← Forward Progress - A Chicago Bears Podcast
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A
Ted 219219.
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Forward progress a Chicago Bears podcast with Dan Bernstein and Matt Abaticola on 312 Sports.
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We give you forward progress on 312 Sports. Bernstein Abatacola this is brought to you by Beer Church Brewing New Buffaloes Brewery Pizzeria in historic Chur Wood Fired Neapolitan Pizza Small batch craft beer brunch every day. Visit beerchurchbrewing.com the bye week has passed us. The Bears at 2 and 2 will be headed to a Monday night matchup with the Washington Commanders, who stand at 3 and 2 a game back of the Eagles in the NFC East. It's a big week for Ben Johnson, his first ever bye week as an NFL head coach, and he's had time to coach, time to keep making this team in his image and importantly, trying to figure out what he has in this roster over which he hasn't had a ton of responsibility yet. There are some moving parts and there are some things that are bad, there are some things that are good. On Thursdays, we like to bring in an outside perspective and that's what we do right now. On Forward Progress with Herb Howard, the Bears beat reporter for the Bigs. Herb, how you been?
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C
And I'm excellent, man. Thanks for having me on.
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B
How are you?
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A
We're, we're great. And I think that's really the question for you right now. I've always thought that you got a pretty good instinct sitting there, especially the way you've asked incisive questions and well timed questions at press conferences. I wonder how you're building that relationship now a little bit with another Bears head coach. Because sometimes, and I know from personal experience, some guys early on will be like, oh, okay, all right, here's what I'm going to have to deal with. Like, this guy's not going anywhere and this guy's not going to buy a lot of my bs. So what is, how, how, how's Ben doing?
- [02:13]
C
I think Ben's doing fine. I thought he was very refreshing when he first came in. He seemed to be very transparent, very open, very willing to tell you what he's thinking without obviously giving away any state secrets or competitive advantage or anything like that, but just being honest about his evaluations of his team as a whole, of individual players, even of himself. And so I thought that to be very, very refreshing, very different from what we've had around here with a lot of coach speak and things like that lately. With me personally, I don't, I don't know that it's Going so well. Then he's gotten. He's gotten a little short with me lately. I'm getting a lot of. Yeah, no, maybe going into. Going into week two, before the Detroit game, I asked him, was there any sense of urgency heading into this game, considering that one of those two teams were going to come out of that game not only 0 and 2, but 02 in the division. And he kind of snapped back at me and said, what, you're talking crazy right now. We're going to win the game. And that was. And walked out of the press conference. I was like, okay, I'm not mad at that. Like, go in there with confidence, but then show up, right? So then y' all go down there and y' all get smacked and let them hang half a hundred on you. And then. So I went on my show to her power show. I'm just. I'm talking making a little fun of it. Like, I'm crazy, Coach. I thought I was crazy for saying that somebody was going to be over. I didn't even say you were going to lose the game. But since then, I don't know if he caught a piece of that or whatever. And he just felt the way about the question. But since then, coach ain't. Coach does seem like a herb power type of guy. So we'll work through it. It's all good.
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A
Give it time. Give it time.
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C
It's all good. He'll be here a while. I hope I stay around like, you're not. You're.
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A
You're not going anywhere. And what I've learned about coaches is grudgingly there. There's respect there. If the fear is there now, that means there's a little bit of respect there.
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C
No, it's all good. I think he's doing. I think he's doing a good job. I've got a ton of respect for. For what he's doing in the process of how he's going about trying to change the culture here and get this thing on a. On a winning track. So I like what he's done so far. Still got a. Interesting schedule ahead of them, and we'll see how it plays out. But I've been. I've been pretty impressed by a lot of the things he's done to this point.
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B
How do you think his communication level has. Has developed or evolved or changed or has it been the same now? I've seen that he has communicated through the media to his team at times, but when you look at where he first came in and where he's at now, after two and two and being a head coach for four games in the NFL, how has that communication changed, in your opinion?
