How Jeffery Simmons changes everything for the Chicago Bears — in ways both obvious and subtle
Jeremy Garrett was in his office on Oct. 29, a Thursday morning, working on the game plan for an upcoming matchup with the Seattle Seahawks when he heard a knock on the door.
Dennis Allen, his boss and the Chicago Bears defensive coordinator, stood in the doorway. Allen had some good news for his defensive line coach.
But that’s underselling it. This was the type of seismic trade that happens only once a year across the NFL, if that. The Bears landed All-Pro defensive tackle Jeffery Simmons, sending two future first-round draft picks to the Tennessee Titans.
Garrett’s first instinct was not to get too far ahead of himself.
“Is it done?” he asked.
His second instinct?
Whew.
His mind already was going through the mechanics of what Simmons’ addition would mean for the Bears defense. The deal would be finalized later that afternoon, and Garrett soon had Simmons sitting in his office asking how he could best prepare to face the Seahawks in four days.
These were two Mississippi boys at heart. Garrett grew up in Senatobia, Miss., not far from the Tennessee border. Simmons grew up about a 2½-hour drive southeast in Macon, not far outside Starkville. Garrett played at Ole Miss from 2004-07. Simmons, one of the top recruits in the country in 2016, stayed home to play for Mississippi State from 2016-18 before jumping to the NFL.
Garrett followed Simmons’ career from afar, from when Simmons was the top recruit in the state to becoming a first-round draft pick to emerging as one of the NFL’s best defensive tackles with the Titans.
To see him now — across the desk in his office — was a defensive line coach’s dream.
“I always knew about him as a player and a person and what he’s done in the community,” Garrett said. “But that was the first time we got together.”
They were in the office past 10 p.m. that first night. Simmons played 86.6% of defensive snaps through the first seven games of the season with the Titans. He’s one of the few defensive linemen in the NFL who rarely comes off the field. Not even Myles Garrett had that heavy of a workload last season when he set the single-season sack record and won his second NFL defensive player of the year award with the Cleveland Browns.
The Bears intend to give Simmons a similar heavy workload. But if he was going to do that in his first game, just four days after the trade, he was going to need a crash course in Allen’s defensive scheme.
“And you could just tell (he was like), ‘I want to make sure I’m not going to cost the team,’” Jeremy Garrett said. “‘I want to do everything, I want to be aligned correctly, I don’t want any mental errors.’ You could just tell the passion he has about doing his job and doing his part.”
Simmons played 87.3% of defensive snaps in his Bears debut Monday in a 34-17 win against the Seahawks. He recorded a sack, one pass defended, two tackles for a loss and a team-leading six tackles. He was a force for a Bears defense that, in some ways, has been overlooked when compared with coach Ben Johnson’s offense.
The Bears traded for Simmons because he affects the game in so many ways, both the obvious and the more subtle. Both were on display Monday in Seattle. The results were there almost immediately, and they changed everything for the Bears defense.
“He raises the level of everybody on the field,” Allen said.
A blur of orange sleeves
After all the cramming he did over four days to prepare for his Bears debut, Simmons ran out of the tunnel at Lumen Field reminding himself over and over again that it’s just football.
It was a wild week for the 29-year-old, eighth-year NFL veteran. He had to hug his 3-year-old daughter, Mulani, goodbye in Nashville, Tennessee, before hopping on his flight to Chicago. Continuing a tradition he began with the Titans, Simmons wore bright orange sleeves under his uniform Monday to help his daughter find him on the broadcast. He admitted that he felt somewhat emotional during the national anthem.
And then the game started.
On his fourth snap of the night, the Seahawks tried to block him one-on-one with Grey Zabel, who only that week had shifted from left guard to right guard to make room for new addition Quenton Nelson.
Simmons showed why offenses can’t stop him with one player. He took two quick steps toward the left, then cut right, blew by Zabel and yanked quarterback Sam Darnold to the ground with one arm in comic-book-like fashion for his first sack as a member of the Bears.
“He was able to change direction before the guard could,” Jeremy Garrett said. “And then the way he took (Darnold) down was pretty athletic.”
The Bears had gotten home while sending only four pass rushers. From his first impact play, it was apparent Simmons changed the math equation for Allen. Through seven games before Simmons’ arrival, Allen blitzed at a 40.6% clip, the fourth-highest rate in the NFL.
Allen’s past defenses as both a coordinator and head coach with the New Orleans Saints did not typically blitz at a high rate. Since arriving in Chicago, Allen has been forced to supplement his pass rush with the blitz. The Bears blitz a linebacker, the nickel corner or a safety from all sorts of exotic looks on third down. Since returning from an injury, nickel corner Kyler Gordon has four sacks in three games.
“We know that they sprinkle it in, but when the defensive coordinator is blitzing a lot within the football game, to me, we’re not doing our job up front,” Simmons said. “For me it’s, especially when guys (are) getting one-on-ones, we have to win the one-one-ones.”
Simmons did exactly that on his sack. Allen cut his blitz rate in half against the Seahawks to just 20.5%.
Certainly that’s going to be a game-by-game adjustment. If Allen has shown anything in his time in Chicago, it’s that he’s willing to try different things in search of creative solutions. So the Bears are still going to blitz.
