good when on the field for his NFL debut. As the game went on, we saw less of him and more of Jonathan Anderson and Christian Jones. I have no idea why. Anderson was waived and later re-signed to the practice squad. The Bears called John Timu up from the practice squad to replace him. I have no idea why Timu wasn’t on the 53-man roster over Anderson in the first place.

CB: 74 (Season: 79, Change: -5)

Tracy Porter was okay. Jacoby Glenn had a couple bright moments and then a few not-so-bright ones. I have no idea why Deiondre Hall didn’t play. I haven’t seen anything to suggest he was injured. Cre’Von LeBlanc had a decent outing as a nickel back.

S: 82 (Season: 79, Change: +1)

Amos had a nice game. Jones-Quartey played well before leaving with an injury. Getting hurdled by Elliott aside, Prosinski played well replacing Jones-Quartey.

So obviously, that game didn’t go well. The defense didn’t have such a great showing, but given that they were missing quite a few guys, I wouldn’t worry too much about the unit long-term. Kyle Fuller was placed on IR and will be out at least 8 more weeks. Pernell McPhee will be out at least 3 more on the PUP list. The loss of Houston hurt. The two losses that really hurt against this team in particular were Eddie Goldman and Danny Trevathan. Sutton had some nice plays and, as a whole, held his own, but this is an awfully good Dallas offensive line and going in, we knew Dallas was going to try to run the ball, so Goldman’s presence in the middle was definitely missed. Trevathan would have been a big step up over what we saw from Anderson and Jones and would have slowed the Dallas rushing attack.

To end on a little bit of a brighter note, things weren’t all bad. The Bears fought in the second half, and if they don’t fall victim to a hideous offsides call on the onside kick (it wasn’t offsides), who knows how the game turns out; they were heating up at the time. Even with the bad call, the second half effort was definitely encouraging. A couple years ago under Trestman, presented with a 21-point deficit at the half, the team would’ve just quit. At the very least, this shows that the Bears aren’t a dumpster fire – they’re just a bad football team. Bad football teams can become good football teams in time if they have good coaching and smart people in the front office, and the Bears have that. The jury’s still out on Dowell Loggains; I’m not impressed thus far, but if a change needs to be made, you can trust the front office to make a good hire. The draft picks and free agent signings from Ryan Pace have mostly looked good thus far. The jury’s still out on Hroniss Grasu, and Jonathan Bullard was very shaky against Dallas, but there’s no reason to think that he can’t develop into a very nice player. Bobby Massie hasn’t been very good, but he’s at least a little better than Ted Larsen would have been and the signing of Massie allowed Long to move back to RG, so at least there’s that.

Looking at the schedule, there are plenty of winnable games remaining, though it’s hard to see this team going anywhere this year. I’m seeing enough good by enough people, though, to suggest that though the rebuild may be a little slower than we had hoped, it’s at least on the right track.

Yet To Be Named Gimmicky Award Meant To Show Who The Best Overall Performers Were

If you have an idea of what I should call this, let me know. Twitter handle and e-mail address are at the end of the blog.

Anyway, up to 3 may be awarded per player. Not necessarily the highest-graded players since different grades mean different things to different players (refer to the primer).

Offense

3: Zach Miller, Jordan Howard

2: Alshon Jeffery, Kevin White, Eddie Royal

1: Josh Sitton, Bobby Massie, Charles Leno, Jr.

Defense

3: Jerrell Freeman

2: Adrian Amos, Willie Young, Sam Acho

1: Cornelius Washington

Yet To Be Named Gimmicky Award Meant To Show Who The Best Overall Performers Were Count

awards-3

Bear Down!

Twitter: @KSchroeder_312

E-mail: schroeder.giig@gmail.com

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