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C
I think it's just this ever developing thing that he's kind of going through. He's going through a lot of these things. For the first time, he's got the big chair, the big hat, if you will. He's making all these different decisions and having all these different press conferences that he's never really had to deal with before. He had to come up with an offensive game plan and call plays on Sunday, and now there's that and then there's all this other stuff around him. And I think he's going through those things for the first time, which he acknowledged would be a learning experience for him. And I think that's just kind of hasteous finding his way. How do I want to deal with the media? With the media? How do I want to approach certain questions? How do I want to set my schedule up to where I speak before practice and not necessarily right after practice, where all these questions can be fresh and they can come at me now could a little bit put a little bit of a buffer in between, you know, present real time information and when the next time I have to talk to the media. So I think he's just trying to figure out how he wants to go about it, but I think he's done a, a pretty good job of, has changed a little bit. I don't think he's as forthcoming as he was before, but I think he's still doing a pretty, pretty good job of it.
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A
I think there's also been an understanding on his part of the size of the job into which he's walked. It's one thing to say, all right, I'm excited about this. I want this job. Here's Caleb Williams. And then with every passing day, between that first day and the time he's actually seen the team and presided over practices, I think he's evinced an understanding of, I've got a lot more work to do than maybe I thought I did. Do you get the same sense?
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C
I think that every athlete and coach that comes to Chicago figures that out quickly. And I think there's an outside perception of, oh, I know it's Chicago's third largest market, it'll be a big thing. But then you walk into your introductory press conference and there's 100 people and 50 cameras there. It's like, whoa, that wasn't the case in Arizona or, you know, San Diego, wherever. You know what I mean? It's just not the same thing. And so I think that part of it is a bit of an adjustment for people when they come here. No matter how much they thought they were prepared for it, it's just a different thing. The, The. The following. The attention that the Bears get around here is just completely different. Everything is magnified. Everything matters. Everything is hyper. Discussed and analyzed. And so you just kind of get. Got to get used to that. And I imagine it could be a little shocking for. For head coaches, for players when they get here. So I think he's. He's starting to understand, like, well, there's a lot more to this. And I think just the head coach position in general, right? They. They've ascended to this point because they're great football minds. And I want to coach football. I'm a football guy. Football guy, football guy. And then you get to the head coaching spot, you realize, well, heck, half of my job has very little to do with football. And I think that part of it is an adjustment, too.
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B
You know, one of the things you mentioned about being the head coach is the play calling, and it's something that we've been tracking over the first four weeks. He's made mention to it that he needs to do a better job in getting the calls in. He said a couple days ago that Caleb is getting better at getting the calls out from the huddle. So what's going on with the difficulties they're having there? Is it really on Ben, or is it just the coach covering for the quarterback? What have you learned? What have you heard?
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C
Yeah, I think. I think it's probably the latter. I think he's covering for the quarterback more so than he is getting the plays in slowly. I think that may happen, you know, once or twice here or there, but I think for the most part, you know, going back to training camp, you see him. I mean, the moment the previous play is over, he's on the sheet and he's back in the headset, and he's getting whatever information he needs to get to Caleb. I think there's just a process of, one, Caleb digesting the totality of the playbook, and then two, communicating that to his teammates in the huddle. Does everybody get it on the first call? Do I have to repeat it in the huddle? Do I have to kind of go through this thing in my mind time and time again during training camp? You would see that play clock get down 12, 11, 10, and we're still in the huddle. And it's like, well, we're not going to get this playoff because he likes to have also a lot of window dressing before the snap. He uses motion on almost every snap because he's trying to get some indicators from the defense, which is great. But if you break the huddle at 10 and then you're trying to motion somebody all the way across the formation and maybe send them back and you're trying to check this and check that and you're communicating with your offensive line, you're going to run out of time. You continue to see that throughout the, the, the entirety of training camp and in the preseason. You still see some of those pre snap issues, but I think it's mostly what's happening once he sends the play and I don't think he's being slow about sending the plays and he's been a great play caller for, you know, quite some time in this league and I know he's at responsibilities now and certainly that could be slowing, slowing down his own process. But I think for the most part coach is getting the plays and it's just about how Caleb can, you know, communicate it to the players, how everybody can digest and get up to the line. Things getting better, but it's still not where it needs to be.
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A
It's been interesting for me to see the passing game improve, you know, yards per pass, the effectiveness of Caleb Williams from the pocket, which is what they've wanted to see without a running game. You know, it's one thing if you said, look, they're going to have a foundation of at least a competent, reliable run game, if unspectacular. And that's. I didn't think it was going to be spectacular as constructed, but it's, it has, it hasn't even been reliable and yet the passing game's been okay. It seems like they should get credit for a bigger achievement perhaps because so much of what he wants to do involves in putting defenders in conflict due to what they're already reading in a run game.
