(670 The Score) Whatever the Bears' season was supposed to be, it's now completely sideways after a miserable home loss against a bad team Sunday.
And any designs on a return to competitive footing after the end of their 14-game losing streak were undone by an injury that knocked Justin Fields out of the game.
Though the Vikings could barely stay out of their own way while missing star wideout Justin Jefferson, they nevertheless hung on to win 19-13 after Byron Murphy intercepted Tyson Bagent's woefully underthrown pass intended for DJ Moore. An undrafted rookie from Division-II Shepherd, Bagent had engineered an efficient touchdown drive in the quarter, and certain Bears fans from Downers Grove to Hegewisch and Antioch to Kankakee were stirring in their feelings before the deciding duck tumbled dead out of the sky.
This was a game the Bears couldn't lose, not after two weeks of resurgent and explosive play from Fields and Moore — the former posting two of his best career statistical performances and the latter becoming only the second Bears receiver ever (!) to be named the NFC Offensive Player of the Week. The Bears also returned their entire starting defensive backfield for the first time all season. We even dared to look at a softening schedule and visualize them taking steps back toward something more than draft-watching.
It was a dumb thought, apparently.
Though Matt Eberflus and Luke Getsy had 10 days to prepare, the game plan was strangely inert and lifeless. The expected pressures came from a Minnesota defense called aggressively by coordinator Brian Flores, who wanted to test not just the Chicago offensive line but also running backs who aren't known for pass protection. But rather than get the ball out quickly into Moore's hands, he was targeted just twice in the entire first half, racking up seven yards — the exact opposite of what everyone there said all week about his significance. Only late desperation seemed to finally open the game up for Moore.
Fields wasn't helping either, holding onto the ball too long and just not making the kind of anticipatory throws against specific coverages that by now have to be second nature. He was a tick behind the action from the very first play of the game, a sack by D.J. Wonnum.
Even getting the ball snapped properly is an embarrassing challenge for this Bears offense, with veteran center Cody Whitehair finally benched after three quarters of scattershot efforts that were off the mark in every conceivable way. It doesn't help a quarterback when he has to move his eye level just to corral the ball to start a play, and that issue simply must be fixed.
The defense was mostly fine all day, at least, keeping the play in front of them with two deep safeties and forcing Kirk Cousins to throw into tight windows, but the 35-year-old never made the critical mistake the Bears hoped to force.
It's right back to crisis mode now for the Bears, waiting for the expected bad news about Fields' injured throwing hand and wondering when or if Eberflus and his .174 win percentage will be put out of his professional misery.
So much for even the kind of hope that takes our signature style of all-too-willing cognitive contortions. It's like we really should know better.
Dan Bernstein is the co-host of the Bernstein & Holmes Show on middays from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. on 670 The Score. You can follow him on Twitter @Dan_Bernstein.
