TheChicago Bearswill head to Green Bay this week without their starting quarterback, as Tyson Bagent is set to start in place of Caleb Williams, who continues to work through a hamstring injury.
Bagent stepped in for Williams last week against the New York Jets, leading the Bears to a 23-12 victory. He completed 25 of 34 passes for 268 yards and one interception. Three other interceptions were wiped away by penalties.
Despite the mistakes, Bagent gave the Bears enough at quarterback to come away with
a win in his first game of the season. His performance also showed why the Bears can feel confident moving forward with him, while leaving room for improvement heading into a much tougher divisional matchup.
Ben Johnson pointed to a few areas where Bagent can still improve heading into Sunday’s matchup against the Packers:
“There’s probably a couple plays last week where I thought our second-level throws were available to us, and we didn’t pull the trigger on them. That’s just one of those things, we just need to see it,” Johnson said.
Bagent showed he can operate this offense effectively, but there are still opportunities for him to be more aggressive, particularly when plays develop down the field. Johnson also expressed wanting Bagent to trust his pass catchers and give them opportunities to make plays on the ball.
“It would be encouraging from the coaching staff to him, you get the green light, man,” Johnson said. “[I] have a lot of confidence in how our pass catchers are playing right now. I thought they did a nice job going up for the ball when given the opportunity last week, and so we’re going to need more of that this week.”
Johnson said the focus this week is on carrying over what worked in Bagent’s game last week while making the necessary adjustments ahead of his second.
“We’re just looking to get better from his first start to his next start … he’s just gotta figure out what he did well, keep doing that, and then the things that we need to improve on, we’ll improve on.”
Bagent won’t need to completely reinvent his game against the Packers. If he can build on what worked against the Jets, take advantage of opportunities downfield and lean on the run game, the Bears will look for him to keep the offense moving in Green Bay.
