CHICAGO – No matter where he’s been in football, there is one thing that’s meant the most to the Bears’ new offensive coordinator.
Naturally, it has to do with the person that’s running his scheme.
“The play-caller and the quarterback have to have a great relationship,” said Luke Getsy this weekend at Halas Hall. “That’s important. We have to be on the same page always.”
The person will be Justin Fields as the former Packers’ quarterbacks coach and passing game coordinator tries to create a situation that will allow the 2021 first round pick to thrive along with the Bears’ offense as a whole. Making that happen has been a struggle of decades and not just years for the franchise, and Getsy’s ability to change that will determine the length of his time in Chicago.
It won’t be till the fall before fans get the real chance to see what the new scheme could do, and it could be a few years before the Bears put together a roster to make it work. So for right now, the key is building the on-field and meeting room rapport between the coordinator and quarterback.
For now, that’s going quite well, according to Getsy, who had glowing things to say about Fields during his news conference at the Bears’ rookie minicamp.
“I’ve been super impressed with him, I really have,” said Getsy of Fields. “There’s no one in this building that works harder than him. There’s no one that cares more than him. We’re off to a great start. He’s really accepted this challenge. We’re asking a lot of him, to learn a lot of new things.
“He’s been a pleasure to work with.”
These are all positive developments as Fields enters his second season with the Bears after a 2021 season in which the team struggled to protect him, put a scheme together that took advantage of his strengths, while Fields himself dealt with his own rookie mistakes over the course of 12 games.
So why does Getsy have so much optimism already from the work that he and Fields have done in a short time?
“Where I’ve felt like he’s grown is he’s communicating with me so well now. Things that he’s feeling. Things that he sees. That part of it has just been tremendous for a young guy to be able to do that these three or four months we’ve been together now,” said Getsy. “It’s been a lot of fun.”
Working well with the offensive coordinator is key but so is the chemistry that Fields will have to build with a nearly brand new receiver group. Darnell Mooney returns along with tight ends Cole Kmet and Jesper Horsted, but most of the pass-catchers will be getting to know Fields for the first time.
“Some of these new guys that have come in the building that didn’t even know Justin before, they’ve all connected really well,” said Fields. “Things have been getting better every single day. The routes that we get to throw during the week and implement that stuff on-air.
“I mean, all that stuff has been really good and I’m really impressed. I can’t wait to see these guys run around again in OTA’s. That minicamp, everything was so new and everything, guys we’re spinning a little bit, too. So I feel like everyone’s got a really good grasp with what’s going on right now. So it will be fun to watch them in OTAs.”
Getsy could say the same about Fields based on his glowing comments on the quarterback this weekend.
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