Chicago Bears safety Kevin Byard’s favorite day of the work week is Thursday. Or third-down Thursday, to be exact.
When defensive players get to Halas Hall for their Thursday meetings, they know that coordinator Dennis Allen is about to unveil something unique for the next opponent and how to win the critical down and force a punt.
“You kind of get excited at the Thursday morning meetings to just try to see what the package is going to be like this week,” Byard said. “He’s going to blitz his safeties, blitz the (line)backers. He’s going to drop everybody into coverage. You just really never know.
“That’s the good thing about it. He’s going to keep the (opposing) offensive coordinator on his toes. Then obviously he’s going to mix it up; he’s going to call different calls. I think that’s why we have been pretty successful on third downs.”
The Bears rank near the bottom of the league in several defensive categories, but one thing that has helped buoy them to a 6-3 record is their ability to get off the field. They’re sixth in the league on third down, holding opponents to a 34.4 percent clip of moving the sticks.
“It’s fun, especially when he’s up there scheming stuff up, and he comes back downstairs and hits us with some good plays,” safety Jaquan Brisker said. “And we’re, like, ‘All right, this is about to work.’ And we’ll start running them in practice, and we’ll start getting the feel for it. And it’s amazing.”
Here’s a look at what makes Allen’s third-down defenses unique, along with colleague Ted Nguyen’s video breakdowns of three key Bears stops on third down.
Coach Ben Johnson explained what makes Allen’s third-down defense “very hard to prepare for.”
“I remember going against him a few years ago when he was in New Orleans, and you had to have a plan,” Johnson said earlier this season. “He finds a way a lot of times to find the unblocked rusher to get your quarterback. It’s very stressful there for the blocking unit, particularly if you’re in a six-man (protection), which most teams are on third down.”
Wide receiver DJ Moore faced Allen’s defenses when he was in the NFC South with the Carolina Panthers, and he was reminded of the challenges in training camp.
“It’s not one thing that looks the same on that defense,” Moore said. “Everything is different every play. It’s good for us, but I’m glad we don’t have to go against it on Sundays.”
Allen has coached in the NFL since 2002, including two head-coaching stints. From 2019 to 2023, his Saints defense ranked in the top 10 on third down four times.
“He’s been a very successful coach in this league for a long time, and I think you’ve got to continue to evolve,” Johnson said. “You can’t just be stagnant in this league or else someone younger, hungrier will find a way to surpass you, and he hasn’t allowed that to happen. He’s done this at a high level and so … he thinks outside the box. He’s very smart, very creative and I think our guys are really starting to understand, ‘OK, he’s giving us a strategic advantage each and every week right now.’”
Here’s how his scheme has rattled quarterbacks during the first nine games of the season.
Bears third-down pass ‘D’
| Stat | Total | Rank |
|---|---|---|
|
Rating |
63 |
3rd |
|
Comp. % |
54.7 |
8th |
|
INT |
5 |
2nd |
|
Def. pass EPA |
22.34 |
5th |
|
QB hits |
6 |
32nd |
It isn’t just taking advantage of third-and-long situations, but also Allen’s group has made big stops on third-and-short, like the late-game, third-and-2 stuff of running back Ashton Jeanty in the win over the Las Vegas Raiders. He’ll pull a linebacker and add a fifth defensive lineman to the mix.
When it’s a passing down, there will sometimes be eight players at the line, and it’s anybody’s guess who’s actually blitzing and who is dropping back. Sometimes he has defensive ends dropping in coverage, a tactic that requires buy-in.
“Anytime you do anything that might be different than people have done in the past, they’ve kinda got to see the results of that first, and then as they begin to see the results, they start to buy in more and more to the things that they’re being asked to do,” Allen said in September. “Sometimes guys have to do things that maybe they may not naturally just want to do, but yet they see the results and how it helps the entire football team.
“There’s going to be times where we’re going to create opportunities for a defensive lineman to go get some pressure on the quarterback. There’s going to be some times where we’re going to ask him to drop so we can create some pressure in other areas.”
The players echo similar sentiments about how the disguises work in their favor.
