One silver lining from the Bears' Week 17 loss to the Seahawks, the pass rush finally came to play
A lot went wrong in the Chicago Bears' loss to the Seattle Seahawks in Week 17, but it was a much closer result than what the team experienced in the past few weeks.The 6-3 result was disappointing from an offensive standpoint, but the defense came to play on Thursday Night and kept the entire team […]
A lot went wrong in the Chicago Bears' loss to the Seattle Seahawks in Week 17, but it was a much closer result than what the team experienced in the past few weeks.
The 6-3 result was disappointing from an offensive standpoint, but the defense came to play on Thursday Night and kept the entire team in the fight, which wasn't the case in the first three games after head coach Matt Eberflus was fired.
The unit did give up some big plays on the ground early in the game that allowed the Seahawks to score those six game-deciding points, but in the second-half, the unit shut down quarterback Geno Smith and the Seahawks' offense.
A big reason why is because of the pass rush by the defensive line, a unit that had defensive tackle Gervon Dexter back on the field for the first time since Week 14.
Leading up to Thursday's game, defensive coordinator Eric Washington challenged his guys to make an impact.
"Everything starts with our ability to affect the quarterback, we have to do that," Washington said on Tuesday. "You have to affect the quarterback. The situation we had [against the Detroit Lions], the quarterback held the ball for five seconds, that will break down any coverage concept."
The Bears' defensive front rose up to the challenge on Thursday night. The unit as a whole finished with 15 total pressures, three total sacks, and had seven different players recording 2+ pressures in the loss.
The unit was also able to affect Smith with the base 4-man rush, only blitzing on nine total dropbacks the entire night. All three sacks in the game came from a 4-man rush.
Star defensive end Montez Sweat picked up his first sack since Week 12 and defensive end Darrell Taylor had a big strip sack on third-down, his first sack since Week 1.
The result was still the result but it's at least nice to find one silver lining in the loss and see some improvement from the pass rush and the defense as a whole. We'll see if the unit continues to play that way in the Week 18 season finale vs. the Green Bay Packers.
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