1st-and-10: Bears coach Matt Eberflus following dubious footsteps
Predicting success is always difficult for chronically optimistic Bears fans, who are almost always disappointed. But red flags for a coaching staff are getting pretty easy to spot after 13 seasons of change at Halas Hall.
When the progressive, aggressive offensive-minded head coach suddenly fears the worst-case scenario in a critical moment, that’s a red flag. Like Marc Trestman kicking a field goal on second down against the Vikings in 2013 — fearing a fumble or penalty. Or when Matt Nagy had Mitch Trubisky take a knee on first down with 43 seconds left to set up Eddy Pineiro’s ill-fated 41-yard field goal attempt on second down against the Chargers in 2019. (“I have zero thought of running the ball and taking the chance of fumbling the football.”)
The red flag wasn’t just that they were conservative. It’s that they were out of character, losing their gumption at the wrong moment. And the post-mortems of those events only made matters worse.
Matt Eberflus, in his own way, is having one of those moments in the aftermath of the Bears’ devastating 18-15 loss to the Commanders on Jayden Daniels’ 52-yard Hail Mary to Noah Brown on Sunday at Northwest Stadium. It was the second time this season the Bears had clearly lost a game because they were poorly coached. And this was even more evident than the 21-16 loss to the Colts in Week 3:
- Coming out of the bye, Caleb Williams and the Bears’ offense not only lost the momentum it had from back-to-back games of 36 and 35 points against the Panthers and Jaguars, but reverted to Week 1 form. The Bears were shut out in the first half against the Commanders, and didn’t score until 43 seconds remained in the third quarter.
In the obverse of the Trestman/Nagy situations, offensive coordinator Shane Waldron got cute at the wrong time. On third-and-goal from the Commanders’ 1-yard line with the Bears on the doorstep of a touchdown that would have given them the lead, Waldron called center Doug Kramer’s number.
Kramer has played in the backfield several times this season, but hasn’t carried the ball. He botched the handoff from Williams for a fumble that the Commanders recovered. Just the fact that you need Doug Kramer to score inside the 5 should tell you your offense isn’t ready to get that cute.
- And, of course, the Hail Mary fiasco. It’s normally a gift from the football gods when it works, but the Bears greased the skids for their own demise on this one — allowing a 13-yard completion to get Daniels in range for a more legitimate Hail Mary attempt; rushing only three linemen, giving Daniels 12 seconds to fire away; and failing to cover Brown behind the scrum, with the player responsible for that — cornerback Tyrique Stevenson — gesturing to fans in the stands as the ball was being snapped. Yikes!
Eberflus doubled down on every strategy that led to the debacle, with one in particular standing out. Should Eberflus have called time out, with Stevenson clearly not ready for the play?
“From our vantage point, everybody was lined up in the correct position and then we just were ready to go,” Eberflus said.
Wait, what? While other strategies are debatable, that defies reality. When a coach almost literally isn’t seeing the same game we are, that’s the biggest red flag of all.
2. It’s getting to be a tired refrain, but it still stands — unlike Trestman and Nagy (and John Fox, for that matter), Eberflus has an ascending team on both sides of the ball.
Even in an overall disappointing performance, their leaky defense allowed only 18 points (just 12 until the Hail Mary). And Williams’ notably became a lot more accurate and focused in the fourth quarter when he saw the opportunity to steal the game.
Williams completed 4 of 16 passes for 36 yards (a 39.6 passer rating) into the fourth quarter. But in the final two drives, with a chance to take the lead, Williams completed 6 of 8 passes for 95 yards (a 114.1 rating), eventually leading to Roschon Johnson’s one-yard run that gave the Bears a 15-12 lead.
3. As we learned from the Nagy era, teams have good culture until they don’t. A loss like this won’t fracture the culture the Eberflus’ Bears thrive on, but it can chip away at it a little bit, leaving it a little bit more vulnerable.
DJ Moore expressed surprise that the Bears tried the handoff to Kramer (“I don’t know the reason behind the play call,” he said on his weekly paid appearance on the Mully & Haugh Show on The Score). And safety Kevin Byard intimated he would rather the Bears “pressed up” the Commanders receivers on the 13-yard pass to Terry McLaurin that set up the Hail Mary, and talked to Eberflus about it.
