LAKE FOREST, Ill. — After two strong defensive efforts in back-to-back games on the coast, the game plans of Chicago Bears defensive coordinator Mel Tucker have again come under fire.

Tucker was a frequent target for critics last season because the defense finished tied for last in sacks and 30th against the run.

Against the Green Bay Packers on Sunday in a 38-17 loss, Tucker opted to blitz fewer than 10 times when the defensive line had trouble getting to Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers.

Without pressure, Rodgers calmly picked apart the Bears secondary in a 22-of-28 effort for 302 yards and four touchdowns.

“We didn’t get any kind of extensive pass rush,” coach Marc Trestman said. “We didn’t win the one-on-ones inside when we had the opportunities to win the one-on-ones. He just had too much time.

“We rushed four. We did very little blitzing. We felt like the best way to beat him was to try to get a pass rush and play coverage behind him, but we didn’t get the pass rush we needed, and then when we got one, when those moments came, he was able to extend the play.”

The plan of Tucker met entirely with Trestman’s approval.

Bears coordinators are not available to the media after games or on Mondays, and Tucker won’t get the chance to defend his decision until Wednesday.

However, it was fairly obvious the Bears favored this approach last week when they talked about how effective the Detroit Lions had been against the Packers by rushing four and playing zone coverage.

So they obviously imitated this approach, which is a plan they would like against most teams.

“With any experienced passer in the National Football League, you can take advantage of the blitz,” Tucker said. “Jay (Cutler) did on about three or four occasions yesterday, where he knew exactly where to go with the football. They had some unusual external blitzes that they ran, and Jay took advantage of it, hit Marty (Bennett) on a couple plays, got us first downs and so forth.

“The normal trend of thought is, we want to try to get a pass rush on him, to try to keep him in the pocket, to try to stop the run, to get him in some third-and-longs. We didn’t get that done yesterday.”

Trestman said history has shown that those who blitz Rodgers while playing man-to-man coverage will pay.

“There’s a history of what teams do to successfully defeat him and what he is able to do and hurt people is when he’s blitzed,” Trestman said. “He’s able to get the ball out of the hand quickly and eliminate the pass rush, the extra pass rushers by getting rid of the ball quickly.

“Now you saw yesterday to start the game, they probably ran three or four quick gains right in a row. All their throws were what we’d call a rocker throw or three-step drops, so he was able to get it out. The way that most teams try to get to him is just like Detroit did a week ago. They were able to get a pass rush, stop the run, get him in some third-and-longs and hit him, and we weren’t able to do that.”

Players were quick to defend the approach. Defensive end Willie Young called it their fault simply for not getting to Rodgers with four.

“Whether we were thinking that or not, we have to do better to try and get that guy off that spot,” he said. “I talked about that all week — getting him off that (passing) spot. But, even when we got him off that spot a few times, he’s still good.

“I mean, it’s Aaron Rodgers, you know? It’s just an opportunity for us to get better, to figure out how we can stop this guy. This is adversity for us. Obviously, we’ve got those guys again. We’ll be looking forward to that. It’s always a challenge, trying to figure out ways to win the game.”

The real problem with this approach by Tucker, though, was the personnel he had trying to rush. The Bears did not have Jared Allen because of an illness that has been reported as pneumonia, but not verified by the team.

Allen is back at Halas Hall working out this week. But without him, the Bears lacked a pass rusher who is without a sack this year but is notorious for battling through plays that have been extended to apply pressure.

None of the other Bears pass rushers has this reputation, and it’s a talent that has caused problems for Rodgers in the past to the tune of 15 1/2 sacks by Allen.

Knowing Allen’s status, a different approach seemed more appropriate.

The Bears also were without Jeremiah Ratliff, which hurt the run defense and prevented them from applying pressure off the edge on early downs for fear they would be hurt by Eddie Lacy.

Trestman thought the coverage also was lacking. It was the second full game the Bears have had to play without injured cornerback Charles Tillman, who is out for the season.

They have been forced to play Isaiah Frey at nickel corner because of the injury to Tillman and a quad injury to Sherrick McManis.

Frey wasn’t even on the team after being cut in preseason. He started at nickel last year after a season-ending hamstring injury to Kelvin Hayden, but struggled against Randall Cobb Sunday.

“I think that fundamentally, we’ve got to be better,” Trestman said of the coverage. “We had some missed assignments back there, we had some guys where they shouldn’t have been, that was No. 1.

“I think particularly because we played so much zone yesterday that we’ve got some cleaning up to do with our coverages. We rolled the wrong way one time, we played a low player one time and they got behind us. We got our eyes in the backfield a couple of times when we were in man-to-man. It’s strictly the process of continuing to try and get better.”

They could have similar troubles this week in Carolina with Cam Newton, who is another quarterback at his best buying time and throwing.