Cubs News: Beatty on working with Brown, Allen stepping up as a leader |
CHICAGO—This is Chris Beatty’s first year as a coach for the Chicago Bears. He started the season as the wide receivers coach. Now, with the firing of former head coach Matt Eberflus, Beatty has become Chicago’s third offensive coordinator.
With all of the turmoil in the locker room, it would not be surprising for players to be dejected. However, Beatty said this is the exact opposite of Chicago’s mentality, as they still have the hunger to win. “They’re a tough, close-knit group … These guys, they’re pros and when you lose four games on the last play, that’s hard no matter what it is. But at the same time, they come to practice. They want to work. They want to get better,” Beatty said. “They want to be coached, which that’s why we all appreciate them as (coaches because) the players want to get better. They want to do whatever it takes and that’s why we feel like we owe it to them. We want to be accountable to them to be able to get this thing right and put them in the best situation possible.” Under Eberflus, the Bears had many problems with clock management and decision-making in crucial situations. Beatty said interim head coach Thomas Brown has spoken with him about streamlining this process to avoid debacles like what happened at the end of Chicago’s game against the Detroit Lions on Thanksgiving. “Time management and clock management have been a big part of my career since I was a high school coach. So, one of the first things that Thomas and I talked about was how to streamline that and to make it smoother. So, we’ve talked about that,” Beatty said. “We’ve (gone) through the process of trying how we’re going to simulate that in the game and trying to get that to where it’s not an issue, trying to be a play ahead. I think that’s part of the issue is we haven’t been ahead of the game where we’ve been a little bit late and (that’s) part of it. That’s a hard thing.” As the wide receivers coach to start the season, Beatty worked extensively with six-time Pro Bowler Keenan Allen. Despite all of the people Beatty has worked with throughout his career in college and the NFL, he said Allen is the smartest person in football he has ever encountered and Allen has displayed the ability to be a coach through the leadership qualities he has shown throughout the season. “Keenan could be a coach. Keenan’s the smartest player I’ve ever seen. He’s the smartest football person, not just player,” Beatty said. “He sees stuff different than the rest of us. He’s a play ahead, just like a coach would be. So, what he has done over the last three weeks since the initial change was he’s been kind of my conduit for those guys. So, he runs a meeting in between while they’re doing the special teams. He gets all the offensive skill in there and does a meeting. He knows how I want it to look … He’s taken a little bit bigger of a leadership role because he’s really not as outgoing as you guys think he is, but he’s been a little bit more.” In the last two games, Allen has stepped up on the field as well. In that span, he has 23 targets. Off those targets, he has 14 receptions for 159 yards and three touchdowns. Allen and fellow veteran receiver DJ Moore are tied on the team for the most touchdown receptions with five. With Moore unable to practice on Wednesday and Thursday with a quad injury, Allen may have to step up this Sunday when the Bears take on the San Francisco 49ers (3:25 p.m. / FOX).
