The Chicago Bears head into their bye week with a 4-2 record. If you told Bears fans that would be the team's record at the bye week heading into the season, they would have been more than thrilled.
Despite that, the Bears' road to 4-2 is not what many expected. During the first three weeks of the season, the Bears' offense combined for 38 points and 794 yards of total offense. A large part of the offense's ineffectiveness was poor offensive line play.
In that stretch, the offensive line allowed 15 sacks and many more pressures. They also struggled to open up consistent running lanes.
Thankfully, over the past three weeks, the Bears' offense has improved significantly, combining for 95 points and 1,098 total yards. The Bears' offensive line improvement has been a major reason why the offense has succeeded. In these games, they have only allowed seven total sacks and kept the pressure rate down while also opening up holes in the running game.
Defensively, the team has performed well, not allowing any team to score more than 21 points on them. Although there are specific areas of the defense (i.e., run defense) that need to improve, the overall performance has to meet most expectations.
Even with the improved offensive play and the solid defensive play throughout the first six weeks, some Bears have still had disappointing starts. Let's take a look.
1. Darnell Wright, RT
The Bears drafted right tackle Darnell Wright with the 10th pick in the 2023 NFL draft to be their right tackle for the next decade. Although Wright had a rough first half of his rookie season, he looked to be getting his feet under him during the second half of 2023.
According to PFF, Wright allowed seven sacks, three QB hits, 51 QB pressures, and 11 penalties as a rookie. Wright's play as a rookie earned him a 62.4 overall grade with a 61.4 in pass blocking and a 66.0 in run blocking from PFF. While that's not terrible play from a rookie, there was definitely room for improvement, which is what everyone was expecting going into the season.
Unfortunately, Wright's start to the season hasn't been great. Throughout the first three games of the season, Wright allowed three sacks, three QB hurries, and nine QB pressures. Along with allowing pressure on pass plays, Wright also seemed to struggle a bit as a run blocker.
His worst performance was against the Houston Texans when he allowed two sacks, three QB hurries, and five QB pressures.
#Bears RT Darnell Wright played looked really good through the first half of Sunday Night Football. He put together a handful of dominant reps and was doing a good job containing Will Anderson. There were a few losses in the first half, but he was winning the majority of reps.… pic.twitter.com/zYbai2GYK3
— Quinten Krzysko (@ButkusStats) September 17, 2024
Over the past three weeks, Wright has only allowed one sack, three QB hurries, and four QB pressures. Wright's run blocking has also looked better than it did the first three weeks of the season.
#Bears RT Darnell Wright looked like he had some extra burst against the Jaguars in London. He was a key part of the Bears run game, but did have some issues handling Travon Walker's extreme length.
— Quinten Krzysko (@ButkusStats) October 14, 2024
In pass protection, Wright had his share of both good and bad reps. The good… pic.twitter.com/xpagW4OZS4
It should be noted that Wright popped up on the injury report with a back problem in Week 4. Although the back injury was reported in Week 4, Wright could have been affected by it in weeks prior.
Overall, while Wright didn't start the season great, he has played well the past three weeks. If Wright continues to play well, then his disappointing start to the season will be forgotten.
2. Zacch Pickens, DT
In the 2023 NFL draft, the Bears selected defensive tackles Gervon Dexter and Zacch Pickens in back-to-back rounds. Dexter was the 53rd pick in the second round, while Pickens was the 64th pick in the third round.
Dexter and Pickens were selected in back-to-back rounds in hopes that one or both of them could dominate the interior of the defensive line. While Dexter (431) played 178 more snaps than Pickens (263) as a rookie, both were quite underwhelming.
Nevertheless, the hope was that, in their second season, they would show at least marginal improvement. So far, Dexter has done just that, gathering four sacks, seven QB hurries, and 18 QB pressures through six games.
In contrast, Pickens has yet to play this season because of a groin injury. Pickens's injury makes it impossible to see if he has improved at all from his rookie season.
He makes this list, though, because opening the season with a groin injury and not being able to get healthy is not a good sign for the second-year player.
3. Montez Sweat, DE
Montez Sweat changed the complexion of the Bears' defense when they acquired him at the trade deadline last season. In the nine games he played as part of the Bears' defense, Sweat had eight sacks, 37 QB pressures, and 23 QB hurries.
The havoc Sweat created up front helped the rest of the defense create turnovers. That ultimately led to the Bears' defense being tied for the lead in turnovers by the end of the 2023 season.
After seeing what Sweat brought to this defense last season, fans expected more of the same. Especially after spending a whole offseason with Matt Eberflus and the Bears defense.
Sadly, Sweat hasn't played to the standard fans thought he would. Through six games, Sweat has three sacks, 18 QB pressures, 16 QB hurries, and one forced fumble. While those aren't bad stats by any means, it doesn't look like he is on pace to match what he did last season through nine games.
In the grand scheme of things, Sweat is still playing at a high level; it's just not at the level he set when he came to the team last season.