Can Bears repeat last season’s recovery from nightmare loss?

It’s time to give the Bears coaching staff some credit.

No, really.

After a week of getting hammered on both sides of the ball over the Hail Mary pass and the decisions leading up to it, they actually did the right thing to prepare for Arizona.

They took the day off with a walk-through because of the physical toll that loss took. More importantly, the theme all week focused on the difficult task the Cardinals had to fulfill.

It’s easy to make short work of an opponent who has struggled to win in recent years, especially after your own terrible defeat that can hang heavy over the team like a fog.

But the Bears talked all week about the Cardinals as a team that was on the verge of taking over the NFC West, which they very well could do.

The offense treated safety Budda Baker like he was the Terminator. You waited for one of them to say, “Baker is out there. There’s no bargaining with him. There’s no reasoning with him. He feels no pity, no remorse, or fear. And there’s no way he’s going to stop.” ever.” They didn’t say it, but close.

“Budda Baker is walking around there, coming from the middle of the field,” coach Matt Eberflus said. “They have a three-safety look, usually in a five-down look and he’ll come around. He doesn’t always come by, but there will be guys who come by, and he’s mainly the guy who does that.

“When you see your runs it sometimes causes a little bit of confusion. Our guys have done well in training, but again, it will be full speed. He’s going to be a very good player and a very good player.” good front because they move it a bit. Our guys have to communicate very well.”

The same respect has been shown to Kyler Murray, who the Bears faced last year, as well as running back James Conner.

Last year, the Bears suffered their most painful loss, blowing a 21-point lead against Denver, then turned around the following week and shook off the hangover and shame, heading to Washington for a brief preparation for a Thursday night game and the Commanders fled.

Eberflus and the staff must hope something similar happens now for their first road win of the season. They desperately need the win.

Here are the keys to doing it.

1. Pass protection

Whether it’s through basic pass blocking, through pass plays after establishing the run or by moving Williams around, they need to keep their quarterback’s feet clean.

Williams was completely ineffective when under pressure on the road. He has a passer rating of 57.11 when blitzed in road games and 45.09 when pressured or not blitzed on the road.

The problem with all of this is that the Bears’ offensive line will be getting a new left tackle, as Braxton Jones has been ruled out due to a knee injury. Larry Borom will replace him and while he is experienced, he hasn’t played all year because he was on IR when he left camp.

For this reason, tactics such as play-action, establishing the run to do so, moving the pocket and using bootleg action will be huge in preventing Williams from being harassed.

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If they give Williams time, he can see how they use Baker and burn the gambling within their plan.

2. Danger zone

The Cardinals are a nightmare for defenses in man-to-man pass coverage because of Kyler Murray’s scramble ability and also because their receivers are more effective against man coverage.

So opponents hit them hard with zone.

According to Pro Football Focus, they have faced zone 75.6% of the time.

The Bears’ defensive scheme is zone, and according to PFF, they rank in the top 10 in defensive success rate (50.2) and yards allowed per target (7.4).

The zone situation also applied against Washington and the Bears still lost, but only gave up four field goals until the last desperation play. But Washington had better offensive zone coverage than the Cardinals.

Defensively it’s more of the same, as they play a strong zone pass defense, and also a strong red zone defense as they are No. 1 in the red zone.

3. Time of possession

This is not just ball control, but actually eating the clock as in ball possession. It’s big because Arizona’s offense can be explosive and the Bears want to keep them off the field.

In Arizona games, the winning team was usually the team with the largest possession advantage. Losing three of their first four, Detroit, Buffalo and Washington all had big advantages. Normally this is done by running the ball effectively.

In their last game, when it was ultimately a back-and-forth shootout with Miami, this was not the case. In the Chargers and 49ers games, the Cardinals came away with wins, but the games went in the same direction as the previous ones in terms of ball control. Then the key turnover cost the Chargers and 49ers, making their ball control efforts a near loss.

For the Bears, this is easier said than done. It shouldn’t be that way, but a hallmark of Shane Waldron’s offense in Seattle was its inability to possess the football. Twice they were last in possession of the ball, second last in his other season. The Bears were about in the middle of the pack in terms of possession. Shooting for the moon, trying to make big plays, should be less important than consistently moving the ball and scoring.

Waldron may even find that this approach helps them score points early in the game so they don’t have to start over in a hole as usual.

Twitter: BearsOnSI