Are fourth quarters an issue for Chicago Bears QB Justin Fields?
There has been a lot of talk about Justin Fields and winning final drives. Some Chicago Bears fans are pushing back, but saying that there are still areas in the game of Justin Fields that need to improve is not controversial. Every quarterback strives to get better every day and every week, and this is one area for Fields.
It is easy to just say that the defense stinks, and if they held leads, the Chicago Bears would not need Fields to become the game-winning drive-creator. However, it is also true that when the fourth quarter starts, we start to see some of the worst from Justin Fields. This is less about the game-winning drive and more about the game-winning quarter altogether.
Below are two images that show CPOE compared to EPA per play, courtesy of RBSDM.com. Expected points added are the value you add to the team, and CPOE is how accurate you are for how hard the throw is. In the first image, we will show Justin Fields in the first three quarters, then we will show the fourth quarter.
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This is for the entire season, so he still has struggled early on in games. Still, his EPA is much higher than average, as he sits up near Jimmy Garoppolo. In the first three quarters, he is a playmaker. He is below average in accuracy, but he is making things happen, and increasing the chances his team scores points.
Now, we see the fourth quarter.
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His CPOE stays almost exactly the same, it is just that his EPA crashes from near 0.2 to -.025. He goes from being a playmaker to somebody who starts to hurt the team.
Justin Fields really started to turn things around in week seven. The win against the Patriots launched a four-week span of 30 points per game.
Below, you can see just how good he has been. This is just the first three quarters.
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His EPA is up around 0.4, nearly double what his full-season EPA is in the first three quarters. Beyond that, his CPOE is significantly higher in the past couple of weeks. This has Fields as one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL over the past four weeks in quarters 1-3. That is no shock to most fans.
Still, below we see the past month in the fourth quarter.
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The CPOE drops back to its normal averages, and his EPA play is back in the negatives. None of his first six weeks are dragging this down, this is who he is in the fourth quarter of his magical run.
You can see that Josh Allen has a similar shift as Fields right now. However, the Bills are also losing games in the fourth quarter, they lost two straight and blew a lead to Green Bay. So, while it is fair to say that Allen is playing at the same level as Fields, it is just as fair to say that Allen is taking deserved criticism for it. On the flip side, you can see Patrick Mahomes is about as impressive in the first three as he is in the last. That is the type of quarterback play that will not get much criticism.
Justin Fields is dynamic, and in the first three quarters, the stats show that not many are giving their team more. However, it is not just the final drive for Fields. It has been the fourth quarter as a whole when he reverts back to his first month of the season in play.
The Chicago Bears do not have to be in comeback mode, but we need to see Fields keep the same energy that he has in the first three quarters throughout the game. Nobody is saying Fields is not holding his own, or that he cannot pass. It is just something he needs to improve on in the coming weeks.