And if it’s running the ball, if it’s passing the ball, whatever

LAKE FOREST David Montgomery Jersey , Ill. (AP)Throwing 16 times a game runs contrary to popular methods for winning in the NFL, or getting a passer experience. Chicago Bears quarterback Mitchell Tribusky doesn’t care if his offense continues playing it safe – as long as it’s in a victory. ”As a quarterback, you want to be throwing the ball, but as a competitor and leader of this team, you’re going to do whatever it takes to win,” Trubisky said. ”And if it’s running the ball, if it’s passing the ball, whatever it is, that’s what we’re going to do.” Trubisky goes into Sunday’s home game at Soldier Field against Carolina with only 41 pass attempts in two games, as the Bears have leaned heavily on the running of Jordan Howard. Trubisky threw 16 passes and the Bears ran 54 times last week to beat Baltimore 27-24 in overtime. Overall, they rank fourth in rushes (186) and 28th in pass attempts (183), but they’re not worried so few attempts limits Trubisky’s progress as they play it safe. ”This is a combative game, a will-breaking game,” Bears coach John Fox said. ”Running the football is not the easy way to do it. You’re not finessing people. ”I think it’s a little bit like a championship boxing match. Body blows aren’t real sexy Dion Sims Jersey , but they take their toll in the later rounds. It’s a way to win, maybe not as flashy, as exciting as knockouts and those kinds of things. But it works.” This approach is nothing new for a team coached by Fox. In 2003 during Fox’s second year coaching the Panthers, they finished 28th in pass attempts (460) with Jake Delhomme at quarterback and third in rushing attempts (522) but went to the Super Bowl. In 2011 with Tim Tebow at quarterback, the Denver Broncos were last in pass attempts (429), but first in rushing attempts (546) and won a wild-card round playoff game. Offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains called the excessive running more abberation than a regular plan, and cited the Ravens’ use of a cover-2 defense as a reason. The Ravens tried to confuse Trubisky in his second start with a defense they’d rarely played, and left open the running lanes. ”You (media) guys know me, I like to throw the football,” Loggains said. ”I’m a quarterback guy.” Howard rambled for a career-high 167 yards and broke a 53-yarder to set up the winning overtime field goal by Connor Barth. ”When you average 4.5 yards a carry, you can do that,” Loggains said. ”It’s easy to do that there. It’s when you’re averaging 2 and 3 and then all of sudden, you’re putting your quarterback in third-and-extra-long the whole time, you can’t play that type game. ”And that type game isn’t fun if you don’t win the game. The reward is you win and the guys up front did a great job. The run-game guys did a great job designing a good plan and our guys executed well.” Loggains isn’t worried about a young passer becoming impatient with this style. ”He’s a team-first guy Tarik Cohen Color Rush Jersey ,” Loggains said. ”He knows that we are going to do whatever it takes to win a game. ”Sometimes it’s throwing 27 straight fastballs. If that’s what it is, that is what we are going to do. He also is very aware in his little time in the NFL that there are going to be games – maybe this week, maybe next week, maybe a month from now – that we are going to open it up and throw 45 times.” Coaches say even with so few passes, they’re seeing development in Trubisky. ”I feel like I’ve grown a lot,” Trubisky said. ”I mean, I’m able to see it, I’m able to see it coming.” Fox said Trubisky patiently threw the ball away six times last week and called it a sign of progress. A week earlier, Trubisky gave up a key fourth-quarter interception to lose his first game against Minnesota. ”You can’t get selfish wanting to force in every pass – that just doesn’t make sense,” Trubisky said. ”So it’s just me trying to play smarter and put my team in the best position to be successful each drive and come out winning games. ”The throwaways are important.” NOTES: Defensive back Sherrick McManis missed Wednesday’s practice with a pulled hamstring suffered in Sunday’s game. … Linebacker Nick Kwiatkoski (pectoral muscle) practiced Wednesday on a limited basis. Kwiatkoski has been out since suffering the injury in Week 2. — Now that the Chicago Bears 2019 schedule has been made official, and we’ve all had some time to dissect the path the Bears will need to travel to repeat as NFC North champs, I wanted to share my..."Now that the Chicago Bears 2019 schedule has been made official, and we’ve all had some time to dissect the path the Bears will need to travel to repeat as NFC