Justin Fields seemingly blames coaches for the poor start.

The 2023 season hasn’t been off to a very good start for the Chicago Bears. They’ve lost both of their games so far in the regular season, and they haven’t really had any type of success offensively at all.’ Part of that falls on quarterback Justin Fields, but apparently, he believes that coaching has a part in that underperformance as well.

Fields was taking an interview and stated that he thinks he’s playing robotic on the football field. Reporters pressed and asked why he felt that way, and he responded that it might be the coaching staff. This instantly raised eyebrows across the NFL community, and it got so much talk that Fields gave a second interview on the same day to clarify his comments. Straight away, you could tell that these comments were serious. We should also point out though, that Fields has been getting hammered on social media ever since these comments have come out, mostly due to how he’s just not lived up to his offseason expectations. 

Fields said, “You guys’ jobs are to get clicks. So, it’s like, take my quote out of context, and we can just say that. If you paint the picture on the inside out, y’all are trying to split us up.  I’m not blaming anything on the coaches. I’m never going to blame anything on the coaches.” He later said that he wants to take the blame for everything that happens on offense and that he’ll never openly blame somebody else for something that happens on the field. 

Fields really wanted to clarify that he wants to play more freely moving forward rather than just being stuck in his head on every play. He said, “My goal this week is to say, eff it, and go out there and play football how I know how to play football. That includes thinking less and just going out there and playing off of instincts, rather than say so much info in my head and data in my head.” Personally, this feels like a great step forward for Fields if he can actually pull this together. It always feels like he sees the field. Clearly, he just doesn’t pull the trigger enough on throws that he could easily make. If he can think less and just react, we might see him finally take another step forward.

Due to how popular these comments became, head coach Matt Eberflus had to respond to these quotes as well. The first thing that he did was openly state that he wants the staff and Fields to play with instincts rather than getting into his own head. Eberflus didn’t point to any internal conflict, and it felt like he understood where Fields was trying to go with his statements. Don’t freak out too quickly on Fields and this staff, but one has to imagine how much time they can keep performing like this before upper management and the fans start to get restless.