The Chicago Bears offensive line was in a bad way by the time the bye week arrived. Two key starters were on IR and another was coming off a bout with COVID-19. On top of that, two of their key backups were nursing injuries as well. So it wasn’t a huge surprise the unit struggled so mightily against a frankly below-average Minnesota Vikings defense two weeks ago.
It appears the team spent those next 12 days in deep thought. Matt Nagy and his offensive staff seem to have made some noteworthy alterations to the starting lineup according to Brad Biggs of the Chicago Tribune. They include moving Cody Whitehair out of center to left guard, inserting Sam Mustipher into that spot. Alex Bars, who played decent at both center and left guard the past few weeks, will man right guard.
Last but not least? Germain Ifedi will replace Rashaad Coward at right tackle.
“Sam Mustipher was snapping the ball during warm-ups with Cody Whitehair lined up next to him with his left hand on the ground. It’s a signal Mustipher will start at center and Whitehair will shift to left guard, a position he has played quite a bit in his career.
Based on how players were working, it appears Alex Bars will move to right guard — the third position at which he would start in three consecutive games — and Germain Ifedi will move from right guard to right tackle.”
A lot of people will be thrilled that Coward is going to the bench. The Bears have really tried to make him work at multiple spots since last season. He initially transitioned from the defensive line last year and ended up playing extensively at right guard. This year he alternated between left guard and right tackle as injuries mounted. It didn’t seem to matter. He struggled wherever he lined up.
By the look of things, the deep self-scouting the Bears did in the bye week reached the same conclusion. Moving Ifedi to right tackle makes sense since he played that position from 2017 to 2019 for the Seahawks. He’s quite familiar with it. The most interesting move though is swapping Whitehair and Mustipher.
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Chicago Bears have abandoned the Whitehair experiment
People tend to forget that Whitehair was never supposed to be a center. Back in 2016, he was a left tackle drafted out of Kansas State. The plan had always been to shift him to left guard. Everything was lining up that way until right before the season. That was when starting center Hroniss Grasu tore his ACL. This forced the Bears into a difficult decision, moving Whitehair to the middle.
He played surprisingly well that year and so the team never bothered to make a change. Then in 2018, they drafted James Daniels in the 2nd round. He was considered a more natural center and somebody who could replace Whitehair in the future. Sure enough, they tried just that at the start of 2019. Unfortunately, Daniels struggled. So halfway through the year Whitehair went back.
It wasn’t until Mustipher stepped in last month that things changed.
Despite being a former undrafted free agent, the young man had loads of center experience at Notre Dame. He handled the position like a natural. This led many people to wonder if the best thing for the Chicago Bears was to keep him there moving forward and shift Whitehair to guard. A spot where he wouldn’t have to think as much.
Sure enough, it seems the coaches have reached that exact conclusion. The idea behind all of this is trying to get the best possible starting five they can on the field. This new variation has done that. It’s not a great lineup by any stretch but it might have an actual chance to at least be functional. That would be a major step up from where they’ve been lately.
