NFC Notes: Baker Mayfield, Desmond Ridder, Bears, Buccaneers, Falcons

Bears

Bears OC Luke Getsy said C Cody Whitehair had a “rough day” in Week 6 but is confident he can turn things around.

“He just had a little rough day. He knows that. He’s played great for us. He’s done great things for us. He’s a stud every single day in this building. We love Cody, and that’s never an easy thing if someone is not playing to their capability, right. But he’s done a great job and we’re excited to get him back out there,” via Courtney Cronin. 

Buccaneers

Buccaneers QB Baker Mayfield said they need to be “pissed off as an offense” and expect a higher standard of scoring.

“At a certain point, we’ve got to get pissed off as an offense,” Mayfield said, via PewterReport.com. “We should be putting a lot of points up on the board. It’s got to be – we talk about the standard about winning around here, but offensively we need to look at it in a smaller picture. We should be putting up a lot of more points than we have been, and so we need to be accountable with that – it starts with me and we’ll get that going.”

Mayfield thinks they need to continue executing and taking pride in their work. 

“Just fundamentally executing,” Mayfield said. “You know after watching the film it’s never … the good games, bad games – the film is never as good as you think it is, and it’s never as bad, either. With a few of those things it’s a lot of fundamentals. Like I mentioned, it’s get pissed off – but it’s take pride in your work about executing and doing your job each play. Today we had a good practice. There wasn’t any rah-rah speech. The guys know what we need to get done. That’s why this is a veteran group. Everybody understands what we need to do to get it fixed. Like I mentioned after the game, I’ll get my stuff fixed and everybody else is doing the same thing. I’m not worried about it.”

At 3-2, Mayfield points out they can win the NFC South and is confident they can still make improvements. 

“We’re still hungry and all of our goals are in front of us,” Mayfield said. “Big picture-wise you have to win your division first to get where you want to go. We’re still in control of our destiny. We’ve got a big one [coming up on Sunday versus the Falcons] for us. We’re not hitting the panic button. We know we can play better. That’s the good thing. It’s not like we’re looking around, ‘Oh no, what’s the deal? How do we fix this?’ We know what we need to fix and we have the group to be able to do that.”

Falcons

When talking about Falcons QB Desmond Ridder‘s season, former QB Matt Ryan thinks the rest of October and November will be important toward determining Ridder’s ability as a starting quarterback.

“What you’re going to see in October and November will give you one full season to evaluate where he’s at,” said Ryan, via Jeff Schultz of The Athletic. “The areas you’re looking for growth are situational play, things like what happened at the end of the game last week when they had the third-and-2, then he threw the interception on the third-and-7 after the delay of game. The clock was running down again. Growth there would be knowing if the play gets in late that burning a timeout is OK. If I put my GM cap on, I would say the next six weeks are important. Because with the Falcons, the decision (on Ridder’s future) hasn’t been made, yet.”

Ryan would’ve liked to see Ridder play more as a rookie in 2022. 

“I wish for him that he had had more time playing last year,” Ryan said. “Everybody’s situation is different. Mine was to come in and play right away. They felt like they could get good play out of Marcus for a stretch, but they didn’t. I would’ve loved to have seen (Ridder) earlier because every game, every situation, is so valuable. I just don’t think you can get that from the sideline. There’s going to be growing pains.”

Ryan thinks Ridder can make “all the throws” on the field but he must clean up some of his shorter passes where he’s rifling in balls.

“[Ridder] can make all the throws. He can throw the ball down the field. He can throw the ball intermediate. Honestly, where he needs to clean things up are the shortest ones. That comes with knowing how to throw with a little bit of touch. Not every throw needs to be a fastball.”