Mitchell Trubisky saw his first preseason action in Matt Nagy's new system. The second-year Chicago Bears quarterback wasn't thrilled with how it looked.
"Our standards are higher that we expect to be better," Trubisky said, via NBC Sports Chicago. "No excuse for first preseason game. We have a bunch of experienced guys from last year, so there shouldn't be any jitters. Maybe guys were excited, but it's very simple -- come out here, do your job, do exactly what we were doing in practice. We practiced our butts off this week. We just came out here and were sloppy."
Trubisky finished the night 2-of-4 passing for a measly four yards in two penalty-filled drives. He had an eight-yard scramble negated by a flag and picked up just one first down via penalty. Additionally, the Bears needed to use a timeout on the opening drive on a third-and-long
"It's going to be changed, because that's not who we are or who we want to be," Trubisky said.
The first play from scrimmage, Trubisky aired out a deep shot to Kevin White that landed just beyond the wideout's hands. It's the type of aggressive style Trubisky expects to employ this season under Nagy.
"We're going to be aggressive all year long," Trubisky said. "Everyone's got to buy into that mentality that we're going to take shots (downfield), and we just got to make them work. ... We just got to connect on those, and we will. We have in practice, so we just got to keep getting better."
First-time head coach Matt Nagy downplayed the uninspiring night for his starting unit.
"This is so early right now, it really is," Nagy said. "... It will be fun as we go here to get them some more snaps, let them get into a rhythm and, really, for all the guys to get into a rhythm offensively. He's going to have eight snaps to take a look at and see what was right and what was wrong, but it's hard to judge off of eight plays."
Nagy is correct. We'd be foolish to make drastic assumptions based on a handful of plays.
Yet, it's a positive that Trubisky was honest with himself, teammates, and the media about his performance, however brief, and his expectations. The young player could easily have swept the game under the rug, brushing it off as a no-big-deal preseason game. His open admission that he and the entire offense must improve shows the young signal-caller is becoming a leader.
"You get limited to so many plays, so you go out there and try to do the best you can with it," Trubisky said. "It's gotta be better. It will be better."
