Why bears look like non-participants in the final days of the edge market

As it stands now, it would be surprising if they took action for additional emergency aid, and here’s why.

1. Dwindling list of candidates

The names of Cleveland’s Myles Garrett and Vegas’ Maxx Crosby were tossed around for a while as potential candidates for teams in need of edge rushers like the Lions. But reports since then then say neither team even wants to talk about trading their Star Rusher. Jordan Dajani of CBS Sports called the Giants’ Azeez Ojulari, the Browns’ Za’Darius Smith and the Packers’ Preston Smith possibly the best rushers on the market.

Since the Bears tried unsuccessfully to trade for Matthew Judon, the thinking is that they might have interest in whoever is available, but the truth is that it wouldn’t really benefit them much. They won’t give up high draft picks for someone like one of the Smiths, who terrorized them both in Green Bay. Both are in their 30s, but the Packers would likely have little interest in dealing Preston Smith to a divisional team. Ojulari has skills, but with just 43 games played he has always had injury problems in four seasons. He has 22 sacks in four seasons, but is more of an upside for a 3-4 than a one-gap pass rusher like the Bears use at end.

2. They already rush well

They’ve risen from second to last in the league to 12th in sacks last year with 20, the same number they had in the last nine games last year when Sweat burst onto the scene. However, it goes much further than failure.

According to Stathead/Pro Football Reference, the Bears rank 10th in rushing at 9.6%. A rush forces the QB to throw before he wants to or by flushing it out of the pocket. They rank eighth with a pressure of 27.6%.

For the Bears, it’s all about the pressure and forcing takeaways.

3. The big picture looks good

The whole point of the pass rush for the Bears is haste and coverage. It is a two-part system that complements each other. How much better can they get if, like them, they lead the NFL in passer rating, and if they’re No. 1 in red zone scoring and red zone touchdown percentage allowed? They held a top-four offense to four field goals until a lucky break on the final play by forcing them to make field goals.

“The guys have done a great job in that area of ​​understanding the urgency that you need and understanding that our goals are field goals and takeaways,” defensive coordinator Eric Washington said. “We want to take the ball away or force field goals. Their urgency increased. We had to do things to defend the run. We had to do things to influence the quarterback. And everything was exactly what you wanted.”

More interceptions could happen if they applied a little more pressure, but on the other hand, more could come if they finally got their two vital, injured members back in the secondary, Kyler Gordon and Jaquan Brisker.

They don’t keep statistics on the percentage of Hail Marys stopped. They could benefit from having a strong pass rush on that one play, but Sweat was out with a shin injury and appears to be on track to return this week after playing just 50% of the plays last week. Without sweat, the full rush seems weaker. They have three other pass rushers in the top 20 ESPN’s pass rush winning percentage largely due to Sweat’s presence.

“The other benefit of having a person, a player like Montez, as you probably know, is that some of the rushing production is spread out to the other guys on the defensive line,” Washington said. “We are the sum of our parts, if you will. If you’re going to focus your attention on Montez, the person out of line has to be productive.”

4. They may already have their answer

The younger rushers haven’t had much of an impact, but Darrell Taylor has been in the top 15 in pass rush winning percentage all year and they just got Jake Martin back on Sunday after he was on IR all season. He only played 15 plays.

“The energy was obvious, his energy, the speed, the quickness, the toughness,” Washington said. “I thought he did some really nice things as an edge rusher. I thought he was in position a few times to not only impact the quarterback but also hit him and I look forward to him having a decent run this week.” makes a big leap.”

If he doesn’t, or if Sweat has an unforeseen issue related to his injury, the rush looks a little more serious. But the help they’re getting at tackle, with Andrew Billings fifth among interior linemen in pass rush win rate and Gervon Dexter 11th, has evened out the rush and could continue to do so, provided that they don’t lose Sweat in the long run.

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If that were to happen, it would essentially be every man for himself and the Bears would be almost back to where they were in 2022 in the pass rush.

And then a trade wouldn’t look bad. But there’s only one game where all of these scenarios can happen, and after that, the Bears’ defense will be what it is.

Right now, if you can hold a high-scoring team to 18 points, or four field goals and a fluke, that’s pretty good. If they do anything similar to Kyler Murray and a potentially explosive Cardinals offense, expect the deadline to come and go without their names being mentioned in regards to pass rushers.

Twitter: BearsOnSI