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C
Yeah, I think what he's done really well is make a lot of similar things look different. And I mean you don't necessarily have a great beat on what they're about to do offensively. You've covered the Bears as long as anybody. You, how many times they come out of the huddle, you're like, well here's, here's the screen pass over here. They're going to try to do this over there and it's like you kind of understand what they're going to do before they even do it. And that hasn't been the case much with Coach Johnson. They break the huddle, and I'm reading across the formations. I'm seeing where guys are lined up, and I'm trying to figure out what might be coming. And I think he's done a pretty good job of mixing that up as a way to keep defenses off balance. Even though the. The traditional way of establishing the run game and then, you know, using the play action or changing their eye points and things like that. Like, I think even though that's not been established yet, because of the way he's been able to mix up some of his play calls, because of the way he's been able to move some of his personnel around to see D.J. in the backfield. I think that.
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A
I was just going to say that there also used to be giveaways with personnel groupings that you used to be able to see if they came out in 12 personnel or they came out in 11. You knew that the card had already shrunk. And that's not the case now that. That you're not necessarily getting clues when they're, you know, seeing who's on the field and everybody's pointing at everybody because the defense already knows with this grouping, now we only have to worry about these five plays.
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C
I think that that's a credit to. To Ryan Poles and his staff as well. In terms of the personnel they brought in. They've got guys that can do a multitude of things. And so when they do go 12, whereas before you understood this means that. Well, now I don't know what it means, because coast and leveling can do this and that and Colco this and that. And DJ Might line up here or he might line up there, or he might line up in the backfield. Right? And so I think having these different players that can do different things, you even add in a guy like Luther Burton who hasn't been completely unlocked yet, but he has the ability to do so many different things for you. You can send him on jet sweeps, you can, you know, put him in a slot. So all these different things that he's able. That these players are able to do, again, it allows Coach Johnson to design things that look different but are the same. And so usually you say, well, that looks different. So it's going to be this. Well, it could look different, and it'll still be the same thing that it. That it may have looked like out of, you know, 11 personnel, now they can do those same things out of 12, and so I think that helps. He's usually he he's utilizing it very well.
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B
Looking at Dennis Allen's defense, and one thing that's, that's interesting to me on paper and looking at the stats, they're defending the pass really well. I mean, they're. They're one of the, one, One of the top teams in defending the pass. They have lots of interceptions. They have no pass rush. You've had Kyler Gordon out, you've had Jalen Johnson out. They've gone against a rookie quarterback, then they've gone against Jared Goff, who might lead his team to a Super Bowl. Dak Prescott, Geno Smith. How have they done it against the pass while failing to do it against a run, while not getting any pressure on the quarterback?
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C
It's. It's a conduct. I don't know. I can't figure it out. I don't know because you look at the last two weeks and they've got eight turnovers, right? And these are. They got legit takeaways. These aren't giveaways. This isn't the, you know, will Levis pitch the ball to Tyreek to give. To give week one away last year? These are legitimate takeaways. They're reading the, the offense, they're anticipating route combinations and they're breaking on throws and they're taking it away. You see the fumble in the backfield, great penetration from Big Bill. Then Noah Sewell comes through with the big hit. They get the football. Tyreek does the same thing a couple weeks ago against Dallas on the sideline, but it's like they're taking the ball away. Now, I don't know how sustainable that is, right? You get four takeaways against a bad Raiders team and you win by one point and like, you think you should win that game by more. We took the ball away four times, so I don't know how sustainable that is because they are. They're very opportunistic, and when they get the opportunities, they're taking advantage of them. And I don't know how long that lasts. You look at what Detroit was able to do in terms of taking advantage of the man coverage. They play so much man, and Detroit was like, okay, thank you. We're going to run these crossing routes and just drag across the field all day long, and it's going to work. I do give Coach Allen a lot of credit for being willing to adjust and say, well, we have to play a little bit more zone. He wants to play, man. He wants to play press, man, and he wants to give you these different exotic looks. But if you got to sit back and play a little bit more zone, then that's just what you kind of got to do. And I think he's been willing to have some flexibility into how he goes about deploying his defenders. I think that's allowed them to stay afloat these past couple weeks.
