In case anybody wasn't aware of it by this point, Chicago Bears head coach Matt Nagy hates the preseason. He holds the genuine belief that it doesn't really serve many purposes towards the betterment of his team. Sure it offers simulated game action against a different opponent. However, the random nature of the contests along with the refusal of either team to throw any sort of creative plays into the mix for fear of giving away secrets make them utterly pointless.
That's why he and his coaching staff set about finding a way to make it irrelevant. The most recent practice on August 14th was the product of that brainstorming. Under the lights late in the evening, the Bears ran a full simulated game. Not just in terms of 11-on-11 plays either. Everything was included from music to the now infamous Bear Raid siren. Nagy explained the benefits of this process after practice. Specifically in regards to he and the staff's ability to control the action by simulating different situations.
“They got 60 plays, and on top of that, we got every special-teams situation. You can’t mock that in a preseason game. Nothing to take away from that, but we took a lot of time and hours to script. Every play was scripted. It wasn’t like we just called them off the head. We scripted every scenario. I think that’s what was so cool about it.
The other part of this, too, is it’s not just red zone, goal line, short yardage, etc., but we were scripting sudden change in there. Sometimes that’s what gets neglected in really anything that you do. You can’t predict when a sudden change occurs in a preseason game.
For whatever it’s worth, we were able to get that. The guys have a 10-play drive on defense. They sit down and then we scripted a fumble, interception, etc., whatever. And now, all of a sudden they got to run back out and do another eight-play drive. You’re not guaranteed that in a preseason game, so we were able to do that.”
Matt Nagy believes this method is far superior to preseason
There is no denying the value of this process. It helps to prepare the team for every eventuality and gets the starters more reps than they probably would've gotten in an actual preseason game. Ones, where there is guarantee the desired moments they wish to practice, would even occur. By the sound of things, every phase had their nice moments. Mitch Trubisky had a couple of pretty throws during the action. The defense forced six interceptions and the kickers nailed all seven of their attempts.
Unfortunately, the heated competition led to tempers flaring. Kyle Long got into a vicious fight with rookie Jalen Dalton. One that saw the veteran guard tear off Dalton's helmet, swing it at him, and then chuck it down the field. Long was reprimanded for the incident and not allowed to finish practice. Cody Whitehair also left with an injury to a finger on his left hand. Nagy said he should be fine though.
One thing is clear. The head coach believes that practice was far more valuable to the preparation for his team than any of the remaining preseason games will be. Expectations are that most of the Bears starters won't see the field over the next three week. If at all. Matt Nagy wants everybody as healthy as possible for Green Bay.
