Never Forget Matt Nagy Had A Chance To Prevent This Offensive Disaster

Chicago Bears fans are a disillusioned bunch these days. A lot of promises were made to them back in 2018. Promises that were broken. When the team hired Matt Nagy as their head coach, it was for two key reasons. His standout qualities as a leader and his offensive prowess from coaching under the great Andy Reid in Kansas City. This was it. This was the guy Marc Trestman was supposed to be. That offensive guru who would carry the Bears at last in the 21st century of NFL football. Fast forward two and a half seasons? It's hard not to feel betrayed. Fresh off a year in 2019 where the offense ranked 29th in both scoring and total yards, Chicago ranks 28th and 29th in scoring and total yards eight games into 2020. For the longest time, it felt like Nagy was hiding behind the ongoing frustrations at quarterback. Yet even after a switch from Mitch Trubisky to Nick Foles, nothing changed. The only common denominator left is Nagy himself. This mess falls on his head. What makes it so frustrating isn't just that it's happening too. It's that Nagy had a prime opportunity to avoid it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9rLtIXt68g&ab_channel=ChicagoBears

Matt Nagy is in a nightmare of his own creation

Fired Harry Hiestand

It was clear Nagy wanted to send a message back in January when he basically purged his entire offensive coaching staff. Everybody except quarterbacks coach Dave Ragone and wide receivers coach Mike Furrey were dismissed. This included offensive line coach Harry Hiestand. A controversial move considering how respected the veteran assistant was in league circles. Not to mention the good work he'd done in 2018. Nagy replaced him with friend and former colleague Juan Castillo. The two had worked together for a number of years in Philadelphia. The head coach insisted that the man would coach and teach players "the right way." As if insinuating that he wasn't overly impressed with how Hiestand went about his job in their two years together. Well, how is that decision working out? In 2019, the Bears offense ranked 27th in rushing and allowed a total of 45 sacks. So far this season they rank 30th in rushing and are on pace to allow 40 sacks. They've allowed nine in just the past two games so that rate could go up. After all that talk about how much better things would be with Castillo, nothing has changed.

Pushed for tight ends instead of offensive linemen

This is something that tends to get overlooked a little bit. It became clear from the outset of the offseason where the Bears were placing their priorities on offense. Not the area of the team that gave up a ton of sacks and produced no ground game. No Castillo would fix that. Instead, Nagy put his foot down and made it clear to Ryan Pace that he needed tight ends. Everything would be better if he just had some tight ends.

So the Bears GM obliged. He started off by signing a former Nagy connection in Demetrius Harris. The two had worked together in Kansas City. Then he threw $16 million at veteran Jimmy Graham, somebody with the skillset to fit what the coach wanted at the "U" position. Last but not least? He spent the team's first pick of the 2020 draft on Notre Dame standout Cole Kmet. Did it make a difference? Not really. Through eight games the three players have combined for less than 400 yards with five touchdowns. An improvement over last year but hardly difference-making to the bottom line.

Keeping the call sheet

This last part is the one that people harp on the most. There were already questions about Nagy's ability to coordinate an offense at the end of 2019. While he was quite good at designing plays, especially in the passing game, his ability to get his guys into a rhythm while avoiding mistakes was never there for longer than one week here and there.

Perhaps the smart thing for him to do would hand the call sheet to a new offensive coordinator and focus more on strictly being the head coach. Others have done that and had lots of success. His mentor Reid is a huge example. There were definite options on the market that could come in and fill that role. Pat Shurmur, Joe Brady, and Jay Gruden being three such examples. Matt Nagy chose to pass. He would keep the call sheet and hired Bill Lazor to take over for Mark Helfrich. Basically another guy to bounce ideas off of and not much else. That decision more than any other seems to have created the mess we now see each Sunday.