The Chicago Bears defense has high expectations in 2018. That shouldn’t be a surprise. The unit is coming off their best season in six years. They finished 10th overall in the NFL and were playing some of their best football against some really good opponents. Since then they’ve added another young playmaker to the mix in first round pick Roquan Smith. All things considered, they should be even better this year right?
That’s the thing. Becoming a top 10 defense is easy. A lot of teams have had good years like that. Sustaining it though. That’s the real challenge. It’s not easy. Far from it. One of the critical aspects of accomplishing this is being able to put a sustained, consistent rush on the opposing quarterback. Any passer, even average ones can have good days against you if he’s allowed to survey the field without concern.
Looking where things sit now? It’s hard not to feel a sense of angst. The Bears pass rush is in a state of unknown. They have Akiem Hicks and they have Leonard Floyd. That’s about it. They are the only two proven players on defense who can consistently get to the quarterback. Outside of that, it’s nothing but question marks, and that’s not a good thing.
The Bears defense hasn’t looked this thin at pass rush in 20 years
This begs the question. Has the rush ever looked this dicey on paper before? One would have to go all the way back to 1998 to view a depth chart that looks similar in terms of its uncertainties. It was the last year of the Dave Wannstedt era. If people ever wanted an idea of how limited his eye for talent was, they merely need to look at the Bears edge rush that year.
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- John Thierry
- Shawn Lee
- Bryan Robinson
- Mark Thomas
- Carl Reeves
Hats off to fans who intimately know any of those names. Thierry was a former first round pick of the Bears in 1994 but had already shown he was a bust as a player. Lee was a former sixth round pick of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Robinson came in as an undrafted rookie. Thomas had been drafted by San Francisco in the fourth round in 1993 but spent a journeyman career in the league. Reeves was a former sixth rounder by the Bears who had 1.5 sacks in three seasons for them.
Seeing a lineup like that, it’s not hard to understand the results that followed. The Bears defense had just 28 sacks total in 1998. Not of the defensive ends had more than 3.5. The man who saved it from looking even worse was defensive tackle Jim Flanigan who had 8.5. Thankfully the Bears are a little better off this time around with Floyd and Hicks, but that’s no reason to relax.
Sam Acho? Always been a backup. Aaron Lynch? Hamstring issues. Kasim Edebali? A journeyman. Isaiah Irving? A former undrafted free agent. Kylie Fitts? A sixth round pick with health concerns. Nothing about that group says don’t worry if the worst happens and Floyd goes down. He’s already suffered season-ending injuries two-straight years. This feels like a time bomb just ticking down to the explosion.
It created a disaster for the Bears back in 1998. They finished 4-12. Can Vic Fangio avoid a similar catastrophe? They better hope so.