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B
Yeah, and that's what's interesting, too, is that, that they are opportunistic, but they're not getting lucky. And like, like looking at a team that's lucky, that's not sustainable because they're not doing anything for that to happen. But they are being opportunistic. Yet I still can't explain how it's happening or why it's happening, particularly with the injuries and the lack of pass rush.
- [15:09]
C
It's the lack of pass rush for me. Then, like, you think, you know, you hear, you know, rushing coverage. Are married together. They belong together. One helps the other. Well, they don't have any pass rush. They're not. They're not disrupting any quarterback. They're not moving them off the spot. They're not doing anything with the pass rush, but they're still holding up on the back end, and it's like, I don't really know how that's happening. They play pretty good in the red zone. I think Tremaine Evans deserves a lot of credit for that because he's just a big, huge obstacle that you got to navigate down in those tight areas where with his. With his height, his length and his athleticism. So I think he helps down there. Kevin Byard is playing really, really good football right now as a free safety. Somebody's getting up in age and sure, maybe he is, but he's playing at an extremely, extremely high level. And I think getting Kyler Gordon back is going to only help them in terms of the different things they're going to. They're going to want to do and disguise different things. I think Nick McLeod and Josh Blackwell played well there, but you extended Kyler Gordon for a reason. He's a difference maker. Getting him back should only help with their pass coverage.
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A
And I'm interested in how Dennis Allen coaches these defensive linemen and what he asks them to do, because we've seen everything on the spectrum from a 3, 4, 1, gapping defense when all you're doing is sort of controlling the man in front of you and allowing the four behind you to flow to the play. We have seen the Matt Eberflose and Lovey Smith defense when you are in a one gap and you stop the run on the Way to the quarterback and one is longer than two, and all of these guys, quick, quick, quick. Slither up the field. Where it's a bit of a hybrid. I think under Allen, where it's. There is a physical engagement immediately off the snap where he expects you to beat your guy. He likes big, strong, fast guys, long arms. Where it's a bit of a hybrid. And I don't know that they've quite gotten it yet and. Or the personnel is correct. I'm not sure if, if. If big Bill Andrew Billings fits exactly what they want. Austin Booker is going to be interesting as they've reopened the practice window there, because with his speed and some of his bend, I don't know that he wants that physical engagement that he wants to have to disengage from that block. Is this something that they're just. The light's gonna go on and Montez sweat and Dayo Dengbo all of a sudden be like, oh, okay, I know what we're trying to do here. We. Or are these guys not the right fit?
- [17:38]
C
I think probably is going to be a point where the light just comes on and it just switches and then, you know, sacks come in bunches. And I think once they figure that out, not only what coach DA is asking of them, but then how to play off of each other. What does this guy do well? What does this guy not do so well, and how does that help me do what I'm trying to do? And I think they'll get to that space where they'll kind of figure it out, and then you'll start to see them be a little bit more productive. And I'm specifically talking about guys like Javon, Dexter, Montez, sweat. Now we talk about diode Dango. Different conversation. I. I don't know what that is. I don't know what. What the Bears have there. I'm waiting to find out. He's a huge, massive guy who certainly fits the mold of the types of defensive linemen that coach Allen wants. But I don't know what that is there just yet. But that's a different conversation. I think that they've got to get to a space to where they can play off of each other, understand exactly what he's doing. He likes to create mismatches. He's looking for the matchup more so than this is the system. This is what we're going to try to do. So he's trying to put guys in positions to where I do expect you to beat that man in front of you because I put you in position to be able to do it versus here's your responsibility on every single play. I think you know, when you have your responsibility on every single play, it allows the guys to play faster, play a little bit more free, and they get used to what they're being asked to do versus your responsibility may change from down to down in this system. I understand why he's trying to do that, to create those mismatches, but I also understand that it may take some time for guys to be used to.
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A
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B
All right, so coming up Monday night, we have the Washington Commanders. It's the Bears second Monday night game in, in. In six weeks here of the NFL season. What, what's been the. The atmosphere, the tone around the team this week? I know it's a different coaching regiment, but a lot of the same players that were there last year that really opened the door to what crumbled the season away. What's been the mood at House Hall?
