To break playoff drought, Bears need Leonard Floyd to become NFL's next great pass rusher
Outside linebacker is a weakness the Bears can only overcome if Floyd lives up to his potential
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5 min read
Mitchell Trubisky is the Chicago Bears' most important player, but if the Bears are going break their deceptively long playoff drought (it's been since 2010!), they need more than just Trubisky to turn the corner. They also need Leonard Floyd to turn into the quarterback hunter they envisioned him as when they traded up to draft him ninth overall in 2016.
Floyd, along with Trubisky, is the key to the Bears pulling a Rams.
Allegedly, the Bears are the most likely candidate to become this year's version of the Rams, a team that underwent a historic transformation a season ago, going from a laughingstock to a powerhouse. It's easy to understand why the Bears are drawing comparisons to the Rams. They swapped out an older, outdated coach (John Fox) for an innovative offensive mind (Matt Nagy), just like the Rams did. They have the second-year quarterback oozing potential (Trubisky), just like Rams had with Jared Goff. They have a sturdy offensive line, fun toys for their coach to play with, and a defense that is better than its reputation suggests.
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But what the Bears don't have is a dependable pass rush. The pass rush -- rather, their lack of a pass rush — appears to be the Bears' biggest weakness, and it's a weakness that will likely hold them back. While the Bears have some tremendous defensive players in the front-seven like defensive end Akiem Hicks, defensive tackle Eddie Goldman, and linebackers Danny Trevathan and Roquan Smith (this year's first-round pick), they don't really have a dependable second pass rusher to help Hicks.
More specifically, the Bears are lacking pass-rushing threats at outside linebacker. It's the Bears' most problematic position. After cutting both Willie Young and Pernell McPhee, the group is spearheaded by Floyd and bolstered by no one really. Sam Acho, who is coming off a three-sack season, is listed as the starter opposite of Floyd. Aaron Lynch, who has 2.5 sacks total over the past two seasons, is next in line, but he's been dealing with a hamstring injury for much of the summer.
So, where are the sacks and pressure going to come from? It's an important question -- as an important of a question as, will Trubisky make the leap from promising to great?
The NFL is a quarterback-driven league. More often than not, teams need two things to win a Super Bowl: a good quarterback and a defense that can stop a good quarterback. The best way to stop a quarterback is to repeatedly hit and harass him. And here's where it's worth pointing out that the Bears reside in the same division as Aaron Rodgers, Kirk Cousins, and Matthew Stafford. So, if they're going to journey into the January, they're going to need to overcome three upper-tier quarterbacks.
A year ago, the Bears racked up 42 sacks, tied for the seventh-most in football with three other teams. It came from a variety of difference sources, but a lot of those sources are no longer on the roster -- like McPhee, Young, and Lamar Houston, who combined for 10 of the Bears' 42 sacks. Hicks, who plays on the defensive line, is a sack creator, having notched 15.5 over the past two seasons. He led the team with 8.5. Nobody else finished with more five.
Hicks needs help. That's where Floyd comes into play.
In 2016, as he struggled to put on weight, he flashed serious potential, finishing with seven sacks and as Pro Football Focus' 11th-most productive pass rusher among 3-4 outside linebackers. But injuries (including a scary neck injury and a scary concussion) limited him to 12 games. In 2017, Floyd tallied only 4.5 sacks in a 10-game season cut short by a knee injury. Before going down, he was the 10th-most productive pass rusher among all 3-4 outside linebackers, per PFF.
The potential is clearly there. His burst and speed is undeniable.
And he's got some power in his arsenal too.
Next? He needs to improve how he uses his hands.
"His hands have come alive," Bears linebackers coach Brandon Staley said earlier this month, per the Chicago Tribune. "That was always, to me when I got here, the missing piece with him -- just being able to use his speed, use his length and attack these guys with his hands. He still has got a long way to go, but he's coming. You can see it."
The only problem? Floyd fractured his right hand in the preseason and later underwent surgery to repair the injury. There's a good chance Floyd will be able to play in the team's season opener against the Packers, but he might be forced to wear a cast or a club on his hand, which will hurt his chances to put his new handwork to use.
So already, Floyd is facing yet another injury obstacle on his path to becoming the pass rusher the Bears so desperately need. It's been a common theme during his young career, from his concussion issues to the knee injury that cut his second season short. It's difficult to blame any player for non soft-tissue injuries, and that's not what anyone should be doing after Floyd's first two seasons. But the Bears need Floyd to put it all together. And they need that to happen sooner rather than later, beginning immediately in Week 1 when they go up against Rodgers.
The good news is that Floyd has some experience bringing down Rodgers.
Bears general manager Ryan Pace has done well to rebuild the Bears from the disastrous state previous regimes left them in. He drafted a quarterback who appears to be the franchise savior the Bears have craved since forever really. He's drafted two good running backs in Jordan Howard and Tarik Cohen. He went out and signed Allen Robinson, Trey Burton, and Taylor Gabriel, giving Trubisky the weapons he didn't have a year ago. He's built a defense that has steadily improved under Vic Fangio's direction; they climbed from 24th to 13th in defensive DVOA from 2016 to 2017. But the one area he ignored this offseason is outside linebacker.
The Bears only have one good pass-rushing outside linebacker on the roster. If Floyd makes the leap and becomes a double-digit sack guy, the Bears might just manage to compete for a Wild Card spot. If Floyd doesn't, the Bears are going to be in a for a long season without a constant pass-rushing threat coming from the outside.
In so many ways, Floyd is just as important to the Bears as Trubisky. In a league shaped by quarterbacks and pass rushers, the Bears have one of each. Just how good both of those players actually are will determine the outlook of their 2018 season.
