Jeff Dickerson, ESPN Staff Writer 10y

Bears fail to pressure Aaron Rodgers

CHICAGO – Chicago Bears defensive coordinator Mel Tucker rolled the dice.

Instead of dialing up a variety of blitzes to disrupt Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers ’ rhythm in the pocket, the Bears opted to drop the back seven into coverage and relied on the front-four to generate the pass-rush.

The results: Rodgers torched the Bears for 302 passing yards and four touchdowns and had a 151.2 passer rating.

“We didn’t blitz a lot,” Bears linebacker Lance Briggs said. “It was very simple. We thought we could get a four-man rush on a lot of occasions. But whether [Rodgers] was able to escape the pocket, or whether he was standing there inside the pocket, he was able to pat the ball and look a couple of different ways and find somebody.

“Rodgers, to me, is the best quarterback in the league. It was his day today. You give a guy like that time to find somebody, and he’ll make them open.”

The Bears’ game plan to lean on the defensive line is understandable, even with veteran defensive end Jared Allen ruled out because of a bout of pneumonia. Heading into Week 4, the defensive line accounted for seven of the team’s eight sacks (Willie Young 4, Stephen Paea 2, and Ego Ferguson 1). On the Green Bay side, Rodgers had been sacked nine times in the first three weeks behind a suspect offensive line. Clearly, this resembled a matchup the Bears felt confident they could win.

They guessed wrong.

The Bears managed to sack Rodgers only one time (by Ferguson) in 28 pass attempts, and the defense as a whole was credited with zero quarterback hits in the official statistics kept by the NFL.

Did the Bears ask too much of its defensive line? Young balked at the suggestion after the game.

“Whether we were thinking that or not, we have to do better to try and get that guy off that spot,” Young said. “I talked about that all week – getting him off that spot. But even when we got him off that spot a few times, he’s still good. I mean, it’s Aaron Rodgers, you know? It’s just an opportunity for us to get better, to figure out how we can stop this guy. This is adversity for us. Obviously, we’ve got those guys again. We’ll be looking forward to that. It’s always a challenge, trying to figure out ways to win the game. That’s absolutely going to be one of them.

“I’m motivated. That’s what we’re about. Yeah, we lost, but that’s in the past. So, at this moment, it’s time to start putting it behind us, recover, and get ready for our next week.”

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