Chicago Bears: Grading the team’s first half performance

Special teams: D

The Bears’ special teams hasn’t been very special for several seasons now. Things haven’t changed in the first half of this season. Too many mistakes resulted in too many touchdowns given up. Also, those mistakes led to turnovers, really hurting the team.

With the struggling offense, punter Pat O’Donnell leads the league in the number of punts made. His 48.2 yards per punt average ranks him 8th in the league. He’s done a good job changing the field position, putting the defense in a better position, including booting a 69 yarder.

Connor Barth had his struggles. His 64 percent field goal percentage made ranks 35th. Between 40-49, where a lot of games are won or lost, he made just 2 of 5. In order for the Bears to win more games, he needs to improve in that area.

Furthermore, in terms of returns, the Bears have no touchdowns. That isn’t too rare, but their opponents have two of them. More importantly, the returners haven’t had many big runs to give the offense a shorter field to work with. The average drive start for the Bears is their own 28-yard line. Cohen owns the team’s highest kickoff return average of 25 yards per return and highest punt return average of about 8 yards.

The special teams unit needs to correct itself if it wants to help the team win games. The Bears aren’t good enough to blow teams out, so field goals are extremely important. If the kickoff and punt return teams can give the offense a shorter field the offense could perhaps score more points. This is a team effort and all three areas of the team (offense, defense, and special teams) need to work in tandem to squeeze out as many wins as possible.