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C
That was one thing I tried to ask coach Johnson the other day, and he was very dismissive of the idea. Nothing to do with it. You got to ask those guys, the whole new team, I said, okay, coach, cool. But as far as the players, a lot of those defensive players absolutely still feel the sting of how that Game ended last year. And so there's been a lot of energy and, and attention around Tyreek Stevenson. And sometimes he's avoiding, and sometimes he was like, okay, let me go ahead and deal with this and get this out of the way.
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A
He's done great. I really. We were just talking about that. On Dan Bernstein, unfiltered. I think for the most part, his availability, his vulnerability, his candor, I give him a ton of credit. He's not running away from it. He's acknowledging it. He's. He's talking about how much it hurt. I think he's setting a terrific example.
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C
I agree with you. And I think he's going to go out there and play well. I think there's a matchup issue more so than any type of mental hurdle that he has to get through. I think Terry McLaurin is a matchup issue for Tyreek Stevenson. Tyreek is good with the bigger receivers. He can get his hands on him. He can hand fight with them all the way down the field or whatever, but it's those smaller, quick, twitch guys that give him issues. And so when you see him one on one with Terry McLaurin or Aman Ross, St. Brown, that's. That always, that always concerns me. I remember sitting in the booth in Washington last year at the game and they broke the huddle, and I immediately recognized that Tyreek was man to man with Terry McLaren. I think I was sitting next to Kevin Fishbane, if I'm not mistaken, and I said, this is terrible right here. He's one on one with Terry McLaren and sure enough, bomb straight down the left side line about 60, 65 yards. It's like, that's just, that's just. It's a matchup thing. So I, I think that Tyreek has been playing really, really well the past couple of weeks, creating turnovers and being good in coverage. I think he's in the right headspace. He's been very, very mature about how he's approached, you know, the attention that he was going to receive based off what happened last year. And I think, you know, I've been proud of the way he's. He's. He's handled it, and I think he'll continue to handle it well. I expect him to have a good game, but one on one with Terry McLaurin is just not ideal for his particular skill set.
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B
Yeah. When you look at that game for Monday night, though, what, what's important for the Bears to, To execute well, to come away with a win in a really tough environment.
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C
Yeah. I think they got to have ball control. They want to. They want to keep Jaden Daniels, that offense, that running game on the sideline. And so, you know, we talk about their inability to stop the run. Well, Washington's running the ball really, really well right now. And so the Bears are going to have to figure out, I don't know if that's put an extra man in the box or whatever they're going to have to do, but they're going to have to figure out a way to win the time of possession so that they are not constantly watching Jaden Daniels in that offense. And when they get those takeaways, because I do expect them to continue to play that way, like you said, these are not lucky instances. They are taking the ball away. And when they do that a couple of times, the offense has to take advantage of it. They get you extra possessions. You got to turn, you know, some of those into seven. These can't be punts and they can't just be field goals either. I know Cairo converted 4, 4 for you last week. But you want to turn some of those into touchdowns because all four of those takeaways against the Vegas Raiders, they were in plus territory, right? And you got to turn those into touchdowns. And so when they get those opportunities, they got to take advantage of those things. They got to be smart about how they choose to cover Terry McLaurin, have a game plan for Deebo. But I think this is an offense that has a lot of weapons on it. When you talk about the commanders, the Bears got to have a good game plan going into that, figure out how they're going to deal with the run. But then offensively, they have to be the tone setters. They have to be able to come out, establish their own set of a bit of a running game or whatever it's going to be that keeps them on the field. Whether you utilize the short passing game as a kind of pseudo running game, whatever, to keep these drives going, stay ahead of the chains. This continuing, developing relationship between Coach Johnson and Caleb Williams, this trust factor. I've been asking Caleb about this a couple of times over the course, kind of going back to the summer, and it's about developing the trust from Coach Johnson in certain game situations. You go back to the Raiders game, it's the second quarter, it's the, it's the drive that Max Crosby ends up getting a sack. He also blows up another play and then they end up getting the sack. That takes them out of field goal range in that. In that second quarter. And That's a, that's those trust things, right from Coach Johnson. Can I call these plays for you and you with full trust that you are not going to make a negative play that takes us out of scoring range. And so some of those plays, those types of sacks, Caleb can't give up. He understands that. And so, you know, situational football is going to be key. 2 minute, third down, end of half, that type of situation.
