If controversy is swirling about the Bears’ passing game, it is not filtering into the locker room or huddle.
The Bears and offensive coordinator John Shoop may rue the occasional mistake or call, but do not expect a radical shakeup in either the lineup of wide receivers or even the overall offense.
The Bears are in fact close to the balanced offense they want, running the ball on 87 of their 187 plays (47 percent) and using pass plays 53 percent of the time–precisely the same proportions as the New England Patriots ran last season on their way to winning the Super Bowl and about the same as recent winners Denver and Baltimore.
The Bears are averaging more total yards, considerably more passing yards and a far higher third-down conversion rate than last year. Scoring is about the same at 21 points per game.
And Dez White is going to remain a starter at wide receiver ahead of David Terrell. White and Marty Booker remain the top two wide receivers, and coaches say it will stay that way even though White dropped a TD pass at Atlanta and ran a wrong route against New Orleans, leading to an interception that ended the Bears’ hopes of winning.
Even Terrell, who has pleaded for more passes and playing time, is settling into the Bears’ “way.”
“We know John Shoop is capable of making calls to get us the football and we’ve got to take advantage of the opportunity when it comes, whether it’s out of two-wide [receivers], three-wide, five-wide, 16-wide,” Terrell said. “We’ve just got to make a play and get the football up in the end zone.”
Insiders say Terrell is practicing as well as he has at any time with the Bears, and teammates are impressed publicly and privately at his development. And Terrell is extremely popular with teammates who do not see his I-wish-I-got-the-ball-more comment as selfish in ways detrimental to the team.
He and veteran leader Marcus Robinson have become good friends.
But Booker and White, who has twice as many catches (eight) as Terrell (three) and Robinson (one) combined, have the confidence of coaches and quarterbacks. Robinson is still not fully back from his knee surgery, making him a role player rather than an every-down player.
Quarterback Jim Miller “had a whole off-season with Marty, had a whole off-season with Dez where he threw thousands of balls to those guys,” Shoop said. “He’s got a lot of confidence in them and I think that will start to show up.”
Terrell caught passes for the game-winning touchdowns in each of the Bears’ first two games and there was some surprise that Terrell was not Miller’s first option on the Bears’ final play in the New Orleans loss. Miller went to Booker, the offense’s most trusted receiver and the NFL’s No. 2 receiver in yardage, while Terrell ran a post pattern to the left side of the end zone that was not open.
“Jim made a read, put the ball in the air and the game ended that way,” Terrell said. “We can’t really do anything about it now except look at the film from a standpoint of how to get better, and that’s what we’re doing.”
