BOURBONNAIS, Ailing. — The coaching camp evaluations of his franchise quarterback have been lukewarm at greatest, and when advised this, Matt Nagy shook his head.
It’s a cool Sunday morning in Bourbannais, simply minutes after Chicago’s ultimate coaching camp apply open to the general public, and Nagy — the second-year head coach of the resurgent Chicago Bears — has been requested to take inventory of that quarterback, Mitchell Trubisky.
Final 12 months presently, Trubisky was simply attempting to soak up the playbook of his new head coach and get the crew lined up appropriately. Now, after a 12-Four season wherein he led the Bears to the NFC North title, Trubisky has been given extra accountability, which implies nailing down protections, seeing the protection higher and dealing by progressions extra effectively.
This has been a course of over the previous a number of weeks, as a number of observers famous Trubisky has struggled in opposition to the Bears’ protection this preseason. Nagy contends that since he already is aware of the issues Trubisky does properly, the one manner the offense can develop is that if the third-year signal-caller pushes by the discomfort of creating errors in apply, which serves to assist the employees work out the whole lot else he can do.
“Mitch is rising as a quarterback, which is necessary,” Nagy advised Yahoo Sports activities. “On this offense, it takes an excellent two-and-a-half, three years till I feel you really know all of it, and he’s a child that desires to be so good that generally I pull him up and say, ‘Hey it’s OK in the event you make an error, it’s OK to only play.’”
It’s a course of just like what Nagy went by with Alex Smith, who developed into the league’s greatest statistical deep-ball passer in 2017, his third and ultimate 12 months underneath Nagy’s tutelage in Kansas Metropolis. And when requested if it’s irritating that every one this might simply be taken as a adverse, Nagy shook his head … however not out of anger.
“No, no it’s not [frustrating] — I’m OK with it,” Nagy mentioned. “So long as Mitchell is aware of that he’s studying how I coach and I’m studying how he performs.”
And belief, Trubisky does know. Nagy wished to make certain of it on the morning of Aug. 13, when the 2 huddled in his workplace to take inventory of the place the offense is and most necessary, survey the place it’s headed.
“We threw quite a bit at myself and the offense all through coaching camp,” Trubisky defined. “Whether or not it’s including extra new stuff or pulling again somewhat bit and maintaining it easy, [we’re] permitting the offense to play quick, permitting me to play quick.”
As Trubisky famous, that is the purpose of the preseason the place Nagy begins fine-tuning what he desires the Bears’ offensive assault to appear like over the 12 months. The plan is to construct on their bread-and-butter performs from final 12 months whereas including new performs that they’ve examined out this camp in opposition to their protection, one of many league’s greatest.
Quite a lot of it, to make certain, hasn’t labored. However a few of it has, together with the up-tempo stuff that Nagy mentioned intrigued him final 12 months. The thought is that if it really works in opposition to Chicago’s third-ranked defensive unit, it ought to work in opposition to anybody.
“We’re simply attempting to get to a degree the place we are able to get out and in of the huddle quick after which simply play quick,” Nagy mentioned. “I felt like there have been instances final 12 months the place we did that, there have been instances we didn’t. So we as a training employees are figuring it out on offense as a result of we’ve received tons of expertise — we’ve received lots of expertise — and I don’t suppose you wanna simply overcomplicate issues. Simply let gamers play.”
Significantly the quarterback. And it’s value noting that Trubisky mentioned he feels “actually comfy” with the place he’s at within the offense, keen to unfold the ball round to the Bears’ huge array of playmakers, from operating backs Tarik Cohen and David Montgomery to wideouts Allen Robinson, Taylor Gabriel and Anthony Miller, in addition to tight finish Trey Burton.
“He simply desires me to go on the market and be the purpose guard, distribute the ball to our playmakers, and that’s actually all I gotta do inside this offense,” Trubisky mentioned.
Whereas that may be the case in 2019, it may not be sufficient to fulfill Bears followers who watched Kansas Metropolis’s Patrick Mahomes and Houston’s Deshaun Watson, two quarterbacks taken after Trubisky in 2017, emerge final season as bonafide playmakers who might bail their groups out of bother when issues broke down on the sector.
Nagy, nonetheless, is assured that Trubisky — an excellent athlete with a powerful arm who can throw on the run and rushed for 421 yards and three touchdowns final season — has that verifiable playmaking gene, too.
“He has that, he has all that,” Nagy mentioned. “Yeah, he’s received all of it. And as soon as he will get this offense down, you’ll see extra of that.”
There’s already been indicators of it.
“Watching sport tape, seeing a few of the blitzes we do on protection, he’s choosing it up,” Nagy mentioned. “He’s making the precise Mike [linebacker] ID calls, sliding to the precise guys, which is giving him time to throw the ball.”
Followers in all probability gained’t get a lot of an opportunity to see any of this enchancment earlier than the Bears’ Sept. 5 opener in opposition to the Inexperienced Bay Packers, since Nagy isn’t huge on taking part in his key starters throughout the preseason.
However will followers get to see a faster-paced model of an offense that ranked 21st within the league in 2018, additional delivering on the up-tempo promise Nagy hinted at a 12 months in the past?
“We’ll see, we’ll see,” Nagy smiled. “We’re simply getting began.”