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INDIANAPOLIS — Fourth-and-goal from the 1-yard line. It’s the time to use one of your best, go-to plays. It’s time to send in a call that you’re 99.99 percent certain will work for a touchdown.
What did offensive coordinator Shane Waldron call for the Chicago Bears against the Indianapolis Colts in that situation in the second quarter Sunday?
A speed-option play to the left with rookie quarterback Caleb Williams and running back D’Andre Swift.
Seriously. That’s what Waldron sent in for Williams after three consecutive runs by running back Khalil Herbert out of shotgun got the Bears from the Colts’ 4-yard line to within inches of scoring.
“It’s a play we’ve practiced,” tight end Cole Kmet said after the Bears’ 21-16 loss to the Colts at Lucas Oil Stadium.
“We wanted to get a certain look. I don’t know if we got the look we wanted on it. So that’s something I’ll have to take a look at. I can’t really for sure say what went into all that. But we wanted to get a certain look that they were showing on film at the goal line and you got to give them credit, they played it right.”
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We’ll get into the details of that “look” shortly. But the more you watch the Bears flounder on offense, the more you wonder if Williams’ development is in good hands with Waldron.
Williams did throw for 363 yards and two touchdowns and two interceptions. Rookie receiver Rome Odunze made six catches for 112 yards and a touchdown, while Kmet made 10 receptions for 97 yards and a score.
Williams showed signs of development, but more questions were raised, starting with: Why did you run the option on fourth-and-goal from 1? Waldron won’t meet the media until his regularly scheduled window Thursday at Halas Hall, leaving Williams, Kmet, Swift and coach Matt Eberflus to discuss it.
“That was a tough one being right there on the inch-yard line or so, the 1-yard line, and to not get that,” said Williams, who was 33-for-52 passing. “It’s a play we practiced all week, understanding that when they get around the 5-yard line to the 1-yard line, their defense changes and they get into those 6-1 defenses and things like that. They normally crash (the defensive ends).
“I guess I maybe didn’t get on the edge fast enough or whatever the case may have been. But they didn’t crash how they normally do or how we saw on film. They made a good play. They had an extra overhang player over there and it may have been because of the pistol (formation) or whatever the case may have been.”
Instead of a 6-1 look, the Colts had two linebackers and five down defensive linemen. The extra “overhang player” was linebacker Zaire Franklin. Defensive end Tyquan Lewis didn’t crash on Williams as the Bears predicted.
Franklin, though, was the difference-maker. Williams pitched the ball from the 5-yard line back to Swift near the 8. Franklin went unblocked and chased Swift past the 10-yard line, where Lewis eventually stopped him for a 12-yard loss on a play that was less than a yard from the end zone.
“It was called,” Swift said. “It’s on us to execute. See what I could have done differently to make it happen.”
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It was the Bears’ worst play during a first half in which they ran 49 plays of offense but scored zero points. It raised more questions and concerns about Waldron’s play calling but also his game planning considering that every player who was asked about it said they practiced the option play plenty last week.
The whole sequence for the Bears from the 4-yard line felt baffling. Why did Herbert replace Roschon Johnson after Johnson fought for a 1-yard gain on fourth-and-1 from the 5 to put the Bears in that scoring situation? Why did the Bears not go under center once for three consecutive runs to Herbert, which included a wildcat run?
And, generally speaking, why does it continue to be so darn hard for the Bears to run the ball, including against the Colts, who allowed 261 rushing yards last week to the Green Bay Packers?
On fourth-and-goal, Williams said he had the option to change the option play but that the Bears broke the huddle with 10 seconds left on the play clock. The ball was then snapped with five seconds left, according to the broadcast.
“I didn’t want to get up there and alert the play or change the play … having around five (seconds) or so or whenever everybody got set,” Williams said. “At that point, you got to call and run it and get going.”
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Williams said he might have changed the play if he had more time. This just leads to more questions about the Bears’ offensive process. Why are seemingly late play calls becoming a trend?
“We liked the play,” Eberflus said. “We just got to get to the second level, get to the linebacker there, zone up to him and get him there on that. We were going to pitch off the end man on the line of scrimmage. We got to execute better.”
It wasn’t a rookie moment for Williams but another bad moment for the entire offense, starting with Waldron’s decision to call it.
Another one was a coaching gaffe. The Bears sent out their field goal unit after their first touchdown, called a timeout and then failed on their two-point conversion. The plan should have been established well before Williams hit Odunze for the first NFL touchdown of their careers.
“We have to be better there,” Eberflus said. “That’s on the coaches. We got to be better there, from the top to the bottom, from upstairs down to the bottom. So we got to do a better job there.”
A lot should be on the Bears coaches right now. It was a messy game Sunday, but much of that mess was of their own making.
“We’ll keep slinging it. We’ll keep working on run game,” Williams said. “And we’ll keep getting better definitely as an offense. We’re going to get this going here soon.”
(Photo: Michael Hickey / Getty Images)