North champs, I wanted to share my top 10 takeaways. I won’t give a season record prediction yet https://www.thebearsfanshop.com/Jim-Mcmahon-Jersey , a few of us at WCG will break the schedule down in four quarters in the near future, but these are just some of my general thoughts on how it all lays out. 1) With this being the 100th anniversary of both the NFL and the Bears, the Thursday night season opener is going to have a playoff atmosphere. Last year the Bears nearly spoiled the 100th anniversary of the Green Bay Packers, but the moment seemed to be too big for that Bears team, and they allowed 21 fourth quarter points and lost 24-23. That experience, plus the narrow playoff loss to the Philadelphia Eagles, will give the Bears the edge they need to ensure they can match the moment on September 5th, 2019. Last year we saw a Bears team that was prepared for the emotional rush they’d get by being the visiting team on such a momentous occasion, so this year they’ll be able to replicate that, but be able to maintain it throughout 60 minutes for the win.2) Playing in Denver early in the season is usually a recipe for disaster.But with the Bears playing the Thursday prior, that might give them the extra prep time they need to game-plan against Vic Fangio. Also, I think it would be wise for them to head out to Denver a few days early to help the team get acclimated to the altitude. This will be a good early season test for Mitchell Trubisky and the Bears’ offense. 3) The Bears have 5 Prime Time games, plus two more for now (Week 4 and Thanksgiving) that will be considered national games, as well as the London trip Walter Payton Color Rush Jersey , so the Bears won’t play at their usual noon time until week 8 against the Chargers. In fact, only six of their games will be at noon, but that’s what happens to good teams. If we expect the Bears to have sustained success, then we should get used to their schedule being all over the place. 4) Speaking of that London game, even though the Raiders are the designated home team,Tottenham Hotspur Stadium will feel like a home game for Chicago. The Bears have been a popular team in the UK ever since they played in London’s Wembley Stadium in 1986, which came just three years after they started to air NFL games on British TV. The Bears were one of the best teams in the NFL in the mid-80s, and they gained plenty of fans at that time. 5) Weeks 7-9 is one of the toughest stretches of football that any team will face in the NFL this season. Saints, Chargers, then the Eagles are three Super Bowl contenders and we’ll learn a lot about the Bears in this stretch. 6) The week 11 Sunday Nighter in L.A. against the Rams comes at a time in the schedule where the contenders start to separate from the pretenders. A big win on the road by the Bears could boost their national exposure even more and really ramp up Super Bowl talk. 7) As a fan, I don’t like the Bears taking on the Chiefs so late in the season (week 16). There’s a good chance one, if not both, of these teams will have a postseason spot locked up, so they could be resting or coasting. A mid-year match-up could have been electric.8) The double Thursday dip vs. the Lions (Thanksgiving in Detroit) followed up with the Cowboys in Chicago is an interesting scheduling quirk that will get the Bears some extra prep time for the Packers (week 15).9) I’m so sick of hearing about the Bears playing a “first place schedule.” Every division plays 14 similar games Gale Sayers Jersey , with only 2 games being determined by the previous season’s standings. Plus with the way teams fluctuate on a year to year basis, who’s to say that the 2 first place games the Bears are playing this year (Saints and Rams) won’t have a down year in 2019? At some point the 40-year old Drew Brees will slow down, and the Rams could be in for the classic Super Bowl hangover. 10) On a related topic, can people stop giving a shit about strength of schedule? It’s meaningless. The Bears’ strength of schedule before the 2018 season was .520, and before the 2019 season it’s an identical .520. The Bears went 12-4 vs. that tough .520 schedule a year ago, but before the season plenty of fans were concerned. I think more time should be spent looking at travel miles and rest differential. Travel miles is how often teams spend travelling to away games, and rest differential is explained by ESPN’s Brian Burke in this Twitter thread.International games will skew the travel miles for teams playing those games, but the immediate bye week is meant to help alleviate some of that jet-lag.The Bears only have one short week and that comes before Thanksgiving, but the Lions are also playing on a short week.