Justin Fields was “pissed off” with Bears’ game plan in his first start, private coach says

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Justin Fields‘ longtime personal quarterback coach says Fields had some issues with former Bears head coach Matt Nagy’s game plan last year.

Ron Veal, a private quarterback coach who has worked with Fields since Fields was in sixth grade, said on 670 The Score in Chicago that Fields hated the game plan the Bears installed for Fields’ first start, an ugly 26-6 loss to the Browns.

“It was bad,” Veal said. “He took a beating that day. It was kind of crazy and weird at the same time. . . . I know he was a little pissed about it but I didn’t get an explanation. And I really didn’t ask because I know he was in a situation where he was really pissed off about it.”

Veal said he and Fields have done several sessions together this offseason to help him prepare for what the Bears’ new coaching staff is asking of him, and that Fields knows there’s a lot he can improve.

“He played well at times and he struggled at times, which is what happens with rookie quarterbacks,” Veal said.

In a rough rookie season, Nagy took more of the blame than Fields did. In Year Two, the Bears badly need Fields to be able to thrive in his new offense.

59 responses to “Justin Fields was “pissed off” with Bears’ game plan in his first start, private coach says

  1. If I was a Bears fan, I’d be pissed off that they picked this clown over Micah Parsons.

  2. With Foles on the roster, Nagy blew the season. 4 more wins would’ve made the playoffs. I really didn’t understand that decision to play him, nor the fans demanding that he play. Almost all rookie qb’s stink in their 1st season. Most everyone knows that.

  3. Fields got valuable playing experience.
    Let’s see how he’s doing at the end of the season.

    If by then he’s still lost then draft a new quarterback

  4. He was angry they asked to him drop back and throw. He isn’t good at that.

  5. Wow…. As god awful as Justin Fields was year one in his first season in the NFL maybe he should just be quiet and be seen not heard until he has some actual success to speak of. After watching him his first year I have worries that he is a bust as most QBs who posted the stats he did and struggled to the degree he did end up becoming draft busts. Fields is a guy who completed just 58% of his passes just 5.8 AY/A a pathetic 155 Passing YD/AVG for only 1870YDs w/ just 7TDs to 10INTs 8 Fumbles lost a scary low 26.4 QBR w/ a passer rating of just 73.2…. Since the year 2000 more than 95% of rookie 1st year QBs who post a passer rating below 77.9 end up becoming draft busts or career backups. Maybe Justin Fields should spend more time making sure he doesn’t become one of the guys and spend more time working on his NFL game. Fields needs to learn to throw with anticipation and needs to get better slash learn how to read NFL Defenses.

  6. He was mad he had to throw the ball , he knew he couldn’t and wanted to run all day

  7. qckappa says:
    April 2, 2022 at 8:39 am
    With Foles on the roster, Nagy blew the season. 4 more wins would’ve made the playoffs. I really didn’t understand that decision to play him, nor the fans demanding that he play. Almost all rookie qb’s stink in their 1st season. Most everyone knows that.
    —————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————-

    Most rookie QBs don’t struggle anywhere near as bad as Justin Fields did. Most rookie 1st round QBs play well and show why they were first round picks. Look how good Watson was his rookie year, Kyler Murray was a pro bowl alternate as a rookie , Joe Burrow was good until his legs were taken out. Most of the 1st round QBs who struggle to the degree Fields did end up becoming either busts or backup QB2s.

  8. Jury is still out on Justin Fields. He looked bad more often than he looked good last year but most rookie quarterbacks are not drafted by a lame duck head coach who has had trouble with game planning.

    Also, he was complaining to his private coach not to the media. That does not make him a whiner. Everyone complains about their job in private. Everyone.

  9. Just another entitled OSU QB that will fail in the NFL . Give Burrow credit , he got out of Columbus before they ruined his NFL career .

  10. A veteran can be pissed about game plans. A rookie making his debut should probably be focused on other things….

  11. Fields is a bust in progress, and I picked him as just that prior to the draft even.

  12. Anyone who watched that game saw he had no chance. Mac Jones, Lawrence, any rookie wouldn’t have performed any better in Cleveland with those play calls. The gameplan was just malpractice by Matt Nagy letting Fields get battered like that in his first start.

  13. I agree that was a horrible game plan, but Fields held the ball way too long. Sure he is athletic, has great measurables and throws a nice deep ball, but he seems to have trouble reading defenses & has that really slow, elongated throwing motion….I won’t be surprised if Bears move on from him after this rookie contract.

  14. Wow! Your qb coach speaks for you? Stop blaming everyone else and look in the mirror, but you may not like what stairs back at you…..

