Among the issues the Chicago Bears have had in losing their first two games of the season, the defense is now on center stage after allowing 73 points over the last three quarters. In particular, the pass rush has been severely lacking despite some notable investments that have been made in the defensive front.
Over his last 18 games, last season and the first two games this season, defensive end Montez Sweat has 5.5 sacks. In the nine games after the Bears acquired him in 2023, he had six sacks. A closer look at deeper metrics since he became a Bear showed a big red flag coming into this season, and fortified how he needed to have a rebound season this year.
After the 52-21 loss to the Detroit Lions in Week 2, former Bears linebacker Lance Briggs calmly called Sweat out.
"What is my standard? What is Montez Sweat's standard?", Briggs said. "Am I a premier player or am I just a guy? Cause right now you look like just a guy getting paid premier money.”
PFF is (mostly) higher than anyone else on Montez Sweat's work so far this season
In their pass rusher rankings heading into Week 3, Pro Football Focus has Sweat ranked at No. 23. This ranking reflects PFF's generally high assessment of Sweat's performance so far this season.
Sweat enters Week 3 as PFF's 27th highest-graded edge defender this season, with the 18th-best pass rushing grade at the position (74.5). His 61.8 run defense grade thus far is above average, but Sweat is paid to get after the passer, and PFF's grades defy what we've seen through two games.
That said, even PFF can't fully hide where Sweat continues to fall short. His 10.5 percent pass rush win rate this season is outside the top-65 among edge rushers with at least 17 pass rush snaps, and among the aforementioned top-32 pass rushers for Week 3, that pass rush win rate is third-worst. The two below him (Cameron Heyward and DaRon Payne) are interior defensive linemen.
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Better play up front, and ratcheting up the heat on opposing quarterbacks, will be the biggest key to the Bears' defense performing better moving forward (not that it can be any worse than it was in Week 2). That starts with Sweat, who has been in some kind of slumber for more than a season now, stepping up his game as the spotlight on his underperformance gets brighter and brighter.