Every season is a chance for players and teams to start new, or even better, build off of what they had started. The Chicago Bears will be no different, and they have a lot of room to move up after finishing with the first overall pick in 2022.
While some players will be asked to step up, others may have been demoted as the team tries to improve on their 2023 record. Who are two players that will be asked to step up, and two who may not have the same role next season?
1. Justin Fields will be more of a passer for the Chicago Bears.
This one should come off as obvious. If the Chicago Bears want to take that step forward as a team, it will be Justin Fields who is leading the way. That means seeing him take on a bigger role. As the quarterback, it is not like he is moving up the depth chart, but rather that the team is going to ask a lot more of him.
This is his second year in the same offense, so he will be expected to expand the playbook. The Bears will still lean run-heavy, but they have to start putting some of the burdens to pass on Fields. He has new weapons, so his stats should improve across the board.
More than that, they need to see growth in areas of his particular game that show that he is getting better, and it is not just the pieces around him. The line did not help, but he took too many sacks under pressure. Fields has to reduce this by getting the football out quicker. More than that, he has to be able to spread the football to all levels of the field.
Right now, most of his completions are either behind the line or twenty yards downfield. He needs more of a happy medium. If Justin Fields can take that step as a player he will be taking on a role as a leader of the team, and he will be someone the Chicago Bears have to build around. That is pretty vital.