  15. As a Packers fan I wasn’t happy the Bears traded for Fields. I still think he could turn out quite good. The NFCN will be quite interesting in a few years. Outside the Bears, the other three teams will be hitching their carts to unproven QBs, pending no big trades. Then we’ll see which GMs proved their worth.

  16. Naggy should have known better before drafting a Ohio State Buckeye QB. They all fail in the NFL.

  17. For whatever faults Nagy had, if this kid flames out it is 100% on the fan base.

    Nagy was smart enough to say “this kid isn’t ready” and was willing to sit him, even at the risk of his own job, but the fans just wouldn’t have it.

    Nagy even said “this kid is so far from ready, he could get hurt” and the fan base still wouldn’t have it.

    The fan base finally applied enough pressure that word came down from above “the kid plays.”

    The kid wasn’t ready.

    The kid got hurt.

    “Fire Nagy” shrieked the fan base.

  18. Just a feeling, but this isn’t going to end well for Bear’s fans. And in Field’s mind, none of it will fall to him; and it’s likely just a matter of time until the race card will be played (not necessarily by Fields but by some idiot like Mike Wilbon).

    Today’s elite athletes, at the premium positions (QB, WR, Edge, CB), have been coddled, have had smoke blown up their backside since 10 yrs old (this kid had a private coach in 6th grade?). They’re perception of what reality is, is just very different from people who aren’t coddled.

    I firmly believe part of the Deshaun Watson issue(s) is that be believes he did no wrong, that he’s entitled to do whatever he did with those women, he’s been told he can do no wrong for as long as he can remember, his standard of “wrong” is just different than most of ours. By the standards most of the rest of us must live by, including the 22 women in Watson’s civil cases, we just see the world differently.

    In Field’s case, when things go wrong, it won’t be him, being a rookie, not being able to handle any game plan put in front of him, and so on. He’s been taught he’s never wrong, he’s entitled, he’s a chosen one. It won’t end well in the real world of the NFL.

  19. Nagy never changed his game plan for Fields and for the horrible offensive line.

    He took a mobile QB and made him stand in the pocket with one of the worst offensive lines in the league. He wanted Fields to be Andy Dalton and even Andy Dalton got killed trying to stand in the pocket while rushers were coming free.

    Nagy had an opportunity to show he could adjust and he didn’t.

  20. People on here trashing Fields for “complaining” when he didn’t even talk to his coach about why he was pissed. The coach stated he could sense Fields was pissed but didn’t know exactly why, because Fields didn’t talk to him about it and he didn’t ask.

  21. Sounds to me like a lot of haters out there. My guess is their team wishes they had him in their locker room. Wow. People calling him a bust don’t know football.

  22. First start and already complaining about the game plan? Pretty soon he is going to make Russell Wilson’s public whining about the game plan looks like child’s play. How about not being the “entitled quarterback” and instead try being the quarterback who is willing to do anything needed to win?

  23. Rookie QB pissed about the game plan? This explains a lot as to why Fields was so bad. Someone should have told him to be eager to learn and embrace what he is being taught. Fields will most likely flame out, but then again he did come from the Buckeyes. Who would expect anything different.

  24. Bears will finish 4th in NFC. They no longer can depend on beating Detroit twice. Fields doesn’t seem to have fire to be a top Qb. Watched all of his post game interviews. Seemed to want to be somewhere else.

  25. When are NFL teams going to learn to NOT draft Ohio State QBs in the first round? When Art Schlichter is the only “crowning achievement” of 1st rd QBs drafted out of Ohio State….history is not on your side.

  26. I’m from the Indiana side of the Chicagoland area so I am unfortunately in the Bears TV market so I see most of their games by default and this guy is an epic bust. He had 1 good game in college against Clemson and for some reason that’s the only game every NFL draft expert on tv focused on, completely ignoring the terrible performance against northwestern in the big 10 title game and alabama in the national championship. This guy looks completely clueless on the sidelines whenever camera show him on the bench gazing into the abyss instead of preparing to go back on the field. Bears fans still steadfastly defend this clown for whatever reason.

  27. I’m not sure Fields will be any good, but I don’t get why he’s being trashed as a complainer here. Fields didn’t go to the media with this, and the quote came from a private conversation with his personal coach (who probably spoke out of turn).

  28. I was at that game as a Browns fan. It was a horrible game plan, and he probably wasn’t ready to play. I actually felt bad for him.

  29. That game plan was atrocious. I don’t care who the QB is. 5 guys can’t block 7. Make two of those 7 Clowney and Garrett, throw in only 5 and 7 step drops on slow developing plays and you get what we saw. I remember watching the charting of that game and I think there were 2 plays they had enough blockers. The browns also started sending extra blitzers when they caught on the bears had no plan in place to counter the rush so it turned into 8 and 9 on 5 quickly. I respect Fields for complaining, I would have sat down. He’s lucky Nagy didn’t end his career or at least his season. Nagy was an accessory to assault that day. Most the people in the comments would have PTSD if they ended up in a situation that helpless with that level of violence around them.

