If one were to put together a package of broadcast shots that spell out rock bottom for a franchise, it would be the troika of beleaguered fans shaking their heads before exiting the game in droves; the quarterback shaking his head on the sidelines, seemingly trying to process the endless stream of pressure he’d faced for four consecutive quarters; and then the head coach, who wears the entirety of the failure on his shoulders, clapping like a penniless gambler who just lost his Airstream trailer on an ill-advised nine-team parlay.
Such was life for the Chicago Bears amid a totally bleak 19–3 loss to the New England Patriots on Sunday that dropped them to 4–5 on the season. To add in a bonus, the game’s color commentators were discussing the removal of Matt Eberflus the way we might suggest a different lawn seed to our neighbor. Casual and noncontroversial at this point. Very clearly, this is a club that has not recovered from the most high-profile loss of the season—a Hail Mary defeat at the hands of the Washington Commanders—and in two games since has produced one of the most anemic offenses in the NFL. Very clearly, this is a team that has reached a decision point as the optics increasingly paint a picture of a season spilling off the rails. Very clearly, the Bears still have the most grueling part of their schedule remaining and, in terms of opponent win percentage, have the hardest slate in the NFL on tap, and must decide whether to ride through the thick of it with the status quo intact.
There is nuance here, as with any situation. The Bears have an entire front five listed on the injury report. Against New England on Sunday, they tried everything to negate a Jerod Mayo pressure package that kicked into high gear the moment it became clear Chicago had no way of stopping it. Shotgun formations with both a running back and a tight end in the backfield, which New England circumnavigated by forcing the ancillary blockers to help inside then rushing the defenders meant to spy those would-be receivers. Moving pockets with jumbo units, which New England simply blew up on the front side, leaving Caleb Williams like an item on a conveyor belt headed for destruction. This situation led the Bears to give up six or more sacks in back-to-back games for the first time since 1993. And, more ghastly, the failure to score a touchdown in back-to-back games for the first time in 20 years.
Of course, that is not how people in decision-making positions process major decisions. The big-picture thinkers, the buzzword-filled chart and graph crowd, the leadership seminar crew, will all see the following: three straight victories heading into the Washington game, a failed Hail Mary, a player not even watching the game-winning touchdown, a game the week after in which they surrendered a 50-plus-yard touchdown run with seconds remaining before the half and then a meaningless end-of-game stanza with the star quarterback pummeled after the opposition had already waved the white flag and sat its starters.
They will see the New England game, where drives started near midfield, in enemy territory, with the ball laid up on the red tees, ending in punt after punt. False start after false start. As it relates to that point directly, they will see that the Bears lead the NFL in false start penalties, with 19.
Credit the Bears for believing in everything to this point. Throughout the post–Matt Nagy and Ryan Pace era, they eschewed the norms. Eberflus was hired amid a slew of offensive guru type head coaches, which meant that Chicago missed out on the likes of Kevin O’Connell and Mike McDaniel, but also prevented themselves from a more catastrophic mistake during that 10-coach hiring cycle. They traded the No. 1 pick while the urgency to find a franchise quarterback was red hot, scored an administrative coup in a fleecing of the Carolina Panthers and wound up with Williams, who will one day, absolutely, unequivocally, be a fabulous football player (even during the darkest moments of Sunday’s loss, seeing him rifle a fastball into an opening the size of a sea salt grain smoothed the most calloused hearts).
But at some point after the evening of Oct. 27, there was not just a plateau in progress but an outright crash. The minutiae, the tiny ignorable on-field mistakes the Bears had made fairly consistently during this regime, combined with a turbulent weather system that rose up the moment Noah Brown caught a football in the end zone and the team was sent packing in stunned silence.
We know—or at least think we know—what the rest of the NFL world expects now. The paper bag heads. The flood of make-a-change calls to the local radio station. The bombardment of the team’s social media accounts. The tightest parsing of each word that comes out of Williams’s mouth from here on out to search for outward signs of discord.
The question will become whether those in decision-making positions with the Bears will continue with the plan and view this as the unfortunate outlier aberration of all outlier aberrations; a demon that will be exorcized with time. Or, a sign that plans are meant to be altered. And that an alteration is due.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as The Bears Look Broken With Two More Losses Since the Hail Mary.
