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Courtney Cronin, ESPN Staff Writer
LAKE FOREST, Ill. — Chicago Bears quarterback Justin Fields characterized his play in a 27-17 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as “robotic” and did not feel that he was “playing like myself.”
A reason for what Fields believes is causing him to overthink in games, according to the 24-year-old quarterback, is what he has been coached to do.
“You know, could be coaching I think,” Fields said. “At the end of the day, they are doing their job when they are giving me what to look at, but at the end of the day, I can’t be thinking about that when the game comes. I prepare myself throughout the week and then when the game comes, it’s time to play free at that point. Thinking less and playing more.”
Fields was 16-of-29 for 211 yards, a touchdown and two interceptions and ran four times for 3 yards, including a 1-yard touchdown. The road loss extended Chicago’s losing streak to 12 games dating to Oct. 2022.
He said his approach against Kansas City in Week 3 will be rooted in “thinking less and playing more.”
“My goal this week is just to say F it and go out there and play football how I know to play football,” Fields said. “That includes thinking less and just going out there and playing off of instincts rather than so much say info in my head, data in my head. Just literally going out there and playing football. Going back to it’s a game and that’s it.
“That’s when I play my best, when I’m just out there playing free and being myself, so I’m going to say kind of bump all the what I should, this and that, pocket stuff. I’m going to go out there and be me.”
Fields said he believed coaching is part of the reason why he found himself struggling to process the information he’s received. The quarterback took six sacks against the Buccaneers, several of which came after remaining in the pocket for too long.
“I don’t think it’s too many coaching voices, but I just think when you’re fed a lot of information at a point in time and you’re trying to think about that info when you’re playing, it doesn’t let you play like yourself,” Fields said. “You’re trying to process so much information to where it’s like, if I just simplify it in my mind, I would have did this. I saw a few plays on Sunday, if I was playing like my old self, we would have had a positive play. There would have been more third down [conversions]. I think that’s just the biggest thing for me is playing the game how I know how to play and how I’ve been playing my whole life. That’s what I got to get back to doing.”
The quarterback said he spoke to the Bears staff about his concerns and felt that coaches were receptive to his diagnosis of what went wrong at Tampa Bay. Coach Matt Eberflus said he did not feel the Bears were overcoaching Fields and that “having him being free is what we want.”
“He respects that partnership and so do we,” Eberflus said. ‘We want him to play free. I think it’s very important that as we work through this making sure that he does play free, that we coach him that way.
“A lot of times he wants to be perfect. He wants to do it the right way. And there’s a balance there, though, right? There’s a balance between, ‘Hey, going through my progressions, but also having the ability to say, ‘Hey, I feel these things happening. Now I’m going to play instinctual.’ And that could be just sliding up in the pocket in the B gap and delivering the ball or taking off and running. I think that’s where that is.”
Meanwhile, Fields’ protection took a hit Wednesday with the news that starting left tackle Braxton Jones went on injured reserve due to a neck injury.
Asked if Jones could miss this season, Eberflus said: “We’ll see where it is. We don’t have timetables on it right now. That’s where it is right now.”