Bears’ post-bye adjustment shows Ben Johnson is capitalizing on a league trend while expanding a rookie’s role in the offense
Bears have found some success in 6 OL sets since the bye week.
Coming out of the bye week, the Chicago Bears offense has started looking more and more like the offense head coach Ben Johnson was aiming to create.
The Bears have rushed for 186.5 yards per game since coming back on the field in Week 6, a rate that easily leads the NFL. Off of that strong run game, the Bears have been hitting more explosives in the passing game utilizing play-action and in-breakers.
Granted, there’s still some areas to clean up including the accuracy of quarterback Caleb Williams, but the improvements have been noticeable all around for the Bears offense the last four games. Looking deeper into it, the Bears made one little post-bye adjustment that’s come with some decent success compared to the first four games of the season.
Bears’ usage of 6OL sets is leading to some success while getting Ozzy Trapilo more involved
On Monday, football analyst Tej Seth posted some interesting data on X relating to the league-wide usage of six offensive line sets, a package the Arizona Cardinals have been running more than any team. That includes a mix of using tight ends on the line of scrimmage as an extra blocker along with bringing in an actual additional offensive lineman of the bench.
Based on what Seth showed, that personnel is working out successfully for the league as a whole.
For those who have watched the Bears’ offense closely since the bye week, you probably noticed the up-tick of 6OL usage Ben Johnson has been implementing and cashing in on some of that success. Here’s what some of the 6OL stats look like for the Bears before and after the bye week:
| Bears 6OL Usage | Weeks 1-4 | Weeks 6-9 |
| Drop Backs | 1 | 8 |
| Completions | 0 | 5 |
| Passing Yards | 0 | 53 |
| Rushing Attempts | 4 | 8 |
| Rushing Yards | 9 | 44 |
As you can see, since the bye week, the Bears have been utilizing a sixth offensive lineman more in both pass and run plays with some solid success in those sets. When Chicago gets into those heavy looks, second-round rookie Ozzy Trapilo has been one player coming in as that sixth OL lately.
Over the last two weeks, Trapilo has played 15 offensive snaps. Seven of those plays were designed runs and eight were designed passes (one was a scramble by Williams for five yards). On those run plays, the Bears are averaging just over 5.5 yards per carry and on the passing plays, the Bears hit two shot plays of 21 and 31 yards.
Looking at Trapilo specifically, his 90.1 offensive PFF grade in Week 9 was the fourth-highest on the team and the second-highest among all offensive tackles, second only to Bears right tackle Darnell Wright with a 94.1 offensive grade.
“Ozzy’s done a good job with everything we’ve asked of him,” offensive coordinator Declan Doyle explained last week. “Anytime he’s gone out there, we trust him and we trust that he’s going to do it the way we’re coaching it during the week. There’s comfort in putting a player out like that.”
It’s a subtle adjustment that’s paying off for the Bears offense in the few situations Johnson calls it up and it gives Trapilo a more defined offensive role during his rookie season.
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