Bears ripped for reason all too familiar to Chicago fans

The Chicago Bears finally had a breakthrough last season, recording 11 wins and capturing the NFC North division title before winning their first playoff game since January 2011.

What made it even better was that the postseason victory came at the expense of the Green Bay Packers.

As you would expect, expectations have been high for the Bears heading into 2026. After all, they’re largely a young team that should be getting better and better as time passes, right? Well, perhaps not if they don’t fix their glaring areas of weakness.

Chicago had a clear need in its pass rush going into the offseason, as the club totaled just 35 sacks in 2025. But the Bears oddly chose to ignore the edge rusher position over the last several months, failing to add one via free agency or the NFL Draft.

ESPN’s Courtney Cronin sees this as a rather significant potential problem for Ben Johnson’s group.

Chicago Bears taken to task over their pass rush

In a piece where each NFC North team reporter broke down their respective club’s offseason, Cronin zeroed in on the neglect of the pass rush for the Bears’ biggest surprise.

“The Bears went from acknowledging that their pass rush needed improvement to saying they will rely on better coaching to fix their issues up front. In 2025, defensive end Montez Sweat led the Bears with 44 pressures while the next closest player was defensive tackle Gervon Dexter Sr. with 17. Will coaching truly be enough to fix this team’s weakest link?” Cronin wrote.

Sweat registered 10 sacks last season. The only player with five or more was Dexter, who logged six. Yes, Austin Booker managed 4.5 sacks in 10 games, so it would be nice to see what he can do over the course of a full campaign. But Dayo Odeyingbo tore his Achilles halfway through 2025 and had posted just one sack in eight games anyway, and Shemar Turner is entirely unproven.

The fact that Chicago didn’t even really attempt to add a veteran pass rusher to the group is strange, especially considering that names like Jadeveon Clowney, Leonard Floyd, Cameron Jordan and Joey Bosa are still available as we speak.

It doesn’t appear that the Bears have any plans to make an addition, so maybe they are just really confident in Booker potentially having a breakout season next fall.

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