On the Bears offense:

Overall, I’d say Bowen likes the look of the Bears receivers.  He thinks Hester looks sharp on his routes and Johnny Knox has speed to burn.  Most interesting for me was his assessment of Devin Aromashodu:

WR Devin Aromashodu has great top end speed and once he gets past press coverage at the line of scrimmage, he can separate down the field. Stiff in the hips and not the type of receiver who can run multiple breaking routes, but the ideal player for the 9 route (go route) 8 route (deep post) and the 7 route (flag route) in this offense. Should be the vertical player for Cutler.

You got that Fantasy Footballers out there?

Bowen agrees with some early reports out of camp that the TE’s and Greg Olsen in particular will play a major role in Mike Martz’s offense.  On the ground, Bowen seems to like Forte a little more running inside while he gives a big thumbs up to Chester Taylor’s lateral quickness and getting to the outside.

Let’s face it, the offense will sink or swim on the arm of Jay Cutler.  Here’s what Bowen thinks about Cutler’s progress:

The Bears QB can sling the football. In the 3-step game, the ball comes out quickly and has some heat on it. And, just like last season, he will challenge the defense down the field—because he has the arm to do it. At times, I saw the same QB who will throw into coverage and can get carless with the football. But, there were also situations in practice when Cutler would fit the ball between two defenders and put the throw on the up-field shoulder away from the defender. Martz is going to push the envelope on offense and Cutler is the right QB for this system because he will take chances. Enormous talent, now he just has to learn how to produce and limit the turnovers in this system.

Like I’ve been saying, it’s going to be boom or bust.  Some insight on the defense after the jump.

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In the latest entry in his Inside the Playbook series, Bowen offers some insight on how to beat the Cover-2 defense.   As Bears fans, we had a front row seat to this as time and again, the defense was picked apart.  Let’s see what Bowen describes as the keys to beating Lovie’s favorite scheme.

First Matt gives us the 7/FLAT route.  Check out the alignment and Bowen’s breakdown after the jump. (more…)