This is one of my favorite articles of the year. Daydreaming about the worst case scenarios for the inferior teams of the NFC North. Let's talk about what could, anbd hopefully will, go wrong.
Bears
Caleb Williams is bad. A few weeks ago I talked about how a cross body throw that was picked was typical for Williams and some bears fans invaded the comments mad because Williams never throws picks. The point is that he does too much. Running around and forcing throws instead of sitting in the pocket and reading the play out. Anyway, if he's just bad like the last 35 or so first-round Bears QB picks then the team will be really bad.
The high risk o-line fixes don't work out. The Bears strategy for fixing the o-line was to trade for an ancient guard, sign an injury prone one and then overpay a one-trick pony at center. (Remember we're trying to be overly negative here). It wouldn't be a huge shock if one or two of those moves don't work out. Ben Johnson's offense would break down with a bad o-line.
The highly paid edges are what we thought they were. Neither Dayo Odeyingbo nor Montez Sweat have been particularly exciting edge rushers over the past few years. The Bears are counting on them to collapse the pocket and get pressure with four to make Dennis Allen's defense work.
The highly paid linebacker core falls apart. Allen's defense is also dependent on strong linebackers who can cover and rush the passer. TJ Edwards was once able to do those things but has always been a minus athlete. Tremaine Edmunds was just never good.
Vikings
JJ McCarthy is bad. We're gonna have the same first bullet for all three teams here. If the QB isn't good, the team won't be. McCarthy is a second-year rookie who suffered a horrendous leg injury in training camp last year. Some say he was over drafted to begin with and some say Kevin O'Connell and the Vikings weapons would make any QB good. We'll see.
Aaron Jones gets hurt. Jones played a lot more than anyone would've expected last season but he's still an undersized, older, injury prone running back. The Vikings traded for Jordan Mason this off-season but he's just a guy who was elevated by Shanahan.
Harrison Smith falls off a cliff. Smith is older than me and is still a cornerstone of this defense.
Brian Flores leans too much on the zone blitzes. Flores gets the most out of this defense when he can win with four and throw in some freaky blitzes at surprising times. If he has to blitz every down it doesn't work out.
Lions
Back to the QB. Jared Goff is a great QB when he's protected and has a nice play action first offense to run. Now, he's slowly losing his o-line and we have an all new offensive coordinator this season.
Jahmyr Gibbs gets hurt. I think Gibbs is the key piece on this offense outside of the o-line. We've been talking about him being undersized forever, eventually you have to think he'll get hurt. How will a first-year Lions OC adjust?
No pressure. Aidan Hutchinson is coming off a bad leg injury and the rest of the available d-line are run stoppers first and foremost. If a first-year DC has to start relying on blitzing it could lead to a lot of big plays from the offense.
Bad corners. The Lions, who want to run a press-man scheme, blew their free agency loan on DJ Reed, a small corner who excelled in a zone scheme the past few years and was average before that. On the other side, Terrion Arnold was PFF's 109th ranked corner last year. Could be a problem!
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Mike Price is a lifelong Packers fan who recently moved from Utah to Stoughton (a Madison suberb). You can follow him on twitter at @themikeprice.
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