A common quote to be found around the Bears’ locker room following Sunday’s 48-10 thumping of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers was that this was the offense’s best week of practice, and that it translated to Soldier Field.
That doesn’t always make for an interesting storyline, especially because often times teams that don’t play well on Sundays say they had a good week of practice. But take it from a guy who had to practice against the Bears’ offense last week: What Mitch Trubisky and that group did against Tampa Bay really was how they practiced.
“Oh yeah,” safety Deon Bush said. “Yes. Yes. Yeah. (coach Matt Nagy) definitely was scheming. In practice, it looked just like that. The scout team, it was looking just like that. They did a great job scheming them up.”
Stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Chicago sports teams! Sign up here for our All Access Daily newsletter.
Bush, specifically, was referring to how frequently Bears pass-catchers were running open in oceans of space against a hapless Buccaneers defense. That led to a Bears’ offense that only had four plays of 25 or more yards in its first three games doubling that total with eight on Sunday.
“I knew it all week long,” Nagy said. “I really did. I knew all week long (Trubisky) was going to have a good game.”
The result was a magnificent afternoon, which colleague John “Moon” Mullin detailed here. But even though this offense hadn’t shown many, if any, signs a breakout game was coming in the first three weeks of the season, there was a sense behind closed doors that it was coming.
And it sure did on Sunday.
NFL
“They always bring that energy to practice,” Bush said. “We knew at one point it was going to click in the game. They brought it in practice and it clicked this week.”