Chicago Bears - How NOT to Handle the QB Position
The QB position in Chicago has been a horrid mess for many years, but the ridiculousness (ridiculousity? ridicule-deserving-idiocy?) seems to have reached new heights as of the 2008 training camp. After 23 days of training camp (with one to go), OC Ron Turner had this to say yesterday of his assessment about who leads the contest between Rex Grossman and Kyle Orton:
”I really don’t,” offensive coordinator Ron Turner said when asked if he has a sense of who’s ahead.
Maybe Turner should have just said “I really don’t have a clue” and left it at that. How is it possible that the Bears’ offensive coaches could watch 3 weeks worth of practice sessions and still NOT make a determination who will lead the offense? If both players in question are so pathetic, why haven’t the Bears taken steps to bring in a third contender?
It really defies explanation, in my opinion. However, taking a look at the behavior of this organization over the last 20 years (using the Footballguys.com Data Dominator ) tells us that this current situation is really just par for the course up in Chicago. Guess how many times QBs have been swapped in and out of the Bears’ lineup over the past 20 years (1988-2007)? 30? 40? Nope.
During the past 20 years, the Bears have switched/substituted one QB for another 58 times. An average of ~3 different QBs under center each year for the past 20 years! And we’re not talking about a few snaps for the backup in mop-up duty here and there, folks. During the current decade, 24 switches at QB been made by the Bears, with only 3 QBs playing close to a full slate of games in any given year (Jim Miller played in 15 games back in 2001; Orton managed 15 back in 2005; and Grossman appeared in a full slate of 16 games during the 2006 Super Bowl season). Of all the pass attempts thrown during this decade (4078), Grossman has tossed 900 in his time on the field during regular season (~22%); while Orton has lobbed 447 (~11%).
For comparison’s sake, during the same time span the Colts have sent in their backup QBs for snaps during 6 seasons, for a total of 186 pass attempts (out of 4436 passes attempted by Indianapolis, ~96% of them thrown by Peyton Manning).
No wonder Muhsin Muhammad recently told SI’s Peter King “That’s right. It’s where receivers go to die.”
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