What’s the food that is the best fit for a post-win Monday dinner?
I bet these answers will be good?
There is so much Bears victory Monday goodness to round up from the Sun-Times (Potash, Lieser, Finley), Tribune (Kane, Wiederer), Da Bears Blog (Hughes), The Athletic (Pompei, Fishbain, Jahns), Bear Report (Leming, Pearson), CHGO (Carman, Moreano), Bears Wire (Baribieri), Marquee (Emma), and others. Just cram all the Bears content into my eyeballs, please!
If there were any questions about whose team this was or an underlying current of feeling that this regime set out to set up Justin Fields for failure, they were answered in this 57-second clip:
This is Justin Fields’ team. Full stop. JF1 is QB1 until he proves he isn’t. Let the good times roll, young fella.
No, GM Ryan Poles didn’t make the splashy moves to kick off his first offseason. But remember what I said about rounding out a team and giving Fields a fighting chance to win games by filling different holes? This is the type of game I was talking about. It’s just one game caveats being what they are, first-year Head Coach Matt Eberflus has some pieces to work with and build from moving forward. This year was always about incremental growth. The Bears are trying to build this thing brick by brick. If that 49ers win turns out to be a jump-off point for this team, then we’ll probably think of it as a cornerstone for a new era.
Even had the Bears lost that game, we could still point to all sorts of positive developments. Specifically with Poles’ first draft class. Both second-round picks (CB Kyler Gordon, S Jaquan Brisker) played every defensive snap. Brisker registered a pair of splash plays with a tackle-for-loss and fumble recovery. Gordon’s six solo tackles were second most on the team (behind – who else? – Roquan Smith!) and even chipped in with a TFL. Fellow rookie Braxton Jones played 100 percent of the offensive snaps at left tackle. Jones held his own against Nick Bosa and a relentless pass-rushing effort. Dominique Robinson, who – like Jones – was another Day 3 pick, filled the stat sheet with 7 total tackles (5 solo), 1.5 sacks, 2 QB Hits, and a TFL. It is equal parts refreshing and encouraging to see the Bears get *IMMEDIATE* contributions from their rookies.
Da Bears were checking all da boxes yesterday:
I think David Haugh (670 The Score) hit bullseye with this assessment:
“This was a three-hour infomercial for the HITS principle, evidence of coaching seen in the reduced number of penalties and dumb mistakes, an example of what happens when the coachiest of football coaches gets complete and total buy-in from a bunch of players with much to prove in the NFL … This was an ode to old-fashioned football, when effort and intensity mattered as much as skill and scheme, where you could find an attentive audience in the locker room and huddle.”
And the thing about the statement above is that it’s not as if the Bears were lacking for skill or scheme. The Bears have playmakers on both sides. Especially on defense. That unit has some dudes. Roquan Smith, Robert Quinn, and Eddie Jackson all have a laundry list of accolades from their NFL playing careers. Pro Bowl appearances. All-Pro nods. Recognition as top-100 players as chosen by their peers. One isn’t going to simply walk into Soldier Field and put up 35 points on a healthy Bears defense.
And they have scheme, too. Eberflus is a coach-y coach with experience under Frank Reich (who orchestrated a championship-winning Eagles offense) and Rod Marinelli (one of the NFL’s best defensive coordinators) in the pros, as well as Nick Saban while at Toledo. Luke Getsy studied under Matt LaFleur and a bunch of other solid offensive minds. The Bears have pieces. It might not be many. And they might not be the shiniest. But this wasn’t a team that opponents could just walk over. And if the Niners thought they could do that, then they deserve every bit of that loss yesterday.
Not that I needed confirmation that Poles was a #FootballGuy, but literally soaking in the glory of your first win gives him some extra juice:
Our long-time readers know one of my biggest beefs with Ryan Pace was his inaccessibility. It wasn’t just about him being distant. Pace was often unavailable at times when you’d expect a GM to be available. Especially when it came time to answer tough questions. It felt like he was hiding from the team’s issues instead of trying to attack them head-on. The optics weren’t good. And the vibes weren’t any better. In the end, I hope the winning continues (obviously). But I also hope that Poles continues to be a forward-facing executive and not just some dude sitting in a skybox next to Ted Phillips, George McCaskey, and Virginia McCaskey primed to be meme’d when the cameras give us a shot.
You have to think that win was extra special to Poles. Not just because it was his first. But it was his first after an offseason of taking it on the chin from so many different directions. Had the Bears lost, there would’ve been plenty of “I told you so’s” coming from the usual suspects. However, the Bears won. And, frankly, I don’t really care what they have to say as a retort. Yesterday was a refresher on the old adage that anything can happen on any given Sunday. And maybe a reminder that things are never as bad as the worst opinion.
Ya know what? I respect this:
How it started:
And how it ended:
To the victors, go the spoils. And to the losers, go these tweets:
Could the 49ers bounce back from this? Absolutely. We’ve seen teams get punched in the mouth in Week 1, then turn that defeat into a blip on the radar. But the Niners have so many moving parts. The coach is trying to fit developing a second-year first-time starter into a team that apparently has Super Bowl aspirations. Meanwhile, the GM is hoping that he made the right call with (1) picking that quarterback and (2) sidelining the quarterback who already led them to a Super Bowl appearance and to the brink of a second conference championship in three years. It could go well, but this clunky start isn’t what San Fran had in mind when it saw Chicago on its schedule for Week 1.
The Dante Pettis Revenge Game TD, but in NextGenStats graphic form:
It was a historic pitch-and-catch, too:
I am HOWLING:
We can laugh about it now because they won, but getting hit by the most ridiculous penalty you’ve never heard of (and will probably never hear about again) was soooo Bears:
I don’t even think this is one of those things you can assign blame to (if that’s something you were wanting to do). Just chalk it up to weird football occurrences and call it a day.
The old “a picture is worth a thousand words” adage absolutely applies here. Phenomenal photo work from the Tribune’s Brian Cassella on these images:
The Soldier Field chalk had a mind of its own:
Chicago’s present *handshake* Chicago’s future:
For your listening pleasure:
Hang it in the Art Institute on Michigan Avenue:
Even after opening up looking like a disjointed mess of a team in a loss to the Vikings, the Packers somehow open this week as 9-point favorites against the Bears:
Sheesh! You’d think that beating the team that dispatched of Aaron Rodgers’ squad eight months ago would buy the Bears a few points. Guess not.
A very important anecdote going into Packers Week:
Take that, Cheesedoodles!
Albert Pujols did a cool thing:
There is still time to vote in this poll:
NEWSLETTER
