The Chicago Bears started their 2025 regular season with a crushing home loss to the Minnesota Vikings, letting a 17-6 lead slip away in the fourth quarter en route to a 27-24 defeat at the hands of their division rival.
New Bears head coach Ben Johnson has been praised for his creative and innovative play-calling as an offensive coordinator, but after Monday night's loss, even he wasn't thrilled with one aspect of the way he called plays for the offense.
When asked about the involvement of rookie running back Kyle Monangai, Johnson admitted that he didn't lean enough on the run game in Week 1, and wants to change that moving forward:
The Bears rushed for 119 yards in Monday night's loss, but the majority of those yards came from quarterback Caleb Williams and his scrambling ability, which netted 58 yards on just six attempts. D'Andre Swift averaged just 3.1 yards per carry on his 17 rushes, while D.J. Moore added only eight yards on three carries.
Monangai didn't get a single carry in his NFL regular-season debut, despite plenty of buzz coming out of training camp and the preseason that he could have a significant change-of-pace role in the backfield behind Swift. Especially with Roschon Johnson being out of the lineup Monday night due to injury, it's particularly surprising that Monangai didn't carry the ball at all in the entire game.
Don't be surprised if that changes moving forward, as Johnson looks to take some pressure off Williams and the passing game by balancing the play-calling with an emphasis on the ground game.
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