But Simmons allows Allen to be more choosy about when he throws an extra defender at the quarterback.
“In a perfect-world scenario, the more resources you can send back there in coverage and still be able to affect the quarterback, I think that’s probably the greatest advantage,” Allen said. “And yet I think you have to have a combination and mixture of both.”
‘He’s definitely upped his game and his IQ’
The sacks are easy to see. But Simmons affects the game in much subtler ways too.
Early in the second quarter Monday, the Seahawks trailed by seven and were threatening in the red zone. On second-and-goal from the 9, Darnold took a shotgun snap and dropped three steps.
Simmons busted through Nelson at left guard and center Jalen Sundell. Darnold was right there, 5 yards in front of him and still holding the football. Yet Simmons reacted even before the quarterback dropped off a screen pass to running back Zach Charbonnet.
Simmons stopped in his tracks, spun and moved out to the left, where he tracked down Charbonnet for a 6-yard loss. The Seahawks wound up settling for a field goal on the possession.
“That’s just him,” said defensive lineman James Lynch, who lined up next to Simmons on the play. “That’s just how you can read that play and realize what’s going on. So he’s played a lot of football and he’s obviously done it at a really high level.”
For a pass rusher to stop on a dime when he has an unimpeded path to the quarterback — still with the ball in his hands — indicates there’s a lot more than “see ball, get ball” going on in Simmons’ mind when he’s on the field.
“His ability to just play football at a high level comes from instinct and then how he studies the game, so he knows what’s happening just that much faster,” Lynch said. “And then he’s just that type of athlete where, as soon as it happens, he’s able to cut and get there as fast as he can and make a big play like that.”
Bears defensive end Montez Sweat played with Simmons at Mississippi State. When the Bears traded for Simmons, they put his locker next to Sweat’s.
Asked after the Seahawks win how Simmons’ game has changed since they last played together in 2018, Sweat had a quick answer.
“He’s definitely upped his game and his IQ,” Sweat said. “He’s always had a real love for the game and that’s infectious across the whole line, across the whole team.”
Everybody felt that at Halas Hall last week. There was a buzz in the air after the trade. That’s true of the defense, but it goes for the entire building. His teammates are picking his brain and learning everything they can from him. Jeremy Garrett said he already sees that in practice with the defensive linemen.
“We were working through pass rush moves and I could see him just, as we’re working down the line to the next guy, I can see him on the other end like, ‘Hey, put your hands right here or try this or get your eyes here,’” he said. “So you could just see it’s another coach on the field.”
Simmons has been in Sweat’s ear about elevating his game. Sweat led the Bears in sacks last season with 10, but throughout much of his time with the team he has had to carry much of the load in the pass rush.
That can be a heavy burden for one player.
“I challenged him this week,” Simmons said after Monday’s game. “I told him earlier this week, ‘Go put what you were doing in college on tape. Get back to the old Sweat.’”
Game-planning for No. 99
After the sack early in the game, the Seahawks were much more reluctant to give Simmons a one-on-one look. That meant his teammates could feast.
There was no better example than linebacker Devin Bush’s sack midway through the third quarter. The center and the right guard double-teamed Simmons on a play-action pass, leaving a gaping hole up the middle for Bush. The speedy linebacker blew by a block attempt from Charbonnet and wrestled Darnold down by his waist.
“One-on-one. I don’t got to beat a double-team. He do,” Bush said with a laugh. “That’s what makes it easier. Obviously he’s going to get the majority of the attention. So got to capitalize when you get your one-on-ones.”
For the first season and a half of the Johnson era, the offense has garnered all the attention. The defense has been good enough to win games, but maybe not among the most fearsome in football.
Now, opposing offenses need to go into the week circling No. 99 on the roster. In the days leading up to game day, Simmons eats up a lot of real estate in an opposing play-caller’s brain.
“There are game changers out there that, as an offensive play caller, you’ve got to account for,” Johnson said. “You hear all the time about defensive coordinators, they want to take out the best playmakers on the offense. Well, it’s a little bit of the same thing for an offensive play caller. How do we minimize that individual’s impact on the game the best that we can? Sometimes those plans work. Other times they don’t.”
If the offense has to use two linemen to block Simmons, it opens things up for the rest of the defense — such as Bush on his sack. It will lead to more opportunities for Gordon, who is a proven weapon as a blitzer from the nickel spot.
“That’s why I want to keep blitzing,” Gordon said of Simmons commanding double teams.
Johnson awarded Simmons one of three game balls before his customary “ good, better, best” victory speech Monday night.
“It meant a lot,” Simmons said. “It’s just me going out there and doing my job. For me it was: Learn the game plan, but just go play football. It wasn’t rocket science or anything of that nature or trying to do something extra. Just me going out there and doing my job the best way I know how to do it.”
He was caught unprepared for “good, better, best” after the game, but Simmons said this week that he has been watching YouTube clips to get the victory chant ready for next time.
The Bears have a tough Tampa Bay Buccaneers offensive line coming to Soldier Field this weekend. Simmons is excited for his home debut. Mulani will be in the stands watching Sunday night.
The trade and impending move has been a lot for the 3-year-old to process. In a video call earlier this week, she asked Simmons where he was.
“I’m at work,” Simmons said. “I’m at my new job.”