Justin Fields left the sideline in the 3rd quarter for the locker room. It was later revealed the Chicago Bears starting quarterback suffered a dislocated thumb on his throwing hand. While nothing was broken, there is almost certainly ligament damage. It is a matter of how severe. Initial belief is he will likely miss next Sunday’s game against the Las Vegas Raiders, maybe more. That means rookie Tyson Bagent is in line to start. He stepped in for Fields against Minnesota and played pretty well. He went 10-of-14 for 89 yards and ran for a touchdown. Unfortunately, his work was undone by two costly turnovers.
It shouldn’t have been a huge surprise. He came in cold against an opponent with a big lead with zero playing experience outside the preseason. The turnovers can’t happen. To his credit, he took full ownership of them. However, he also had some impressive moments throwing the football. He showed flashes of that poised, confident player we saw in August. By the sound of things, other players in the locker room don’t seem overly nervous about the idea of Bagent starting some games until Fields is healthy. Kevin Fishbain of The Athletic got some interesting quotes.
Tyler Scott
“Came in, had command of the huddle, had command of the offense,” Scott said. “He just has this confidence about him.”
D.J. Moore
“He’s a baller, as you could see,” Moore said. “He showed he belongs. He made impressive throws and was doing well at the line. It was cool to see.”
Lucas Patrick
“Full confidence in 1-7,” he said. “What most people don’t get to see is the moxie of that kid. We all know that this is Justin’s team. Justin’s our quarterback. That’s not an easy role to be behind somebody like that. That kid came in and showed why we like him, why the locker room has his back. He’s a tough, tough, special kid.”
Cole Kmet
“Self-confidence. I think that’s evident,” Kmet said. “Being around him since camp, I think he’s got a lot of self-confidence. He’s got conviction in what he does and what he says. If he’s got to take over for a little bit, we’re going to rally around him.”
Tyson Bagent doesn’t seem afraid of the moment.
His fumble on the first drive wasn’t entirely his fault. Most of it was created by missed blocking assignments up front. After that, he looked pretty sharp until the final two minutes. His underthrown pass to D.J. Moore that led to an interception was on him. That is one you can’t throw. It looks like he will have a chance to learn from that experience next week. Las Vegas presents considerable challenges as a passer, largely thanks to the presence of star pass rusher Maxx Crosby. Asking a rookie to navigate that is tough.
It will be interesting to see what Tyson Bagent does with a full week to prepare. He’ll get every available snap in practice to build some chemistry with his receivers. He at least has the common sense to target D.J. Moore often and seems to have a connection with fellow rookie Scott. The key will be cutting down on his reckless tendencies and playing within the structure of the offense. From there, it falls on his teammates to pick up the slack and the coaches to provide a game plan he can execute.
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It doesn’t sound like a locker room devoid of hope. They seem confident Bagent can give them a chance to win.
Even if you explain away the fumble, that was a bad INT. Bagent seems to bring more energy, but the next opponent has all week to scheme something up for him. I’d love to see him succeed, but we’ve been down this road before.
The INT and fumble aside, Tyson Bagent outplayed J Fields overall.
Why should they visibly be upset? Bagent is a teammate. Next man up.
The Bears went back to the first 3 games of play calling. All they need to do was s roll Fields out, but of course they didn’t do that. The Bears should have beat their ass.
Big lead? It was 12-6
Fields is most likely (99%) to miss at least the next 2-4 weeks and if there is significant damage to the ligatures and joint more likely he is on IR and out for the next 6 weeks. L Getsy may then adjust the offense to T Bagent who may just explode in similar fashion as B Prudy and create a huge decision issue for all concerned.