How Bears' Luke Getsy Coaches ‘Rookie' Justin Fields Through Struggles

How Bears OC Getsy coaches 'rookie' Fields through struggles originally appeared on NBC Sports Chicago

LAKE FOREST, Ill. – After Justin Fields' second interception against the Houston Texans, television cameras caught offensive coordinator Luke Getsy and backup quarterback Trevor Siemian having a discussion with the Bears' quarterback.

For some coaches – see Notre Dame offensive coordinator Tommy Rees – those post-turnover chats can be more one-sided tongue lashings than in-depth discussions.

But Getsy isn't that kind of coach. He saw Fields' second interception – where the 23-year-old tried to force the ball to Darnell Mooney while being pressured – as a teaching moment.

"I think it was more about just the moment in the sense of like, hey, this is an opportunity to learn from this moment. You know, why that happened, the way that it happened, and how we can improve from it, that's all," Getsy said Thursday. "We keep it real. We talk about what happened. Hey, this is why that happened. This is how we can avoid it, so it doesn't happen again. And he's in that moment.

"He's basically a rookie, right, even still and he's going through these experiences for the first time. And to then just think, I made a really bad decision and then not really know why, I think it's important to make sure you're explaining to them why things happened. And so, I think that's just hopefully how we're all coaching across the board here. And that's just a learning moment that we want to take advantage of."

Getsy calling Fields a "rookie" made many antennas stand up. However, from Getsy's standpoint, Fields, who has only made 13 career starts and only three in this offensive system, is still just that.

The rookie quip, along with the Bears' conservative, run-heavy play-calling, would suggest Fields has yet to earn Getsy's complete trust. The Bears' offensive coordinator is adamant that's not the case. 

"Oh, no. Not at all," Getsy said. "We do whatever we have to do to win games. So we've opened up the passing game. It's not like we haven't called pass plays that we were … or that we've been intimidated to call a play by any means. We're calling the game we feel is best to attack with our matchups.

"The perspective is that everything is just because it's through Justin. But we have 10 other guys that we have to account for too. Sometimes we aren't able to go five wide and spread people out, because matchups we have to deal with. That goes into a lot of things. As we go through the games, we've just got to find our way to take advantage of the matchups that we feel really good about and stay away from those matchups that we don't feel good about."

Getsy claims the Bears don't feel the need to ease Fields into the offense. They are more than comfortable letting him rip it 30 times in a game if the situation calls for it.

That may or may not be true. What we know is that Fields has only completed 23 passes and attempted only 45. Those are the fewest of any starting quarterback to play in all three games to open the season.

The Bears have called more than 45 pass plays. Poor pass protection has derailed some, while a lack of separation by the wide receivers has forced Fields to tuck it and run on others.

"Not at all," Getsy said when asked if the low number of pass attempts signals a lack of trust. "We do what we feel is best to help our team play a team football game, to help us win games. I give a lot of credit to guys like him and receivers and Cole. Those guys got to do so much dirty work. They would love to be just running routes, catching balls. But we've got to do what's best across the board, how we can take advantage of matchups sometimes.

"Like I said we put a lot on those guys. Like Justin has so much that he has to handle throughout the game plan. And he does such an unbelievable job with it. It's been more of a crutch for me because of how much he can handle. The receivers, the same thing. We ask them to do so many different splits and alignments and assignments. They've been rock stars."

Getsy spent seven of the last eight years in various roles with the Green Bay Packers before being hired by the Bears. Coaching a legendary quarterback like Aaron Rodgers and teaching a young signal-caller in Fields would appear, on the surface, to be different jobs.

Getsy is taking the same approach, however.

"Not much different. Just a different way of going about it, honestly," Getsy said. "That's coaching, in my opinion. That's what it's all about. That's why we do what we do. That's why we love what we do. And when we can help people progress and grow, and there's a bunch of different ways to go through that, but in the end, your endgame goals are the same, and how you treat it is the same in the sense of, there's no sense in, like, I don't believe in just demoralizing people or anything like that.

"We're going to be positive. We're going to communicate with each other and we're going to talk about the whys and the how's. We're not just going to just say, 'Move on and hey go make that play.' That just doesn't exist in our room."

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Getsy and Fields have spent all week searching for the "how's" to fix the Bears' problematic passing attack.

That process started in-game against the Texans.

Getsy viewed Fields' first interception as a "brilliant play" with a missed throw. Fields said his postgame film session with the coaching staff was productive, and he's ready to learn from his flop vs. the Texans and play better in Week 4.

"I think they're really positive, just try to keep everybody on a positive page, learning from our mistakes," Fields said of his meetings with the staff. "It's life. It's football. You're going to make mistakes; you're not going to be perfect. Just learning from your mistakes and making sure it doesn't happen again."

If it does, Getsy will be there on the sideline to walk Fields through what happened and how to course correct the issue.

Those are things you do when teaching a rookie young quarterback.

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