It's a well-worn narrative now, but leading the league in takeaways covered a lot of flaws in the Chicago Bears defense in 2025. It's not a stretch to say Dennis Allen's unit didn't do anything else particularly well.
A concerted effort was made this offseason to get younger, faster, and more athletic on defense. On the pass rush front, internal improvement is being relied on unless something changes rather dramatically. The holdovers from last season didn't have to learn Allen's defensive scheme from square one this offseason, which can only help foster improvement.
Takeaways can be very random, so we have to assume the Bears will experience some level of regression there this season. The defense's success this season will have to be rooted in more stable/predictive areas, and the path to that feels obvious.
One data split spotlights Bears' path to defensive improvement in 2026
Ted Nguyen of The Athletic has the Bears' defense on his list of defenses that are "poised to break out" this season. The struggles of the run defense stand out the most from last season, and Nguyen put a specific data split behind the clear idea of that as the key to improvement for the whole unit this year.
"The Bears had two different defenses last year: Their early-down defense and their third-down defense. They ranked 25th in defensive EPA per snap on first and second down, but ranked seventh on third down. The Bears ranked second on third-and-fourth down with more than seven yards to the first-down marker. The reason was simple: they struggled mightily to stop the run. They ranked 26th in defensive rushing success rate and 27th in explosive rush rate allowed. We saw coordinator Dennis Allen’s ingenuity with his disguises and pressures in obvious passing situations, but the defense didn’t earn enough of those opportunities because it couldn’t stop the run, which resulted in finishing 25th in defensive DVOA."
Nguyen logically wondered if enough was done to fix the Bears' run defense this offseason. The return to health of cornerback Kyler Gordon (if that happens) will be big. Linebacker Devin Bush looks to be an upgrade over Tremaine Edmunds, and rookie safety Dillon Thieneman will add some juice to the effort from the back end.
As Nguyen noted, this year's unit doesn't have to be the 1985 Bears against the run for the entire defense to be noticeably better.
"The weakness at defensive tackle will likely prevent them from being a high-level run defense, but the surrounding pieces could be enough to at least make them average", Nguyen wrote. "That would be a force multiplier for them with how good Allen is as a play caller in passing situations. The Bears gave up the sixth-highest explosive run rate in the league last year; if they can cut that figure down, it will have a trickle-down effect for the rest of the defense."
A league-high 23 interceptions greatly aided the Bears' EPA mark on third down and in longer-yardage third and fourth down situations. By surface measures beyond the takeaways, yards allowed, completion percentage, etc., the pass defense wasn't all that great.
While Allen is an upper -tier schematic designer on the defensive side of the ball, and it's fair to say he has more pieces that fit said scheme now, being a sieve against the run puts any defense behind the eight-ball.
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If the Bears can manage to be average against the run this season, and more specifically cut down on the number of explosive runs they allow, the positive dominoes will naturally fall, and Nguyen's idea will be lined up to come true.
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