The Chicago Bears shelled out a ton of money — $70 million over five years, to be exact — to add some more talent to their pass rush in veteran Robert Quinn, who was coming off a 10.5-sack season with the Dallas Cowboys.
The combination of Quinn and Khalil Mack was enough to make many Bears fans drool. And yet, it feels like we haven’t seen the full extent of what this duo could do together on the field. Mostly because Quinn’s snap counts have hovered around 50% through these first five weeks.
Quinn was dealing with an ankle injury that kept him sidelined for the season opener, but he made his debut against the New York Giants the following week, where he recorded a strip-sack on his first play as a Bear.
Since then, Quinn’s snap count has slowly increased from 38% in Week 2 to 58% in Week 5. And according to outside linebackers coach Ted Monachino, that’s about the full extent that we’re going to see Quinn on the field.
“We know where he plays best,” said Monachino. “So we are going to try to keep his numbers around that number [58 percent]. It’s somewhere just north of half the snaps. That’s where we are trying to keep him.”
The immediate reaction is why did they shell out a ton of money for a player they’re not going to use more than 60% of the time? But Monachino says that it’s about production, not just the playing time. Also making sure Quinn stays healthy throughout the course of the season.
“We are keeping very close track of his rep count and trying to keep him as fresh as we can,” said Monachino, “so if we do run into two-minute situations at the end of a game, he and Khalil [Mack] are as fresh as possible.”
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