That’s not abnormal, but a reminder that players are paying attention just like the rest of us. This is one of those weeks where the Bears’ vaunted culture will be tested.
“I think it’s always a test when you come out of a loss,” tight end Cole Kmet said. “We as players did not play well in that game. I thought the plan we had offensively was good, we just didn’t execute it very well. So I don’t think any of us came away having less faith in the coaching staff and what we’ve got going on here or the culture that we have. It just came down to one play and the ball literally bounced their way at the final seconds.”
4. Stevenson is still a keeper, despite his Hail Mary gaffe. The disappointment is that he wasn’t already humbled after allowing a 61-yard pass play to McLaurin and another unnecessary roughness penalty prior to the final play. But that’s on the coaching staff, which has known all along that Stevenson is a high-strung talent whose hard edge has to be managed.
With an obvious option in Terell Smith, it should not be that difficult for Eberflus to get the message across. The discipline — or lack of it — will not go unnoticed inside Halas Hall this week.
5. For What It’s Worth Dept.: Of the 10 teams with a bye so far this season, the Bears are the only one that did not score in the first half coming off the bye. In fact, eight of the other nine had a 10-point lead in the first half, including the Lions (up 27-3 at Dallas), Chargers (up 20-0 at Denver) Rams (up 14-3 vs. the Raiders). The Bears were down 9-0 against the Commanders.
6. A lot of plays get lost in a game that ends like this. The Bears are 9 for 12 on fourth-and-short conversions this season, but they gambled and lost on fourth-and-1 from their 40 in the second quarter. Williams threw a quick pass to Moore behind the line, and Commanders cornerback Benjamin St-Juste anticipating the play, tackled Moore for no gain.
7. The Bears have had some miracle finishes in their favor — Bob Avellini’s 37-yard touchdown pass to tight end Greg Latta with three seconds left to beat the Chiefs 28-27 in 1977; Shane Matthews’ 34-yard Hail Mary to running back James Allen for a tying touchdown on the final play of regulation in 2001.
But they had never lost on the final play of a game they were leading since the merger. In 1970, Packers quarterback Bart Starr — with no time outs left — scored on a three-yard run with three seconds left to beat the Bears 20-19 at Lambeau Field.
Sunday's game was the latest the Bears have taken the lead and lost in regulation since 2008 against the Falcons. The Bears took a 20-19 lead with 11 seconds left on Kyle Orton's 17-yard touchdown pass to Rashied Davis. But the Falcons won as time expired on Jason Elam's 48-yard field goal — after a short kickoff and Matt Ryan's 26-yard pass to Michael Jenkins with one second left)
8. The Bears’ defense allowed 481 yards but still only 18 points, which should have been enough to win. (The Lions allowed 416 yards against the Titans on Sunday and won 52-14 — their fourth consecutive victory when allowing 400 or more yards.)
The Bears have lost 16 consecutive games in which they’ve allowed 400 or more yards — the longest streak in the NFL. The Patriots are second with 11 consecutive losses while allowing 400 or more yards, since a 38-31 victory over the Bears, when the Bears had 453 yards — 54 on a Hail Mary completion to wide receiver Kevin White, who was tackled at the 1-yard line to end the game.
9. Ex-Bears Player of the Week: Wide receiver Darnell Mooney had four receptions for 86 yards, including a tie-breaking 30-yard touchdown from Kirk Cousins that gave the Falcons a lead they would not lose in a 31-26 victory over the Buccaneers.
Mooney has 37 receptions for 506 yards (13.7 average) and four touchdowns in eight games this season. He had 31 receptions for 414 yards (13.4 average) and one touchdown in 15 games with the Bears last season.
10. Bear-ometer — 8-9: at Cardinals (W); vs. Patriots (W); vs. Packers (L); vs. Vikings (W); at Lions (L); at 49ers (L); at Vikings (L); vs. Lions (L); vs. Seahawks (W); at Packers (L).