The Chicago Bears took yet another loss on the season on Sunday vs the Green Bay Packers. In spite of the loss, the secondary brought a positive outlook to the game. The Bears’ secondary was expected to get demolished without Eddie Jackson, Jaquan Brisker, and Kyler Gordon. But other than Justin Fields, the secondary was the best-looking unit.
On average, it took Aaron Rodgers 3.31 seconds to throw the ball from the moment it hit his hands. If you take away any screenplays then that average goes up to 3.7 seconds. For reference, the league average for time to throw is 2.7 seconds and Aaron Rodgers’ average is 2.5 seconds on non-screens/dropbacks. Though it may not seem like much, forcing a quarterback to take this much longer to throw gives the pass rush a much greater opportunity to create pressure. Unfortunately, the Bears’ pass rush is among the worst in the league as very little pressure was created all game.
Everyone in the secondary locked down on their man/zone in order to create this amount of time for the pass rush, starting with Jaylon Johnson. Johnson gave up zero catches on only two targets. Johnson faced zero targets in the second half which made fans completely forget about him, which is the best thing that can be said about a defensive back.
Jaylon Jones was the big surprise of the day as he was looking like prime Derrell Revis at times. The undrafted rookie out of Ole Miss was picked on quite a bit but he rose to the challenge. He allowed three catches on seven targets for only 39 yards and an allowed passer rating of 61. All three of his allowed catches were on quick slants or check-downs making him seem more impressive as he didn’t allow a single catch further than 8 air yards downfield. Jones made a statement that he could be a consistent cornerback for the Bears in the future and is someone that fans should keep an eye on.
The second longest-tenured Bear, Deandre Houston-Carson stepped up to the occasion as usual. Carson gave up zero catches and was all over the field for the Bears making a couple of huge stops behind the line or for short yardage. Houston-Carson has always been a special teams player for the Bears but whenever he needs to step in on defense he gets the job done as one of the most reliable backups in the NFL.
There is a lot of promise in the Bears’ secondary and is the most reliable position group on the Bears’ defense for the foreseeable future. These guys proved that this weekend and it’s going to be exciting to see if they can continue this level of play once the injured players return.
