Matt Nagy is in a difficult position right now. His team is 3-4 and losers of three-straight games. The two most recent being at home in gutwrenching fashion. What makes it all the worse is that his offense is the reason why this is happening. Through seven games, the Bears have the 28th ranked offense in the NFL. Keep in mind that Nagy was supposed to be an offensive guru coming over from Kansas City. By rights, the unit shouldn't be performing this bad.
Yet it is.
Not only that, but all his key decisions in games aren't working. Players are suffering from way too many mental mistakes and nothing Nagy does seems able to correct them. He looks like a man that is out of answers. Never a good sign for a head coach. He can't blame these issues on a lack of talent. Chicago has more than enough to be a good football team. Last year proved it.
In truth, this season is starting to feel eerily familiar to one Bears fans have tried so hard to forget. One that started with such high hopes only to spiral down into disaster. All thanks to an offensive head coach who seemed unable to put out the fires. His name was Marc Trestman, and the similarities between him and Nagy are growing.
Matt Nagy is drifting way too close to Trestman territory
Too in love with razzle dazzle
A lot of offensive coaches at the college level or in the CFL are free to experiment because defenses aren't all that great. So they can draw up complex plays meant to confuse and misdirect defenses. The problem is in the NFL? Defenses are way more talented and way better coached. They soon realize when a play caller is trying to be the smartest guy in the room rather than just running an efficient, well-executed drive.
This is what happened with Trestman from 2013 to 2014. Opponents soon realized he loved using neat little play designs like jet sweeps and wide receiver screens. So many screens. So they started to play more aggressively and take away any horizontal offense, daring the Bears to attack them directly. Sound familiar?
The same thing has happened with Nagy's offense this season. All his fun, little gadget plays aren't working anymore because the execution needs to be perfect and he's calling them at points in the game when the offense has no rhythm. Just like Trestman did.
Sagging commitment to the running game
Trestman and Nagy were both hired with the same objective in mind. That was to fix the quarterback position. The same position that has held the Bears franchise down for 70 years while they've had to watch others like Green Bay, Pittsburgh and Dallas own the league due to their excellent QB streaks. The problem is neither of them approached this issue with an understanding that Chicago has always been a franchise built around running the ball.
Their solutions whenever the QBs started to struggle? Throw it more.
In 2013, Trestman's offense ran the ball 404 times, good for 24th in the league. Not a great commitment but it was enough since the passing game had great early success. However, as stated above defenses began to recognize this and geared their schemes around making their pass defenses tougher to attack, daring the Bears to run. How did the coach respond? By running the ball 356 times in 2014.
- QB passer rating in 2013 = 96.9
- QB passer rating in 2014 = 87.3
Nagy embraced Bears football far more, at least at first. His offense ran it 468 times in 2018, good for 6th-best in the league. As a result, they went 12-4 and won the division. So one would imagine he'd stick with that philosophy right? Nope. Through seven games in 2019, the Bears have run the ball 163 times. This puts them on pace for 372 this season. Almost 100 carries fewer than the year before.
- QB passer rating in 2018 = 95.4
- QB passer rating in 2019 = 84.7
Questionable late-game management
Any Bears fan with a good memory who watched the loss to Los Angeles on Sunday will have seen a disturbing similarity between Nagy's game management in the final minutes and Trestman's six years ago. It came with 43 seconds left. The Chargers had just taken their final timeout so the Bears were in full control of the clock on 1st down. They still have a timeout of their own. From where they were it was a 40-yard field goal.
Logic dictates they try at least one more play to see if they can get closer right? Not Nagy. He instructed Mitch Trubisky to take a knee, handing Eddy Pineiro a 41-yard attempt with a not-insignificant wind. Of course, the kick missed wide left. After the game, Nagy stated he made the decision because he didn't want to risk a run being stuffed for a loss or the quarterback taking a sack. Truth be told it was more just a lack of trust in his offense.
Trestman can relate.
His career pretty much started its downhill slide with a similar decision. In a tight game with the Vikings in Minnesota, the Bears had the ball in overtime and were in field goal range. Keep in mind Matt Forte had advanced the ball 24 yards on five carries to start the drive. There was 4:12 left in the game and it was 2nd and 7. Logic dictated Trestman try to advance the ball further or even try to score a touchdown if possible.
Instead, he sent out Robbie Gould to try a 47-yard field goal.
The result was predictable. It missed and Minnesota promptly drove down the field and won the game on a 34-yard chip shot. If this striking similarity of in-game management doesn't scare Bears fans to death, they have significant emotional issues to work out.
Does this mean Nagy is destined to crash and burn so spectacularly as Trestman did? No. He's a far better leader of men and put together a much stronger defensive coaching staff. This will sustain him into a third season, providing enough time to learn from his mistakes.
