5 reasons Mac Jones is perfect fit with Chicago Bears

4. RPO game

Another big difference between Shanahan and Nagy is their usage of RPOs. Last season Nick Foles and Mitch Trubisky threw 55 passes on RPO action. That would rank fifth in the NFL. Jimmy Garopppolo, Nick Mullens, and CJ Beathard combined to throw 24 times out of RPO action, which would have ranked 25th in the NFL.

On the contrary, the SF trio threw 146 passes off of play-action, which would rank fifth in the NFL. The Bears tried to run more play-action with Mitch Trubisky under center last year, but at his core, Nagy does not do it often. Trubisky ran 22% in 2018, which ranked 19th in the NFL and was at 19% in 2019 before shooting up to 36% in 2020. Still, when Foles played and ran the offense the way Nagy wants, they had 24% play action.

Nagy likes the RPO game, while Shanahan likes play-action more. Both mingle with both, but at their core rely on these staples. According to PFF, Trevor Lawrence ran an RPO or screen on 27% of his snaps.

Mac Jones was right behind at 22.5%, Zach Wilson was at 12.1%, Trey Lance at 11.2%, and Justin Fields at 8.5%

While Mac Jones did run his fair amount of play-action, again, most of that was from the shotgun. Beyond that, Jones is more comfortable and adverse in the RPO game than the play-action game.