The Chicago Bears fired head coach Matt Eberflus the day after a hard-fought Thanksgiving loss to the Detroit Lions. The Bears added onto their losing streak to make it six games, seven as of current. With the Bears struggling often in late game situations and a tense locker room situation after the game against Detroit, Chicago fired Eberflus and put interim offensive coordinator Thomas Brown in the head coaching position. With the gravity of the late game issues, Eberflus had to go.
“A lot of the blame is on Eberflus, and Shane Waldren, the old offensive coordinator. This is all their fault, they stink,” junior Braxton Ozug said.
The first loss of the streak was an away game versus the Washington Commanders, where Washington won on a final play hail mary. Quarterback Jayden Daniels heaved a ball at the goal line, and cornerback Tyrique Stevenson tipped the ball up and back, where the Commanders caught it for the touchdown. Daniels got little rush and was able to get a great pass off.
Following that loss were embarrassing losses to the Arizona Cardinals, 29-9, and a loss to the New England Patriots, 19-3. Scores that low against mediocre teams are flat out unacceptable. The Bears couldn’t put together a single touchdown drive against the Patriots. Luckily, the defense was able to hold the Patriots to 19 even though their offense was giving the ball back to New England all the time. These losses were terrible, and were a terrible look as the Bears went into a tough stretch where they would face all of their divisional opponents. This would be an amazing opportunity for the Bears to flip a switch and get ahead in their division.
The following week, the Bears played their rival to the north, the Green Bay Packers. Chicago has been dominated by the Packers as of recent, but the game ended up being very even throughout, with both teams putting a few good drives together. The game itself was impressive and showed that the Bears could compete with strong teams. Caleb Williams led a great drive at the end that would seal the game. An important quarterback trait is performing well with little time and lots of pressure, and Williams showed that he has that ability, and the help he got from his receivers was great. He set the team up for an easy field goal, but it ended up getting blocked by the Packers. The Chicago line got absolutely ambushed and barely blocked Green Bay at all. Green Bay got a hand on the ball, and Chicago handed away another win.
The Minnesota Vikings game was a huge failure for Eberflus, and showed a lot about Williams. This game showed the most grit by the Bears. The Bears had some late game heroics including a great kickoff return, an excellent touchdown drive led by Williams where the offense looked spectacular, an onside kick recovery, and a game-tying field goal. However, the Bears completely flipped that and looked terrible in overtime. The offense fell apart quickly and gave the ball to the Vikings, who took advantage of the opportunity and won the game. Bears fans were let down yet again.
“We kinda choked, we got too many penalties, no one got open, and then we got sacked and fell apart”, Ozug said.
Eberflus needs to keep the offense together. The offense had just made a comeback, had all the momentum, and then gave the game away. The Bears are going through stints of successful play and terrible football. As many football coaches say, you need to be steady eddy. You can’t be a “sometimes” team. You need to have a consistent team. Williams showed his capabilities with the great comeback, but he needs to keep his team moving. He looked somewhat lost as he went through his progressions in overtime. Taking a sack really set the team back, and whether the errors were his or from a coaching standpoint is hard to tell, but it needs to be resolved.
“The play calling was kind of awful”, junior Joseph Demeo said.
Williams is shaping up to be an NFL caliber quarterback, with the skillset needed and great talent around him, but he just needs to clean up some rookie mistakes and possibly a better offensive line.
“[Caleb] Williams is the best quarterback in the league. So good, ” Ozug commented.
The last straw for Eberflus was against the Lions on Thanksgiving Day. Going into the game, the Bears knew they were in for a tough game, but the first half was appalling. To put it bluntly, the offense did nothing. The offense left the defense out to dry. The defense let the Lions into Chicago territory a lot, but they at least were able to hold them to a field goal three times. Chicago went into the half down 16-0, and had little prospect of winning. The third quarter showed some promise, as the offense finally put up a touchdown. The Bears scored two more touchdowns in the fourth quarter, and were down 23-20. Chicago fans once again got their hopes up, even though little time remained. The defense held strong and got the ball back to their offense. Starting from their own one yard line, the Bears drove down slowly, and eventually were in comfortable field goal range with less than a minute left. The Bears could try a couple more passes, or even a run (since they had a timeout left). The Bears passed the ball, but got moved back ten yards for a penalty, and then needed some yards for an easier field goal. Williams got sacked on the following play, as the offensive line failed miserably in pass blocking. In a quick decision, Eberflus didn’t use his timeout. Instead, the Bears players tried to get to the line and run a play. It ended up being an awful throw which bled all remaining time off the clock. Eberflus should have called a timeout the instant Williams got sacked, so he could talk to the rookie and set up a play to gain back yardage.
“I was sitting there on the couch with my plate of Thanksgiving food and I was really looking forward to eating it and it would have been nice if the Bears had gotten a win, but I just watched the clock tick from 32 down to zero and we didnt call a timeout,” junior Rob Czarniecki said, “We just snapped the ball with five seconds left and threw the worst pass I have ever seen down the field, no chance of winning the game. And Eberflus seemed to be fine with it, and just told the team that it doesn’t matter. He said that we gave it our all and just to be thankful for stuff but I wasn’t too thrilled.”
The coach could have given his team at least two more plays, but instead he let his rookie quarterback, who had just gotten hit with a sack, try to set up a play.
“I think Eberflus is an idiot for not calling a timeout and we almost beat the best team in the league,” Ozug stated.
Some of the blame is on the offensive linemen, who should have seen the rusher on his outside during his pre snap reads, but obviously Eberflus was already on the hot seat and he certainly could have prepared better for the first half and managed the ending better.
“It’s a little disappointing, as a Bears fan I always go into the season with high hopes and they, clearly and easily, get shot down,” Czarniecki remarked.
Now the Bears are left with little season and lots of work. Williams needs to drop the rookie mistakes and build back some confidence. Although they have already lost their first game without Eberflus, no change is going to work magic overnight. The Bears need to stop focusing their trades and free agency signings on skill players and instead search for linemen. The management has been terrible, but if Chicago can play this right and hire a good coach, perhaps they can flip it around and have a good season next year.