- [25:40]
A
I want to get into Caleb Williams, specifically with you in a moment, Herb. But let's talk about the offensive line moves that may be made that they're hinting at making. I know that Ben Johnson was kind of snarky about we know what we want to do, as if left tackle is going to really change how the opponent practices. But it looks like undrafted British Columbia native Theo Benedict is going to be a starting left tackle in the NFL. And if Darnell Wright's healthy, that's his job. If he's not, maybe we'll see Ozzy Tropillo work in short term, medium term, long term. Where are the Bears at the tackle position right now and where should they be, in your opinion?
- [26:21]
C
They are trying to figure it out and they're trying to put a happy face on a sad situation. And I think that what you're seeing is not this idea that Theo Benedet has just ascended to become this really great player. It's just like, well, let's try this or try that. And I'm not saying that he hasn't earned an opportunity, but this idea that they've just found something, I don't believe that to be the case. I think they have not been satisfied what they've seen from Braxton Jones. I think that when Theo Benedet had his opportunities during the summer, they weren't fully pleased with what they saw from him in the preseason. Same situation with Ozzy Trapillo and then Karana Magazi. I don't even hear him spoken. Like, I don't even hear it. Like, you know what I mean? Like, it's like I was looking at him in the locker room yesterday and I was like, yeah, he is still here, isn't he? I don't even hear him in the conversation. And it's like, well, he's a third round pick. Last year you guys reach for him and now it's so. I don't even know what's going on with that. But I think, you know, does not help.
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A
The third round pick situation with Ryan Poles is, man, it's not great. Yeah, you got to lose another One for a guy who just cannot play and it's a third round pick. Like those are valuable.
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C
Oh, it's not great. It's not great. It's a growing, it's a growing list of third round misses. If this continues to go the way that it looks like. But that being said, I think that you, you, you give Theo his opportunity, right? And you kind of plan to help him out. You got him next to Joe Tuney. You can do some things there. So if he's able to come out and play well enough, then you can still play winning football with him. You put Ozzy on the right side. He's obviously more comfortable there. They did not like what they saw from him on the left side. They thought he played much faster, much more natural on the right side. So Darnell Wright goes down, it's not what you want, but if he's going to go down, then it creates an opportunity for Ozzie there. And so you kind of just look at what you have with those guys, put them out there and see, I'm sure the commanders will have some plans for how they want to go about attacking both of those young guys. And then you just kind of see how they play at left tackle. I feel like this thing could go back and forth, unfortunately, throughout the season. That's not great, right, because that means nobody's playing well. But I could see a situation where maybe Theo doesn't play so well out in Washington. And you come back and it's like, well, now we gotta go back to Braxton. And Braxton's a professional. He'll, you know, be ready to go. But clearly you don't love either of your options right there.
- [28:46]
B
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- [30:03]
C
Herb.
- [30:03]
A
The analysis of Caleb Williams on the field is handled by most of us, but there also appears to be sort of a cottage industry in trying to figure out how he is off the field. His personality, his mentality because it can be important for a quarterback. And the way he relates to teammates, his going back to his desire to be a Bear and everything that has been reported, whether sloppily or not, about his relationship with coaches, current and previous. You're around him a lot. How consistent has he been and how would you assess his for, for lack of a better term, his standing in the locker room? Is he, is he carrying the authority, at the moment deserved authority of a starting quarterback in this league? Do people, are people listening to him in the way that they should or is it kind of a. Here's that again and give. I guess we're going out to practice with it is getting, getting kind of a side eye? Where, where are we on that scale?
- [31:07]
C
Yeah, I've seen in the first, you know, four or five weeks of this season more of Caleb's personality inside that building than I was able to see all of last season. Like, I don't know if he was just trying to digest everything, but just in terms of how he interacts with his teammates, where does it look and sound like?
- [31:25]
A
What, what do you, what do you see in here that tells you that.
