Bears Winning Ugly

September 16, 2019

There are many adjectives to describe the Bears versus the Denver Broncos game. For the second consecutive week, Bears football was boring as both teams combined for only 30 points. Ugly is another apt description with sloppy plays and bad penalties. Maddening watching the Bears offense sputter. Unbelievably wacky final two minutes to decide the outcome. The Bears luckily eked out a victory. A loss would have put them two games behind the Green Bay Packers. The Packers defeated the Minnesota Vikings 21-16.

The Bear defense had a harrowing day but when all is said and done they surrendered only 14 points.  Former Bears defensive coordinator now Broncos coach, Vic Fangio, put together a game plan that caused the Bears some problems. The Broncos were throwing quick release throws to negate the Bears pass rush. Broncos quarterback, Joe Flaco, looked like the Packers Aaron Rodgers. He completed pass after pass against soft Bear coverage. However, when they got to midfield on all but two occasions, the Bears forced a punt. By the fourth quarter the Bears defense looked fatigued from the Denver heat and high altitude. The ineffectiveness of the offense didn’t help keeping them off the field. Toward the end of the quarter the Broncos were at the Bears two yard line when Kyle Fuller intercepted a Flaco pass. As usual, the Bear offense did nothing and punted. The Broncos started a drive with a little more than two minutes left. After converting a couple of fourth downs, they capped the drive with a seven yard touchdown from Flaco to Emmanuel Sanders. Rather than kick the extra point, Fangio decided to go for a lead. The Broncos lost 5 yards on a delay of game penalty so Fangio sent in his kicker for the tie. Bears fans were elated as the kick sailed wide. Alas, the Bears had a dumb off-sides penalty.  With the ball at the one yard line they went for the lead. Flaco again went to Sanders and the Broncos led 14-13 with thirty-one seconds left.

I’ve told people from the day he was hired that Bears coach Matt Nagy was a bad choice. If he didn’t have a great defense and just a good one the Bears would have finished 7-9 last year.  He would not have been coach of the year and no-one would be talking about how he changed the culture.

It took six quarters for the offense to score a touchdown. After a 46 yard run by wide receiver Cordarrelle Patterson, the Bears were inside the Broncos 20 yard line. They ran it down to a first and goal at the three yard line. This is where Nagy gets stupid. Rookie running back David Montgomery is good in space and makes people miss tackles. You can’t use this ability in goal line situations. Nagy runs him twice for minimal or no gain. If not for the Broncos giving the Bears four new downs on a holding penalty, the Bears may still maybe looking for their first touchdown. Nagy’s offense ran Montgomery into the line three more times before he finally stretched the ball over the goal line.

When Nagy was hired, his main objective was to develop second over-all pick, quarterback Mitch Trubisky. You would think he would much better at this point in his career. He still may turn out to be pretty good. However, instead of Nagy making him a game changer, he is a game manager. With 31 seconds left he had completed 14 passes for approximately 95 yards. Take away his longest pass of 18 yards and he has 77 yards averaging 6 yards per completion. No turnovers and short passes are what managing a game is about.

About those last 31 seconds. The Bears move the ball from their 25 yard line to the thirty-two. The Broncos get called for roughing the passer for 15 more yards. This was maybe a questionable call but most roughing the passer calls are. Trying to get into field goal position, Trubisky fires three terrible incomplete passes. The Bears commit another penalty making it fourth and 15 yards. This is irrelevant because they have time for one play to move 25 yards to be in field goal territory.  Trubisky stepped up in the pocket and completed a 25 yard pass to wide receiver Allen Robinson. The Bears got a time-out with one second left. Rookie kicker Eddy Pineiro came in to line up a 52 yard field goal. Prior to this he had connected on attempts from 40 and 51 yards. With Bear fans holding their breath, he hits the field goal while the clock runs out. Bears win 16-14. Unbelievable, you betcha.