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By Rich Campbellcontact the reporter
On Monday, Cutler and running back Matt Forte joined offensive coordinator Aaron Kromer and coach/play-caller Marc Trestman in lamenting that continued imbalance.
Here are the highlights of what Forte and Cutler said on the matter:
Forte, on the importance of establishing the run and being committed to it:
“It’s of the utmost importance, especially if we’re playing outside, with the weather and stuff. You can’t just sit back there and throw 50 passes a game and expect to win. Their (the Lions’) front four were pinning their ears back. They didn’t have anything to do but pass rush. They’re not respecting the run, and then if you play fake, they’re not going take the play fake because you haven’t been running the ball. It’s a big part of the play-action game, to keep the defense off of keying on exactly what to do, whether it’s pass rush or trying to stop the run.”
Forte, on whether he believes that, even against top-ranked run defenses, you should keep running at them and eventually you might be successful:
“Yeah, of course. You can say the same thing the other way around. Just because you’re ranked in the top doesn’t mean you don’t try it. That would be like the defense, if we were ranked No. 1, them just laying down. ‘Well they’re ranked No. 1 so we’re just not going to play defense today.’ You have to make an effort to do that.”
Cutler, on how the game was affected by Forte never getting going:
“It makes things hard. You want to have some balance even if numbers-wise it's not as balanced as you want it to be. If you're running the ball efficiently and giving the illusion that you're going to run the ball, it definitely helps.”
Cutler, on how not committing to the run affected how the Lions’ linebackers defended play-action:
“You look at some of the play-actions against Detroit, they're flying out of there. They're getting underneath our stuff. They get paid, too, They're smart players.”
Cutler, on whether running the ball makes his life easier:
“Yeah. You want to throw the ball. You want to throw touchdowns. You want to throw (for) big yards. But you also want to win football games, and I think anyone that has been doing this for a while realizes that you’ve got to have the best of both worlds. You’ve got to kind of move the pocket. You’ve got to be able to run the ball. You’ve got to do some play-action. You’ve got to mix it up. There’s no one out there that can drop back 40-50 times consistently and win football games. It’s really hard.”
More: http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/football/bears/chi-matt-forte-bears-offense-20141201-story.html
On Monday, Cutler and running back Matt Forte joined offensive coordinator Aaron Kromer and coach/play-caller Marc Trestman in lamenting that continued imbalance.
Here are the highlights of what Forte and Cutler said on the matter:
Forte, on the importance of establishing the run and being committed to it:
“It’s of the utmost importance, especially if we’re playing outside, with the weather and stuff. You can’t just sit back there and throw 50 passes a game and expect to win. Their (the Lions’) front four were pinning their ears back. They didn’t have anything to do but pass rush. They’re not respecting the run, and then if you play fake, they’re not going take the play fake because you haven’t been running the ball. It’s a big part of the play-action game, to keep the defense off of keying on exactly what to do, whether it’s pass rush or trying to stop the run.”
Forte, on whether he believes that, even against top-ranked run defenses, you should keep running at them and eventually you might be successful:
“Yeah, of course. You can say the same thing the other way around. Just because you’re ranked in the top doesn’t mean you don’t try it. That would be like the defense, if we were ranked No. 1, them just laying down. ‘Well they’re ranked No. 1 so we’re just not going to play defense today.’ You have to make an effort to do that.”
Cutler, on how the game was affected by Forte never getting going:
“It makes things hard. You want to have some balance even if numbers-wise it's not as balanced as you want it to be. If you're running the ball efficiently and giving the illusion that you're going to run the ball, it definitely helps.”
Cutler, on how not committing to the run affected how the Lions’ linebackers defended play-action:
“You look at some of the play-actions against Detroit, they're flying out of there. They're getting underneath our stuff. They get paid, too, They're smart players.”
Cutler, on whether running the ball makes his life easier:
“Yeah. You want to throw the ball. You want to throw touchdowns. You want to throw (for) big yards. But you also want to win football games, and I think anyone that has been doing this for a while realizes that you’ve got to have the best of both worlds. You’ve got to kind of move the pocket. You’ve got to be able to run the ball. You’ve got to do some play-action. You’ve got to mix it up. There’s no one out there that can drop back 40-50 times consistently and win football games. It’s really hard.”
More: http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/football/bears/chi-matt-forte-bears-offense-20141201-story.html