- [31:29]
C
Exactly where he is in the locker room. Right. So last year he's at his locker and that's where he is. And this year he's all over the locker room. He's with the defensive guys, he's with the receivers, he's with the linemen and he's talking and he's engaging, he's interacting. What's today's Thursday, so I guess Tuesday he and young wide receiver, undrafted Jade Walker played basket. There's a basketball hoop in the middle of the locker room and they played one on one around the world, shooting shots for about 20 minutes. And I was just kind of standing there laughing with them because I was actually talking to Jade before they started playing, and Johnny challenged him to the game, and Caleb was all for it. And they go down there and they get to shooting and his personality is coming out, and they're talking crap. And you got Jonathan Owens, the hoop is down by his locker. And so Jonathan Owens, who I don't think can play basketball at all, but what he can do is talk crap with the best of them. And so he's talking so, so much trash to Jade Walker and to Caleb. And Caleb's like, caleb missed the shot. And JL's like, See, I'm in your head. I'm in your head. And cave's like, you can't get in my head. I'm built different. There's no getting in my head. I'm not like that. I'm not one of those dudes. But just seeing how he's interacting with guys, Roma doings a his relationship, just my outside observation, his relationship with DJ Moore has grown exponentially since last year.
- [32:49]
A
Really.
- [32:49]
C
Conversations that they have, the interactions that they have, the times that you kind of just see them together laughing and joking a lot more frequently than you saw last year. Last year I was like, I don't even know if those two dudes rock with each other like that. But you see that a little bit more this year. And so I don't know if that's, you know, him putting himself out there more, if this is teammates becoming more accepting of who he is and how he behaves. But he just seems a lot more comfortable in his role as quarterback leader of that team. And you can see it just by the conversations, you know, the laughing, the joking, when they're cracking jokes on each other, those types of things. Didn't see a ton of that last year. And just literally where he is in the locker room, I think those things are decent indicators that there's been some real growth there in terms of his relationships and his position within his team.
- [33:43]
B
Now, you mentioned two guys there that I wanted to ask about. And the last thing I have for you, DJ Moore and Roma Dunes a outside of their relationship with Caleb, how are they. How are they carrying themselves within the locker room within practice time? We've heard some glowing reports about Roma Dunes a from Ben Johnson about his work ethic and the way he carries himself there for the team. How are you observing those two guys? One guy really on a growth trajectory and one guy in DJ Moore that's just not in the position he's Normally been used to at the center point of an offense for a team.
- [34:20]
C
Yeah, they interact very well. Their lockers are right next to each other. They kind of meet in a corner and so, you know, DJs the last locker room, this particular wall and Rome on the intersecting wall. And so they sit right next to each other all the time and they're talking and they're laughing and they often come into the locker room together. They often leave the locker room together, whether they're coming in from the practice field, headed to the weight room, headed to lunch or whatever. So you see the two of them interacting a lot. They talk together a lot, they joke with each other quite frequently. And so I think their relationship is pretty good now. Rome continues to ascend as a player and as just this dependable target for this offense and for Caleb. DJ's role, I don't want to say it's starting to shrink, but it's certainly morphing into something else. And I think he's accepting of that. You don't. I don't feel that he's kind of disgruntled with his role. He. I've asked him about it. He says, listen, we just want to win. If they ask me to be in the backfield, I'll be in the backfield. I think the coaching staff still understands the value of getting the ball to DJ Moore, getting the ball in his hands. I think they understand how dynamic he is as a playmaker with the ball in his hands. And so he's willing to do those different things, line up in the slide, whether it's a jet sweep or some type of end around or just a straight handoff in the backfield. And I also think you see him make some key plays. There was one he drugged across the field and Caleb hit him right before the sideline. He made a nice great hands catch, got his feet in out there in Vegas. And so I think he remains a very critical piece of this offense in terms of what they want to do. But I don't think he's been kind of put off by his new role and I don't think he's had any type of jealousy issues or anything like that with how Rome continues to ascend the targets that he's getting, the touchdowns that he continues to make week in and week out. I think their relationship is pretty, pretty good and it seems to work very well, not only with the two of them as a tandem, but the three of them together. When you add in Caleb.
- [36:21]
A
Herb, this was terrific.
- [36:22]
B
Yeah, very good.
- [36:23]
A
We appreciate you being generous with your time. Keep up the great work as the Bears beat guy for the bigs, and we'll talk again down the line.
- [36:31]
C
Thank y' all so much for having me appreciated. You work for a very, very long time. Absolute pleasure to be on.
- [36:36]
A
Thanks.
- [36:36]
C
All right.