“It keeps you on your toes,” defensive end Montez Sweat said. “You don’t know what you’re gonna get.”
Added defensive tackle Grady Jarrett, “It gives a lot of variety and makes it fun.”
Cornerback Nahshon Wright has two picks and four passes defensed on third down this season.
“It allows us to play. Allows us to be aggressive,” he said. “Ultimately, it allows us to make plays. He has a variety of different things he likes to do week to week. I think it helps us just because the quarterback doesn’t necessarily know what he’s gonna get. I love the third-down defense.”
When it’s third down and the Bears have everyone up at the line of scrimmage, they can run a variety of looks off that once the ball is snapped. On the critical third-and-7 against the Giants, it was cornerback C.J. Gardner-Johnson who got home for a sack to force a punt. The next possession, linebacker Tremaine Edmunds got the quarterback hit and pass defensed on fourth down.
“I think everybody’s kind of excited at their position to try to see how D.A.’s gonna put them in position to ‘make their play this week’ is what we say,” Byard said. “And also how we’re gonna marry different disguises. Like out of one look, we can run three or four different plays. And then sometimes he’ll bring something back from what we did three or four weeks ago and bring it back up this week based upon what we feel the offense is gonna do.”
Allen’s coaching staff enjoys getting to help implement and teach his third-down playbook.
“D.A.’s a mastermind,” said defensive line coach Jeremy Garrett. “It confuses offenses. People don’t know what we’re gonna do because we have a variety of coverage, pressure, all those kinds of things. … I think he does a really good job of marrying the looks and giving everybody different pictures out of it to confuse quarterbacks.”
Nickelbacks coach Cannon Matthews works with a position that’s frequently involved in blitzes, as we have seen from Gardner-Johnson over the past two weeks.
“(There’s an) excitement of, ‘Ooh, I can’t wait to see this live,’” he said. “As a defensive coach, you love that.”
One thing Allen frequently uses on third-and-long is a dime defense, with three defensive linemen, two linebackers and six defensive backs. No. 3 safeties Jonathan Owens and Elijah Hicks have had reps on defense in those situations.
“You can’t really get a bead on front and coverage,” safeties coach Matt Giordano said. “That’s the awesome thing about it. They don’t know what coverage we’re gonna be, they don’t know what package we’re gonna be in. They don’t know our rotation. It’s great when you have great safeties to work with it.”
Per TruMedia, when opposing quarterbacks face a third down and 8-20 yards to go, they have a 39.3 passer rating against the Bears, the lowest in the NFL, while averaging only 5.8 yards per attempt.
Allen’s group is doing this without a consistent pass rush on third down, either, as the table above showed. In these third-and-long spots, the Bears have only one QB hit, but it’s the coverage and the ability to keep the ball in front of the first down that’s getting the team off the field.
“Sometimes we’ll blitz, sometimes we won’t, sometimes we’ll go back and drop eight, or whatever,” Brisker said. “There’s so many different things we have. That’s what I like about it. Once we get third-and-long, third-and-medium, things like that, we get to have fun. Really, third-and-short, too. So whenever we get on third down, it’s good for us.”
Maybe Allen’s third-down wizardry can continue to help mitigate a banged-up defense that is giving up too many yards, especially as the schedule gets tougher. Their next three opponents rank 31st (Minnesota Vikings), 26th (Pittsburgh Steelers) and 27th (Philadelphia Eagles) on third down.
It’s been the great equalizer for a defense that still has its deficiencies, as evidenced in the win over the Giants. Caleb Williams made massive plays when the offense needed them, and the defense helped get him the ball back. The Giants began the game 4-for-9 on third down but went 1-for-5 in the fourth quarter as the Bears stormed back.
“It’s just fun to kind of see how we can challenge their offensive coordinator and their quarterback to force them to make a mistake,” Byard said. “Thursdays are my favorite days for sure because, I mean, it’s a critical down. Third down is where you make your money. It’s the money day, as we say. (Allen’s) packages are pretty unique.”
— Ted Nguyen of The Athletic contributed to this report.