The Bears are really gonna start Andy Dalton (and that's okay)
Chicago can build up Fields without throwing him into the lineup in Week 1
Through two preseason games, rookie Justin Fields looks like the future of the Bears’ quarterback position. Andy Dalton looks like, well, Andy Dalton.
Yet head coach Matt Nagy, with his job on the line in 2021, has been unambiguous with his choice of starter when the regular season gets underway next month.
"We need to see [Dalton] in the regular season," Nagy told the media after his team was destroyed 41-15 in a preseason outing against the Bills. He threw this idea into the world despite Dalton’s history of 144 regular season games, zero playoff victories, and a preseason with just one touchdown pass through two appearances this summer.
And you know what? He’s got a point.
The Bears risk nothing by walking Andy Dalton into the Rams’ crosshairs in Week 1
Fields has been the nexus of Chicago’s preseason highlight reel. He throws absolute darts and is responsible for 50 percent of the Bears’ touchdowns in 2021.
He has 79 preseason rushing yards on only nine carries, taking what Mitchell Trubisky did best in his four seasons in Illinois and improving upon it. He’s the next potential franchise cornerstone for a team that’s been in search of one for decades. He’s the light at the end of a tunnel chiseled with haunted petroglyphs of beasts used to scare Chicagoland children into eating their vegetables every night. If they didn’t, useless demi-gods with names like Erik Kramer, Chad Hutchinson, and Rex Grossman would root down in their nightmares well into adulthood, sabotaging their sleep with alternately under- and over-thrown footballs.
With that in mind, giving Fields the proper runway for full takeoff is paramount to both team and player. The first round pick is a rookie quarterback coming off a performance in which he completed only nine of 19 passes against the Bills’ second- (and third-) team defense. His protection allowed this to happen:
Fields is tough as hell; he threw six touchdown passes against Clemson in last year’s national semifinal despite absorbing the football equivalent of a car wreck and returned 10 days later to face Alabama. Even so, throwing him into a similar situation against better players could create a setback that hangs over his rookie campaign.
In Week 1, he would face off with a Rams defense headed by four-time (and reigning) Defensive Player of the Year Aaron Donald, who averaged 2.6 quarterback hits and sacks per game last season. The pass rush around him notched 53 sacks on the year, second-most in the NFL, despite blitzing at the 21st-highest rate in the league. The rest of the defense ranked No.1 in the NFL in yards allowed per play by a wide margin (its 4.6 YPP average was a full third of a yard lower than No. 2 Washington). Any throw rushed into the secondary would fall onto the radar of All-Pro cornerback Jalen Ramsey and rising young counterpart Darious Williams.
Fields would take the field behind a group of blockers that was in flux coming into 2021 and then riddled with injury as training camp wore on. Here’s what the team’s current offensive line depth chart looks like.
Wilkinson had a PFF grade of 52.5 last year. Simmons was a seventh-round pick out of Tennessee State in 2020 whose impact was so limited Pro Football Reference and Wikipedia can’t figure out if he actually played a snap last fall. Peters is a likely Hall of Famer, but he’s also set to turn 40 years old this season and is no longer an above average pass blocker. As it currently stands, only Whitehair had a blocking grade higher than 66 last fall.
Furthermore, the receiving situation for whomever is launching passes from the center of a shrinking pocket is ...suspect. Allen Robinson remains quite possibly the league’s most underrated receiver, but behind him is second-year pro Darnell Mooney (whom I love wholeheartedly), Marquise Goodwin, Damiere Byrd, Riley Ridley, and Javon Wims. The tight end group could get a breakout year from Cole Kmet, or he, Jesse James, and Jimmy Graham could underwhelm. There’s only one -- two, if we’re counting Mooney (and we probably should) -- target who can lift his quarterback to new heights.
This is all very bad for a player trying to build momentum to begin his pro career. A full Sunday night of getting wrecked in primetime would give way to a week of getting roasted on Illinois Tollway drivetime radio. So instead, why not throw a player into the mix who won’t crush a fanbase’s hopes but is still good enough to arguably give the Bears their best chance to win in Week 1?
Andy Dalton is ...fine
Dalton got lost in the wash of a Cowboys team with a wretched defense and a crisis year from Ezekiel Elliott, but he played useful football his first year away from Cincinnati. His 87.3 passer rating was right in line with what he’d averaged in nine years as a Bengal, which included three Pro Bowl nods and four playoff bids. He had only nine turnovers in 10 games (eight interceptions, one fumble lost).
He also helmed an offense with Amari Cooper, CeeDee Lamb, and Michael Gallup at the ready and had only one 300+ passing yard performance. His 6.3 adjusted yards per attempt ranked 28th among qualified quarterbacks last season, behind Cam Newton and Nick Mullens and only two spots ahead of Daniel Jones. There’s a relatively high floor for his performances at this point, but also a low ceiling.
So far he’s posted a 82.2 passer rating to Fields’ 83.5 this preseason while providing none of the run game spark. He’s also done so against defenses fielding more actual starters compared to the practice squad fodder that typically dominates the back end of exhibition games. It’s reasonable to suggest Dalton and Fields would have a similar net impact on the game -- Fields would be way more exciting, while the veteran would be more risk averse while probably getting ruined by the Rams’ defense.
There’s value to that! Andy Dalton doesn’t possess a ton of high-level NFL traits, but he’s certainly durable. He got absolutely wrecked by Jon Bostic last year:
only to return from injury and record one of his most efficient stretches as an NFL quarterback. Dalton had a 101.7 passer rating in the six games that followed (13 touchdowns, four interceptions) in a 4-2 stretch that kept Dallas in the olive skewer swordfight that was the NFC East in 2020.
Letting Dalton, a veteran forged in the fires of pessimism and abuse that rage throughout a Marvin Lewis team, get ruined behind a rackshamble offensive line against one of the league’s top defenses wouldn’t have a net negative effect on him or the team. What it *would* do is build hype for Fields to break into the lineup and receive a hero’s welcome once he finally does. That could be in Week 2 against Cincinnati, Week 3 against a tougher Browns roster, or in Weeks 4 or 5 against the decidedly unintimidating defenses of the Lions and Raiders.
That would give him the opportunity to shine -- and build up some confidence before an absolutely brutal stretch of schedule that will throw the Packers, Buccaneers, 49ers, Steelers, and Ravens into his orbit in a six-week span. From the sound of his media clips, Fields would probably be fine with it!
Andy Dalton isn’t the exciting choice for Chicago, but with the Rams ready to play angry in Week 1, he may be the safest one. Asking Fields to make the leap from preseason games to a showdown with Aaron Donald requires some heavy lifting. While he may be up to the task there’s wisdom in saving him for a better debut and allowing him to build confidence against a team that won’t repeatedly punish him for playing behind a sub-replacement level line.
In other words, let Dalton take this one, Bears fans. The whole reason you signed him was to be the sponge that filter feeds all the abuse of a rough start, then dumps that back into the world as unbridled optimism for a young quarterback to suck slightly less. And “sucking slightly less” would be a reason to celebrate a Bears QB given the past four decades.
I agree with starting Dalton. Let him get beat up until the Offensive line gets better than bring in Fields