- [36:36]
B
Thanks, Herb. Really good to meet you and good, good to see and have this time put together.
- [36:41]
C
My pleasure. Y' all be good.
- [36:43]
A
That is Herb Howard. It's the bigs, and it's a distinctive baritone voice that you can hear during press conferences. And now I'm going to be tracking Ben Johnson.
- [36:52]
B
Those questions.
- [36:53]
A
I like it. I like the fact that he's, he's a, he's a burr in his saddle, as it were.
- [36:59]
B
I love, love, love hearing what he had to say about DJ Moore. Absolutely love it. Because I'm just, I'm putting myself and, you know, maybe an ego in his shoes, and how would I feel? I was always the guy, was always the man on my team. They needed a first down, they needed to catch a touchdown. I was the guy. We saw some poor body language things. We saw things that Ben Johnson pointed out and talked about about DJ Moore. I love to hear what he is seeing and observing in the relationships with Roma Dunes A and with Caleb Williams. You know, I, I didn't, I didn't, you know, I didn't hear anything different or anything bad. I just didn't know what, what to expect with it. And I love to hear the observations that, that, that Herb had about, about.
- [37:40]
A
DJ and tomorrow on the show also, we're going to really be diving into the matchups coming up on the Monday night game. And it's always going to remind you that forward progress is here for you. The moment that Bears game is decided, or sooner that we go, we go live on YouTube after every game, we are right there with our first blush thoughts. I've got my crazy person's notes in front of me and we're just going to tell you exactly how we feel in the strongest terms possible right after the game. And we solicit all of your input, we highlight your comments, and we have really enjoyed the live forward progress that we do right after game. So don't miss it. Make sure you subscribe, make sure you get all set up for alerts and that way, you know, hey, Dan and Matt are on. That means you're on with us and we can all hang out together after the game. It's been fun.
- [38:35]
B
Yeah. And when you do it, make sure you click that little bell icon on the YouTube page. Because that, that opens up your, your, your notifications. That's how you get to know that if we're going live. Because a few weeks ago we did a live Dan Bernstein unfiltered on a Sunday morning. We were just, you know, hanging out and said, hey, let's just do a live show.
- [38:52]
A
You want to do a show.
- [38:53]
B
And sure, if you're not getting those alerts, you're not going to know that it's going live when we can just hang out. And it was, it was a fun time to do that. We had a lot of people that joined us again highlighting those comments and just hanging out together for a bit on a Sunday morning. I think that was the Pittsburgh, Minnesota, early Dublin game right during that time. So just, you know, you have to get those alerts. So go to the little bell icon. That's when you get to know that we're going live.
- [39:16]
A
And I also want to let you know that tomorrow morning, as always, on Fridays, Mondays and Fridays.
- [39:22]
B
Yeah, buddy.
- [39:22]
A
I am on terrestrial radio. I'm on 97.1fm.
- [39:27]
B
You got to class up that show a little bit.
- [39:29]
A
The drive.
- [39:29]
B
That's why they need you.
- [39:31]
A
Chicago's classic rock. Yeah. With Sherman and Tingle, who are both completely insane.
- [39:37]
B
Yes.
- [39:38]
A
And what you hear, they're even crazier off the air. And I join them at 8:15 on Mondays and Fridays. We'll be talking, not just Bears, whatever is happening in sports or beyond, or I'll just be fighting. But the more I find out about them, the more frightened I get about how they actually live their lives.
- [39:56]
B
You should eventually start doing those from a remote location, maybe not being in the studio with them. And don't ask them about their fantasy football teams.
- [40:04]
A
Oh, no, don't. Why are you destroying them?
- [40:06]
B
Well, I mean, they had the number one and number two picks in our draft and I think they're down towards the bottom of the standings if I'm. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but who knows?
- [40:15]
A
Yeah. So definitely join.
- [40:16]
B
I mean, I'm only four and ones. I really have no room to talk.
- [40:19]
A
8:15 on 97.1 FM. The Drive Mondays and Fridays in the morning with Sherman and Tingle. But thanks for being part of this. Make sure you like and subscribe and make this a part of your daily existence. We're going to dive deep into the Monday night matchup on tomorrow's show.
- [40:43]
B
Forward Progress, a Chicago Bears podcast with Dan Bernstein and Matt Abaticola on 312 Sports.