  30. Reading a lot of fan comments blaming Fields, but he’s not wrong. Nagy tried to go all-pass with a green rookie against a solid pass rush. It was a terrible game plan. The o-line couldn’t block a HS team, and the running game simply wasn’t called on.

    Fields stood tall and did his best, but it was his first start. Nagy later admitted than he missed the results of a lot of plays because he was too busy picking the next one. He didn’t bother to pay attention to the fact that his rookie was getting bludgeoned like a tackle dummy. Honestly, what coach is so busy picking the next play that he doesn’t notice his QB get sacked 9+ times and hit countless others?

    Fields didn’t say these words, and based on his demeanor last season I doubt he authorized them. Even so, he wouldn’t be wrong to say them out loud. Everybody else did for weeks after the game.

  31. No game plan is going to disguise Fields’ weaknesses, which are many!!

  32. Well it kinda makes sense now why they didnt play him in the beginning of the season not saying there coach was anything special either but still. Part of what makes a good qb is being able to adapt to what your team has to do

  33. Fields isn’t perfect no one is. I live 6 miles from where this kid went to HS and Bears fans are in for a treat. I’ve already said he’s inexperienced and has a long release but the check list of those does well is what’s many. He throws down field, mid range, middle of the field and outside the numbers well, he has the size, arm strength and speed, he’s extremely intelligent and processes information well, he played big in the biggest games of some big time football games, Runs RPO’s well, Runs play action well. I’m not saying he’ll be star because I’m a life long Bears fan. He won’t stay with Reid, Payton, Gruden or one of the other coaches that get a lot out of his position. He going to be fine though. I’ve watched him struggle and bounce back far beyond expectations in HS, 3 times in college and it’s just what he does. He will figure it out. Hopefully in Chicago

  34. That was supposed to say he would be a star in this league with one of the coaches that gets a lot out of the QB position.

  35. It’s funny but last year was supposed to be the year of the awesome QB class. The only one that any resemblance of success was Mac Jones with the Pats. The rest of them, Lawrence included, were pretty horrible or didn’t play at all because they simply weren’t ready. It would be ironic if this year’s “crappy QB class” turned out to have 2 or 3 elite guys.

  36. When you are Tom Brady you can have a private coach that chirps But an unproven rookie? Get the popcorn ready.

  37. If I was Fields, I would be firing this guy. You don’t need anybody airing private conversations like that.

  38. With Nagy gone, let’s see if Fields improves. If not, then he is a bust. No excuses then.

  39. He’s another in a long list of terrible OSU QB’s. College programs like a OSU have good offensive linemen and decent receivers which inevitably hide the flaws and limitations of these QB’s.

  40. That game plan was coaching malpractice. Which is not to say Fields doesn’t have a lot to prove, because he does. Even veteran QBs would have been killed with that game plan and O-line, much less a rookie in his first start. That game may have gotten Nagy fired all by itself.

  41. No dog in this hunt. A long time ago, a kid was drafted at QB first overall. he came in brash and loud, and proceeded to (1) get tackled for safeties in his first two starts and (2) throw 6 TDs and 24 INTs his rookie year. By year 5 hs lost his job to a rookie in preseason and was pronounced done. That QB went on to go undefeated in four Super Bowls, won league MVP, and Super Bowl MVP. Kid by the name of Bradshaw. Point being: let’s give this Fieldskid a little more time

  42. Fields won’t be a bust. He may not be HOF but I think he’ll be a good QB at a minimum…The only one I think will be a true bust is Lance for the 49ers. I think it was a huge reach to dump so much draft capital and pick him. He just doesn’t seem ready for the NFL. The accuracy isn’t there. Many many times we’ve seen guys that aren’t great runners and are without really strong arms, come in and be really good QB’s because they are very accurate. Matt Hasselbeck, Andy Dalton, etc. Accuracy and mental aptitude trumps a strong arm and fast legs every time.

  43. Nagy was the only “Bust” in this story. Even the best golfers in the world “Still” have coaches.

  44. Anyone that watched or played football on my level knows that the Bears’ offense was bad I have seen high school offensive play calling better than the game plans of Nagy. The offensive line blocking schemes were almost elementary and with a bad OL the routes took too long to develop and there were no quick-hitting routes or dump-off to the RB. With a young QB and a bad OL the QB should have had a three-step drop back and the football out of his hands. swing passes to the RB and TE/WR screens and digs routes. It’s easy to blame the QB but the QB doesn’t game plan he only tries to execute the game plan. So all these negative comments about Field make no sense if they are coming from anyone who knows or has played the game of football…

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