The Chicago Bears confirmed promising indicators of their preseason opener Saturday, defeating the Kansas City Chiefs 19-14 at Soldier Field as a handful of younger gamers stepped up and performed with the aggressive edge coach Matt Eberflus is in search of.
Another check awaits Thursday evening at Lumen Field with the Seattle Seahawks welcoming the Bears for a nationally televised recreation (7 p.m., ESPN). Here are 4 storylines value monitoring.
1. Justin Fields’ presence
Fields gained’t have lots of time to show a lot with Eberflus planning to play his first-unit offense for one or two collection. But it’s nonetheless value zeroing in on every of the performs the second-year quarterback is requested to run.
From huddle command to pre-snap imaginative and prescient to his skill to course of and make good choices, Fields’ preseason reps stay below a microscope. The Bears are pushing him to boost the bar because the season nears, demanding higher footwork and sharper timing and really feel within the pocket.
Thursday’s recreation is one other likelihood for Fields and the offense to get higher, and the coaches love how open Fields has been to being coached laborious.
“He loves it,” quarterbacks coach Andrew Janocko mentioned. “You talk about a guy that just loves football and wants to be great and wants to elevate everybody around him. It’s pretty impressive.”
2. Teven Jenkins’ progress
At the outset of coaching camp, Eberlus promised he would combine and match mixtures on the offensive line to determine essentially the most unified and dependable quintet. The newest mixture has Teven Jenkins, who was drafted within the second spherical in 2021 to be a beginning left deal with, auditioning at proper guard.
Jenkins performed 36 snaps at proper deal with in opposition to the Chiefs however was bumped inside this week for his newest problem. He is more likely to begin Thursday however will get much more enjoying time than the remainder of the projected Week 1 starters on the road.
“Like any position, if you’re not an experienced guy at your position, we’re going to try to get you a little bit more (playing time),” Eberflus mentioned Tuesday.
As the Bears attempt to discover a place the place Jenkins will help them, the teaching workers has praised his intelligence as an asset to this newest transfer. Offensive line coach Chris Morgan sees a mix of dimension, energy and pace in Jenkins that he’s intrigued to check inside.
“It’s a little bit of an adjustment,” Morgan mentioned. “But we wouldn’t ask him to do anything he couldn’t handle. He has some attributes that can really shine in there. So we’re excited about it, excited to see how it looks.”
3. The rookies
A pair of Day 2 draft picks — cornerback Kyler Gordon and receiver Velus Jones — are anticipated to make their preseason debuts after lacking Saturday’s recreation with accidents. It’s an thrilling homecoming for Gordon, who’s from Everett, Wash., and places him again within the metropolis the place he performed his faculty ball for Washington.
“It was meant to be,” he mentioned.
Jones, in the meantime, is predicted to play numerous roles for the Bears in the course of the season. So having an opportunity to check him in recreation situations on offense and particular groups will probably be useful.
As for the remainder of the rookie class, hold tabs on fifth-round decide Dominique Robinson and undrafted rookie Micah Dew-Treadway on the line of defense. It additionally will probably be attention-grabbing to see whether or not operating again Trestan Ebner can construct on his efficiency in opposition to the Chiefs; he had a 12-yard landing reception to go together with a 27-yard run and a 34-yard kickoff return.
On the long term, Ebner made a candy minimize within the backfield, juking cornerback Jaylen Watson as he burst into the open discipline. But it was his shoulder-down, teeth-gritting end to that run that impressed offensive coordinator Luke Getsy extra.
“It was an impressive cut,” Getsy mentioned. “But I just think when you have one of these young kids (running) on that sideline and there’s a guy there and you can run out of bounds … but the way he put his foot in the ground and got us 5 more yards, that’s the mentality we’re trying to build here. That’s one of those philosophical plays we’ll put up in the offensive unit room.”
4. The punters
Yes, sure. It’s an enormous ask to request you quit a part of your Thursday evening to observe punting in a mid-August preseason recreation. But, hey, something for a soccer repair, proper?
This is a second alternative for Bears followers to familiarize themselves with Trenton Gill, a seventh-round draft decide who launched seven punts within the preseason opener. Gill confirmed a superb mixture of leg energy and contact and compelled the Chiefs to start out possessions on the 12-, 5- and 3-yard traces. His progress is value monitoring. The Bears would possibly want to make use of him so much this season.
Seahawks punter Michael Dickson, in the meantime, is in his fifth season. The Aussie signed a four-year, $14.5 million extension final season and adopted with a powerful yr through which he averaged 46.9 yards per punt and had a league-high 40 punts pinned contained in the 20-yard line.
Dickson will current a problem to the Bears as they search a winner of their punt return job. Dazz Newsome, Dante Pettis and Chris Finke took cracks Saturday.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com