The Sun-Times’ experts can answer your Bears questions all week on Twitter. Here’s a sampling of Tuesday’s queries sent to @patrickfinley, who responds with more than 140 characters:
Did Cooper get cut yet
— 🦍 🧠 (@BackStage_1) September 26, 2017
No — and he wasn’t benched either. Cooper actually played well in the second half, even with a hold on third-and-goal from the 1.
Tuesday, coach John Fox explained his rationale for not benching him.
“In this league, whether you’re dealing with the outside or even on the sideline, you have to have a short memory,” Fox said. “We can it turn the page. Look out the front window and not the rear view mirror. Don’t look too long in the rear view mirror or you’ll wreck. You kind of learn from those things and move on.
“It’s definitely true as a corner. In this league that’s something you talk about a lot. In my football experience – college level of pro level. So, he’s a professional and he moved on. No different than Tarik’s decision a couple of weeks ago on punt return. I mean, we’re not firing him. He’s too much a part of our team.”
I’ll be the former. I think Packers coach Mike McCarthy would, too.
“We look for them to probably be more aggressive on the perimeter because of just production that they didn’t have this past Sunday,” he said. “I think it’s definitely an offense that’s taken big steps in the last year.”
What about the current #Bears offense is too complicated for Trubisky?
— ryan (@ryanwanders) September 26, 2017
In a perfect world, the Bears quarterback has to do more than just turn around and hand the ball off. The Bears have praised starter Mike Glennon’s ability to go correctly identify schemes before the snap and check the team into the right plays. There’s no knowing if rookie Mitch Trubisky would be able to do that right away. But you’re right — very little of what Mike Glennon has done, or has been asked to do, seems particularly complex.
For the second straight year, we have seen a constant stream of players enter IR. Should there be concern for the training staff? #Bears
— Alex Dwyer (@alexdwyer96) September 26, 2017
The Bears tweaked their training program in the offseason, changing everything from practice schedules to the timing of certain activities. It’s yielded more of the same: Cam Meredith, Kevin White and Jerrell Freeman are out for the year, while Nick Kwiatkoski and Quintin Demps will miss weeks, if not months. GM Ryan Pace said earlier this month the Bears were happy with their training staff.
“I think we’re going to tweak things every year,” he said. “But between Jenn Gibson, Nate Breske, Jason George, those three together have done a really good job of formulating a plan. Coaches have bought in. I’ve bought in. And I think we’re going to see that pay dividends this year.”
If it continues to trend in the opposite direction, though, it will be interesting to see what Pace says at the end of the year.
