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Below is a look at what Detroit Lions head coach Jim Schwartz had to say after Wednesday's practice. (Quotes provided by the Lions.)
On how Bears WR Alshon Jeffery helped coverage schemes for WR Brandon Marshall: "I think it has opened things up, pretty much for their whole offense. Last year they were really heavy in throwing the ball to Brandon Marshall, rightfully so he's a great player. You look at the way they're distributing the ball to Jeffery, (Martellus) Bennett and also to (Matt) Forte, those guys are like one, two, three, four and they're all equal options for the quarterback. The ball has been coming out quicker. The quarterback hasn't had to hold the balls as long. They haven't taken as many sacks and that's been good for their offense."
On DT Ndamukong Suh wanting to play Bears QB Jay Cutler this weekend: "The only thing we know is Bears right now. We'll be ready for Cutler if he plays and we'll be ready for (Josh) McCown if he plays."
On Bears RB Matt Forte: "He's hard to take off the field. He's good in the pass. He's good in the run game. He's made explosive plays. I think he has three plays over 50 yards this year. We're going to have to play our best. He made some perimeter against us. He made some plays in the passing game against us. We'll have to play better against him this time around."
On the defensive line not creating turnover situations: "I wouldn't read anything in to that. Against Dallas, I thought we played very, very well defensively, other than not getting turnovers, which was probably a little different against the Bears. We covered up a lot of mistakes we made by getting turnovers. We're always trying to get them. Some offenses are going to throw the ball, and I think some of those were a result of our offense scoring and making the Bears play from behind. That has a lot to do with it. The last couple of weeks we haven't been able to do that. We haven't been able to make a team play from behind. I think there are a lot of places where we can play better. We're at our best when our defensive line is creating some havoc and forcing turnovers."
On assessing the impact of the defensive line: "Effective enough to win five games right now. That's the only thing. If we had 35 sacks and we won four games, we would be the worst team. If we have eight sacks and we won six games right now, we'd be happy. That's just the way it goes. We're just going to try to do our best and do whatever we can to win the football game. We'll let everybody else worry about what the stats say."
On the defense needing more sacks: "We need to win games. However we do that. We win a game and have no sacks, we're happy. We lose a game when we have 10 sacks, we're not happy."
On DT Ndamukong Suh's performance against the Bears in Week 4: "He's a good player. He worked hard in the week of preparation. He performed on Sunday. I don't think there is anything else behind that. He's a good player and we expect him to perform well. It's a big game. It's a division game and it means an awful lot to us. For him to have a good game will go a long way to helping our defense."
On being surprised at G Larry Warford's progress: "I don't know if we're surprised. We had a good feeling for him. We drafted him pretty high. I think he's been very level headed. There have been some tough matchups for him, but he has been constant in his performance over the course of the first eight games. I think a lot of times when you talk about rookies, you talk about highs and lows and ups and downs, and that sort of goes with the business, but he's been very consistent for a rookie player. He hasn't made very many mental mistakes. That's been a big key. It helps having a veteran player like Dominic Raiola right next to him."
On what DE Austen Lane brings to the DE spot: "He's got good size. He was another one of our Senior Bowl guys. We had a little bit of a feel for him. He's got some experience, he's got some size. We'll get him up to speed. If we need him, I'm sure he'll be ready."
On the mentality of winning the title for the NFC North: "The only thing we can worry about is this week. I think you are right, it is an NFC North game. There are three teams tied at the top. Not only would that be a win for us with a win over the Bears, it would put a loss on the Bears. I'm famous for saying I don't really care about things that aren't tiebreakers, well guess what? Division record is a tiebreaker, so those are all important things for us. We want our players to feel that urgency. We can't control anything other than the game we play this week, but there is urgency every single week. The story of our team will not be written in the first half of the year, it will be written in the second half."