Trubisky or Foles? Bears coach Nagy says, 'We need to see more'

Bears quarterback Mitch Trubisky took snaps with the starting unit on Monday. Nick Foles took snaps with the starters on Tuesday.

Thus begins the training camp shuffle.

It will continue throughout camp. During a preseason with no preseason games, the Bears are working extra hard to make sure both their quarterbacks have the same opportunities to showcase their abilities during practice.

"It keeps it consistent," head coach Matt Nagy said. "We're trying to split up the reps as evenly as we can."

When the Bears traded for Foles in March, providing competition for Trubisky, they couldn't have imagined having to make a quarterback decision with no preseason.

This is a monumental choice, with implications that go beyond this season. The organization needs to decide what it wants to do with Trubisky, who enters the final year of his rookie contract. On top of that, the Bears have a defense that's good enough to win now.

The quarterback question won't go away during training camp - Nagy has said the team will wait as long as possible to name a starter - and it probably won't go away once the season begins.

But what does that competition look like when camp is condensed into a month and neither quarterback is truly going to take a hit like he might in a preseason game?

As Nagy said Monday after the first padded practice, there's only so much that can be determined via Zoom calls. This week has provided a glimpse, albeit a limited one, at the on-field results.

"The biggest thing that we're looking for right now, as a coaching staff, between both of those quarterbacks, is tempo in and out of the huddle," Nagy said. "Obviously, when you're going through different plays and different pre-snap motions or shifts ... there's moving parts now in the defense. That element of new players and all that put together, we want to see the tempo in and out of the huddle at a really good speed."

No matter who is taking snaps where, it will come down to who can move the offense. Nagy said Tuesday that it's still far too soon to jump to any conclusions on who the front runner is.

"We need to see more," Nagy said.

He wants to see more in the red zone, more in two-minute drills and four-minute drills. Situational football.

Nagy's review of the offense as a whole, through two days of padded practice, was less than awe-inspiring Tuesday. And maybe that's to be expected.

"We can be a little bit better, and we always start with the quarterback directing that," Nagy said.

Trubisky spent his offseason working with quarterback guru Jeff Christensen at Throw It Deep. Teammate Cordarrelle Patterson said Tuesday that Trubisky looks like a new player on the field, but it's reasonable to temper expectations on the preseason hype.

Everybody looks good and feels good in August.

"I worked on my craft this offseason," Trubisky said. "So for it to show up this early, it's nice for your teammates to notice that. But we've just got to keep working."

Foles comes in as the new guy, whether for better or worse. He said Tuesday that it felt good to put the pads on again after such a lengthy layoff. Nagy said the former Super Bowl MVP is "slowly but surely" becoming comfortable in the offense.

Foles has the experience to anticipate things on the football field, something Nagy said he likes.

"You want to be at that top level where you're just not thinking and you're just playing," Foles said. "I just keep reminding myself each time a play's called, just focus on this play, just execute this play."

By all accounts, Foles and Trubisky work well together in the meeting room.

Foles joked early in camp that when Trubisky makes a great throw, he'll gladly give the younger QB a high-five - even if he has to go sanitize his hand afterward. Trubisky has echoed the same sentiment.

"Competition or not, we need to make sure this offense is getting better and that's all I'm trying to do," Trubisky said.