After Caleb Williams went down with a hamstring injury with 7:42 left in the fourth quarter, the Chicago Bears still had an opportunity to put points on the board against the Minnesota Vikings at Soldier Field.
The Bears were down 6-3 when backup quarterback Tyson Bagent took over for Williams. Bagent's first pass gained a yard to D'Andre Swift, and the Vikings then forced an incomplete pass on third-and-goal.
Kicker Cairo Santos then set up for a potential game-tying 23-yard field goal, but Vikings cornerback Isaiah Rodgers blocked the kick. The Vikings went on to win 9-3, moving to 2-0 and dropping the Bears to 1-1.
What went wrong with the missed field goal by the Bears
After head coach Ben Johnson reviewed the film, he explained what happened on the play. Johnson noted that the operation was not clean. Rodgers came off the left edge and made a play on the ball.
Bears rookie long snapper Beau Garner's snap was high, giving Rodgers just enough time to block the kick. But Johnson also said the Bears’ first field goal attempt in the first quarter was a “warning shot” since Rodgers was close to getting his hand on that football. The Bears’ head coach said the team addressed the near block on the sideline, but the team wasn't “able to get [the operation] corrected the second time, so certainly in a race to get that right.”
Many people on social media have pointed to rookie tight end Sam Roush as the main culprit on the play, but as Johnson mentioned, the operation wasn't clean. Former Bears long snapper Patrick Mannelly noted this on X.
Mannelly played 16 straight seasons for the Bears and played 245 career games. Mannelly acknowledged that the snap was high and Roush missed his block, but he also questioned the exact snap count and whether the ball was snapped on the correct count. He also noted that the entire unit didn't move together.
The Bears had plenty go wrong in the 9-3 loss to the Vikings in Week 2, and they'll need to address those issues before their Monday night matchup against the Philadelphia Eagles at Soldier Field.
Read more: Lamar Jackson has the perfect blueprint for Caleb Williams' hamstring recovery
Special teams coordinator Richard Hightower will take over the special teams unit. In contrast, Johnson and the other coordinators and position coaches address the issues that came up in the Week 2 loss to the Vikings.
Add us as a preferred source on Google