Maxx Crosby looms as Bears seek first road victory

Ariana Pensy · Correspondent · 2 hours ago

CHICAGO - The Chicago Bears are still looking for their first road win of the season as they prepare to face the Las Vegas Raiders on Sunday, Sept. 28 (3:25 p.m. / CBS).

To defeat the Raiders and go into the bye week with a non-losing record, the Bears will have to get past one of the best defensive ends in the league, Maxx Crosby, and face a veteran quarterback in Geno Smith.

“Defensively, obviously, it starts with Maxx Crosby. He’s, I think in my opinion, he’s a top-five player in this league on defense and probably doesn’t get the recognition that he deserves. He’s all over the place, relentless, high motor and you got to account for him and know where he’s at every single snap or else he’ll get you and he wrecks drives. That’s what he does and then they got great team speed on that side. Those guys are flying around,” head coach Ben Johnson said. “Offensively, they got playmakers at every position group. Quarterback’s playing at a high level. I think they’re the number one team in explosive plays right now on offense and so, we got our work cut out for us. That goes without even mentioning their head coach who, I got a ton of respect for Pete Carroll. He’s been doing this for almost 30 years whether at the college level or the NFL and I think he only has four losing seasons. So, that’s a credit to who he is. The teams take his identity. They play hard. They play fast. They play physical. They fly around and I know that he’ll have this group ready to go this week. So, we got to answer that call. We’re still looking for our first road win and we have yet to obviously win two games back-to-back and so, that’s huge for us and where we’re going.”

Chicago is coming off their first win of the season, a dominant 31-14 victory over the Dallas Cowboys. Quarterback Caleb Williams won NFC Offensive Player of the Week for his four-touchdown performance. It was the first time in nearly two years that a Bears quarterback received this honor.

Johnson said Williams is becoming more comfortable in this offense, and as they give him more to learn, he is able to grasp it quickly, which is also contributing to the offense's rapid progress.

“I think it’s the comfort level right now of taking all this information over the course of the week, which is a lot. We just had a walkthrough and we screw some things up and that’s because we just talked about it for the first time and we’re going to screw a couple things up in the walkthrough. We got to get better at it during practice and then what I think I’m most impressed at with him and his process is the next day, he really locks everything in from the day before. We don’t have to go back and revisit it again,” Johnson said. “So, he’s a quick study in that regard and because of that, we can load up the game plan more each week. Week three was a lot more than week one and hopefully, that’s our new normal here going forward is not just for him, but for the entire offense, we can have a little bit more in the game plan to help attack some of these defenses and so, because he’s doing that and his comfort level’s growing, we’re able to grow as an offense.”

It also helps a quarterback’s development when he has a natural chemistry with one of his receivers. That is precisely the case for Williams and fellow second-year player, wide receiver Rome Odunze. Odunze currently has four touchdowns through the first three games, which is tied for first in the NFL. He is also one of two players to have at least one touchdown in every game, with former Bears receiver Keenan Allen being the other one.

Williams’ touchdown to Odunze in Chicago’s game against the Dallas Cowboys, as well as the defense’s stand against Dallas right at the end of the first half, display the kinds of improvements Johnson has been looking for as a head coach.

“It’s the natural connection that those two have. It was a great release by Rome and (you) see growth all across the board from week one all the way to week three and that’s a good example of it. Week one we had one of those mailbox plays and we weren’t able to connect and then week three, we did and we were. I’d say very familiar to our defense week one. Right before halftime, no timeouts and about 20 seconds left and we gave up an explosive play and gave up a field goal before halftime. Well this past week, almost the same scenario and yet, they were able to hold for us and we were able to get into halftime without giving up any points,” Johnson said. “So, that’s, to me as a coach, that’s what I’m looking for. I’m looking for how are we getting better each week? How are we growing as a team through this first quarter of the season? We’ll reassess everything once we get to the bye and go on from there. But, as always, everything about this week (is) the preparation for how do we win one game here this week?”

If the Bears are able to defeat Las Vegas, it would be the first time Chicago has won consecutive games since weeks four through six of last season, when they won three games in a row.