Bears Blitz

Published by Bear Heiser on November 28, 2014
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Chicago Bears

It’s probably time for the Chicago Bears to blow it all up and start over, as this loosely is Part 2 of the “Marc Trestman-Jay Cutler Partnership is Failing the Chicago Bears” series. Here’s Part 1. 

Sunday’s 34-17 loss to the Detroit Lions provided the final reasons necessary to get rid of head coach Marc Trestman, who is only two years into a four-year contract, just 28 games into a tenure that has seen 13 wins.

Removing Trestman also will require moving on from quarterback Jay Cutler, who signed a seven-year, $126 million extension before the 2014 season. If Trestman, the so-called quarterback whisperer, can’t fix Cutler, then honestly, who can?

Even though making the moves likely will be a headache for general manager Phil Emery, sweeping change must be made, despite the money. For now, though, never mind the money. We’ll talk dollars and cents at the end.

The 2014 season was supposed to be full of Cutler smiles, offensive touchdowns and playoff wins. Instead, there have been few smiles, more touchdowns against than for and now a snowball’s chance in hell of making it to the postseason.

Through 12 games, Chicago’s offense ranks right around 20th in the NFL in points scored, and Cutler leads the NFL in combined turnovers (20). As a team, the Bears have turned over the ball 23 times, which have led to 85 points for the opposition, via ESPN Chicago’s Michael C. Wright (Note: Cutler threw one INT after this tweet was issued).

Football teams are going to turn over the ball from time to time. It happens. With that said, though, the quarterback cannot be responsible for 20 turnovers through 12 games. That’s 20 fewer possessions, 1.667 per game, throughout the course of the season.

Which brings us to Thursday, when the Trestman-called offense only managed to score three points after the first quarter, only ran the ball eight times for 14 yards and, at one point, threw the ball on 12 consecutive plays. The best player on the Bears offense only ran the ball five times. Five times!

“It’s just frustrating because as a team, the talent we have, we definitely are underachieving,” running back Matt Forte said. “Some guys have to do some soul-searching for the rest of the season and plan how they want to play the rest of these games.”

The truly offensive effort is a microcosm of the 2014 Bears season.

After the game, Trestman, in words only, held himself accountable for the 34-17 loss.

“We didn’t do enough,” Trestman said in a postgame stream on the Bears’ website. “It starts with me.”

And at that point, Emery jumped out from behind a plant in the press room and said, “You’re right, Marc! It does start with you! Your services no longer are needed.” OK, Emery didn’t actually do that, but could imagine how the world would operate if people really were held accountable for their actions after taking accountability?

Trestman has been singing the same old “Blame it on me” song and dance for as long as he’s been in Chicago. At what point do Trestman’s words no longer mean anything, because it seems like that’s where we’re at? It’s like saying “I’m sorry” 1,000 times because, if you really were sorry, you’d just stop doing it.

After being blown out in consecutive weeks at the hands of the New England Patriots and Green Bay Packers, games in which the Bears were outscored 106-37, Trestman gave us a solution-less performance at his Monday morning press conference. David Haugh of the Chicago Tribune even noted how much Trestman struggled to offer anything concrete while on the podium:

But what Trestman does is rehash the same game plan over and over again. The game plan involves quick-developing short passing routes, and enough of them to replace the majority of the run game, too.

Earlier in the season, Cutler, via Brad Biggs of the Chicago Tribune, talked about how difficult it is to move the ball in small chunks, like Trestman tries to accomplish.

“ … It’s just hard to go 80 or 90 going dink, dink, dink, dink, dink because sooner or later you’re going to miss one and you’re going to be third-and-8. Just to keep the flow of our offense, we kind of have to (go downfield).”

If you didn’t know Cutler said this early in the season, you might have thought Cutler said it after Thursday’s loss. Same story, different day.

Marshall touched on it after the Bears’ disappointing Week 6 loss to the Miami Dolphins: “We make the same mistakes. Same mistakes. Same mistakes. … ”

Trestman consistently fails to adjust once the opposing defense adjusts to his game plan. Set aside the five wins, the same failures have contributed to the seven losses.

Last season, Trestman’s offense looked pretty different, but with the same faces. Balance existed (58.9 percent pass vs. 41.1 percent rush according to Pro Football Focus), turnovers weren’t being made to the same extent and the ball was being moved downfield. And what did all of those things lead to? Touchdowns. The Bears ranked 2nd in the NFL last season in points scored (27.8).

Oh how different it’s been the second time around. Trestman’s offense has virtually zero balance, passing the ball 65 percent of the time to only 35 percent run plans. The turnover rate is high. And the offense isn’t moving downfield with the same aggression that it once was.

Same faces, different results.

Given how much Trestman regressed as a head coach in his second season in Chicago, there’s little reason to think anything will change next season if he’s brought back. It’s not like there’s a ton of youth on this team that he’s developing relationships with. Trestman was brought in to run an offense that scores points. That no longer is happening.

Sure, it might cost a couple of million to buy out Trestman of the final two years on his contract, but who cares? That figure likely is in the range of $4-6 million total, unless there’s some weird buyout provision.

And don’t forget, as Trestman goes, so goes Cutler. If Trestman can’t fix Cutler, no one can. The Bears’ quarterback is on his fourth head coach and his 94,567th offensive coordinator. Cutler still has eleventy billion years on his contract, so buying him out of his remaining years will be a lot more costly, to the tune of 19,500,000 in dead money if he’s released after the season.

A more realistic approach to moving on from Cutler is to release him after the 2015 season, when he won’t count nearly as much against the salary cap, somewhere around $3 million in dead money if he’s released. Money makes the world go round, but spending too much in the wrong places can wreck an NFL franchise.

The decision-makers at Halas Hall must now decide if they want to continue being in a bad relationship or if now is the time to cut bait and run. Knowing the McCaskeys, though, Trestman, Cutler and the whole kit and caboodle will be back in 2015.

All quotes were pulled from press conference transcripts obtained from the team via email. 

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