Without question the Bears took their foot off the gas Sunday after assuming a 31-7 lead over the Atlanta Falcons with just over 12 minutes remaining.
They nearly paid for it but afterward coach Ben Johnson tried to explain his thinking to reporters about why they began substituting for what had been a very effective defense all game. After the substitutions, the lead quickly shrank when Roschon Johnson fumbled it away, leading to couple quick Atlanta touchdowns before they held on to win 31-23.
"Yeah, you're trying to thread the needle a little bit," Johnson said told reporters afterward. "If we didn't have the Thursday night game, I don't know that we would do things like we did. So that's part of the equation."
In other words, they have a Thursday night game coming up with the Patriots and the thought was to get starters rest once the game seem salted away. Only, the game hadn't been salted away and the Falcons nearly burned them.
Kyler Gordon's strip sack on a slot cornerback blitz and a recovery Devin Bush at Atlanta's 28 sealed the win anyway, and prevented a possible Falcons tying drive. It was an embarrassing turnaround.
The defense had people like Jack Sanborn, Nick McCloud, Josh Blackwell and Elijah Hicks playing, among others. After Altlanta's first TD, the starters returned. By then Big Mo had left the building and the Falcons were coming. The problem with putting in backups when backups are already playing as starters at positions is you're substituting with third-stringers.
Michael Penix Jr. hit Kyle Pitts with the 10-yard TD pass and Zacharaiah Branch with the two-point conversion to end an eight-play, 91-yard drive and then the Falcons got it right back with Roschon Johnson's lost fumble at Atlanta's 22. It led to a quicker scoring drive of five plays, aided by a 41-yard Penix completion to Jahan Dotson. The two-pointer suddenly meant the Bears needed ball possession after they'd done it all day but suddenly they couldn't. But Gordon's strip sack preserved the win.
Johnson blamed it more on the turnover by Johnson than the tactic of looking ahead to get rest for the Patriots game.
"I do believe if we hadn't had that fumble on offense then maybe we would have gotten out of there the way that we wanted," Johnson said. "We know that's the case, especially with an offense like that.
"Once again we were trying to thread the needle and do what's best for us. We had to win the game first and foremost, which we did, but of course we wanted to think long term also."
Long term doesn't count if they're going to lose in the short term. In the future, Johnson needs to think about closing out the victory.
For a while on Sunday it had begun to take on the look of last year's Cincinnati game, when the Bears had to score at the end to win a game they seemed to have locked up already with a two-score lead.
They didn't need it but this needs to be a lesson for them going forward. Many of their backups were already playing and then third-stringers were coming in and trying to stop starters. Too much can happen in the NFL too fast for any team to assume victory when there is 10 minutes or more remaining.
It wasn't the opening game when the Bears scored 59 points. Instead, penalties kept them in check all day and the idea should have been escaping as easily and quickly as possible.
Besides. why would they worry about resting defensive players when they had more than 40 minutes of possession time for the second time in three games? The defense hardly put in any reps. The Bears ran off 75 plays to 50 for the Falcons. Three weeks ago the defense only was on for 32 plays.
The W is more important than the R and R and Johnson needs to realize this going forward regardless of their coming schedule.
This article was originally published on www.si.com/nfl/bears/onsi as Ben Johnson Forced to Explain Why Bears Took Their Foot Off the Gas .
