Toub expects electrifying Hester to excel again next season

LAKE FOREST, Ill. – In the first of a two-part series, special teams coordinator Dave Toub answers email questions from fans exclusively on ChicagoBears.com:
How much do you think Devin Hester’s decline in production this season in the return game had to do with his role expanding as a wide receiver?
Pete B.
Wisconsin

I think it was part of it, but it wasn’t the entire reason his production was down. In terms of his thought process, the amount of time he spent working as a wide receiver took away a little bit from him returning punts. When he goes out to return a punt, that’s the first time he’s thinking about it. He’s getting the ball on offense, so not all of his touches are coming on special teams. Returning punts isn’t the only way he’s going to score a touchdown, so it’s not the first thing on his mind.

Devin Hester seemed more tentative on punt returns in 2008 than he was during his two Pro Bowl seasons, making more fair catches and running laterally and even backwards instead of attacking a seam. Do you agree with that, and in what other ways did he appear different to you in terms of how he returned kicks this past season compared to the two previous years?
Martin R. Chicago

I agree that he appeared that way. He was a lot more cautious this past season. He was a little bit more of a risk-taker in his first two years because he wanted to make the most of his opportunities to touch the ball. It goes along with what I just said. He’s getting more touches on offense, so he has more opportunities to make big plays there. He was a little more cautious, but on the other hand he was a lot more careful with the ball. He made smarter decisions. There’s a fine line. You want your punt returner to make good decisions but at the same time you want him to be a risk-taker so he can make those big plays.

What steps do you plan on taking to help Devin Hester revert to his All-Pro form, and do you think he’s capable of once again becoming the same return man he was in 2006-07?
David K. Indianapolis, Indiana

We’re going to emphasize with him to get a first down; get the ball up the field north and south, get 10 yards and then make a big play from there. We’ve already made cut-ups of all his returns this year and we’ll go back and watch them together and see what we could have done differently and how the new thought process would fit with getting up the field, getting that first down and then making your moves.

We also have to give credit to the other teams, too. They punted away from us a lot of times; there were a lot of punts out of bounds. They made Devin run to the ball. They had high hang-times and we had to call a lot of fair catches. It wasn’t because he wasn’t a risk-taker; it was because the punts were better. Everyone is game-planning and preparing and doing a better job.

In terms of his ability, he’s still Devin Hester. He still has all that ability. You see his ability to make people miss when he catches the ball on offense. He had some big returns during the season that were called back because of penalties. His numbers would have been a lot better if those returns hadn’t been wiped out. On his first return of the year against the Colts, he looked like the old Devin. I think if he would have gotten a touchdown early in the year, the pressure would have been off. Later in the year, the pressure started to build. The questions from the media snowballed a bit on him. He pressed a little bit late. That was part of it also. I’m looking for him to bounce back and be the Devin of old.

Did the rib injury to Devin Hester early in the season affect his play more than we were led to believe? He seemed to be more hesitant about attacking the holes after he was hurt.
Stan M. Honolulu, Hawaii

I don’t think that had anything to do with it. He missed only one game. He’s a tough guy. He takes a lot of shots and he’s very durable. He’s been durable since he’s been here. He didn’t even get hit when he got hurt. It was a twist. It wasn’t like he took a blindside shot and then was shell-shocked. That’s not an issue. There was no one hit that happened, and he’s not losing confidence in our blocking or anything like that. We got better as the year went on, too. We have a lot of young players. They got better and better and they’re only going to keep improving.

(chicagobears.com)