Chicago Sports Exchange: When It Came To Bears Starting Gig, Fields Never Stood A Chance
Sky earn franchise’s seventh playoff bid
It’s our own fault, really.
Without so much as a hint of an open competition at quarterback, a tidy sum of us had our hearts set on Justin Fields getting first dibs on the Los Angeles Rams in the season opener Sunday night.
That it’ll be Andy Dalton who’ll take the field with Allen Robinson, Darnell Mooney, Cole Kmet, and David Montgomery instead is a swift, Pat O’Donnell-like kick in the balls, for sure.
But let’s face it.
Short of a run-in with the injury bug, an uninspiring training camp or a lousy preseason (13-of-21 with two sacks, one touchdown and a turnover in nine possessions isn’t great, but it also isn’t that), the idea that Fields would overtake Dalton on the depth chart and begin his pro career on anything but the bench was plain wishful thinking.
Fields was never even given access to the team’s best weapons, save for a handful of snaps in training camp. Even assuming Fields could find, at minimum, a similar measure of success with his top-line teammates as he did with the likes of Rodney Adams, Riley Ridley, Khalil Herbert, Jesper Horsted, and Jesse James, the decade of experience that’s left Dalton with a 74-66-2 record and an 87.5 passer rating was always going to win out.
It’s been carved in stone since March.
The former Heisman Trophy finalist and two-time Big Ten Offensive Player of the Year wasn’t going to change that. Neither was the fact that it took a stroke of luck and four draft picks to get him here. Nor the months of Sundays that’ve come and gone without the franchise finding an honest-to-god solution at quarterback. Nor the parade of fans who nearly filled Soldier Field to the brim just to see the new symbol of hope in action in games that didn’t even count.
Like Dalton reminded everyone two weeks ago, “[Fields] is going to have his time and he's going to have a great career. But right now, it's my time…"
And why not? There is a spattering of Pro Bowl selections and four playoff appearances (all losses) on his résumé, after all.
No, Dalton didn’t clock what would have been the second-fastest 40-yard dash time for a quarterback in combine history. His name was never on the shortlist of candidates who were in the running to be called the most outstanding player in college football. The pride of Texas Christian University never played in a national championship game, let alone racked up 385 yards and six touchdowns against the third-best defense in the country in a performance for the ages just to get there.
But he did finish with the second-highest completion percentage of his career last season and wasn’t any worse than former can-carrier turned Buffalo Bills backup Mitch Trubisky when it came to playing under duress. That’s…something considering the 33-year-old’s projected protection of Jason Peters, Cody Whitehair, Sam Mustipher, James Daniels, and Germain Ifedi has had little time to coalesce.
Expectations for Dalton, much like those surrounding his second team in as many years, are low. This season promises to be defined more so by the amount of time Fields spends under center than actual wins and losses. Although the latter will certainly influence the former.
But, maybe myself, Jeff Saturday, Dan Orlovsky, and fifty-eleven of our “closest” friends are mistaken.
Maybe Dalton can be the spark to an offense that’s ranked in the bottom half of the league in points scored 16 times this millennium.
Maybe Dalton can pull more tricks out of his grandad-collared shirtsleeve to offset his lack of agility.
Maybe. Maybe not.
One thing’s for sure, while both he and Fields are ready to play, Dalton is the only one who’s ready to play right now.
Right, Matt Nagy?
BUY — Sky Punch Playoff Ticket, Dot “W25”
To the extent that about a quarter of the WNBAs most influential players are linked to the Sky and that the teeter-tottering team clinched a postseason berth, it was a banner day Sunday.
Here’s hoping they can stay on balance the rest of this season to raise one to the Wintrust Arena rafters at the start of the next.