CHICAGO (670 The Score) – By the time the last second mercifully ticked off the clock Sunday, ending the latest misery at Soldier Field, fewer than half the seats were filled.
And those who stayed till the bitterly cold end of the Bears’ 34-17 loss to the Lions that wasn't as close as the score started a chorus of "Let’s go, Lions!”
Which morphed into chants “Jar-ed Goff! Jar-ed Goff!”
It was such a complete Detroit takeover of the South Loop that I wouldn't have been shocked to spot Eminem in the building.
Somewhere within earshot, the McCaskeys surely cringed because not even an organization as tone-deaf as the Bears can ignore the non-competitive embarrassment they’ve become. Right? How much longer can we keep referring to this as a football city?
A late-December lakefront reminder of how far the Bears have fallen from NFL respectability has become a Chicago holiday tradition. Sunday elicited shades of Christmastime 2014 and 2017 and 2021, those long irrelevant winter months that seemed even colder near the ends of the tenures of Marc Trestman, John Fox and Matt Nagy, respectively. Enough already. And while you're at it, guys, enough with turning Soldier Field Sundays into sojourns where everybody in stadium operations pretends everything's fine. It's not.
What’s the purpose anyway of asking a fan a trivia question on the Jumbotron in the fourth quarter of a game the Bears failed to show up again? Can you really script an ex-player saying Bears fans are the "best in the league" on the giant scoreboard when more than half of them will be gone by the fourth quarter? It admittedly seems petty to point out something like that, but it's emblematic of an organization that just can't read the room.
Somebody in charge needs to declare that the feel-good videos and stadium stunts really shouldn't return until the winning does, which, based on the latest loss, looks a long way off.
The most damning question about this franchise as the calendar closes on 2024 is this: Which project is further away from completion, the Bears having a roster capable of playing in a Super Bowl or building a stadium worthy of hosting one?
While Bears president Kevin Warren remains fixated on a project in the city enough to avoid Arlington Heights, where the Bears own 326 acres – if time is money, how much is Warren's obsession costing the organization? – his football operation produced one of the most disappointing seasons in recent memory.
The Bears have lost nine straight games and have had double-digit losses in four straight seasons. They fired their offensive coordinator and head coach in-season. They’ve turned an ideal situation for No. 1 overall draft pick Caleb Williams into a quandary bordering on professional negligence. The culture they brag about is polluted.
A season that began with playoff aspirations has seen the Bears go 0-5 in the NFC North as they’ve lost their last nine games in the division. Remember when general manager Ryan Poles talked about taking the North? Poles is closer to taking his mediocre evaluation skills elsewhere if Warren reneges on his public stance and decides to start over the way an NFL organization hellbent on winning likely would. Warren certainly could justify firing Poles.
The Bears have no chance to close the gap with the Lions, Vikings and Packers without a bottom-line, cutthroat, comfortable-being-uncomfortable approach to winning. The once-feared “Monsters of the Midway” have become sloppy, boring and soft. The Lions? Heck, the Lions offense is so good it has to pretend to stumble.
Two games remain (WARNING!) before the Bears can begin another organizational overhaul. Sunday's game simply reinforced how faulty the football product is. If the Bears were a Christmas gift, you'd return them Thursday.
Here are some other observations from the latest long day on the Museum Campus…
--- Caleb Williams gave those who thought he had stopped improving this season something to reconsider. Williams completed 26 of 40 passes for 334 yards for two touchdowns for a 107.7 passer rating. Familiar issues such as throwing inaccurately and holding onto the ball too long surfaced but, overall, Williams gave Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson reasons to wonder how he might look next year in Johnson's offense. Not insignificant was Williams' ever-present postgame poise, which can't be easy considering the team’s last victory came on Oct. 13.
--- Down 20-0, Williams took a deep shot down the field intended for receiver DJ Moore. Williams badly overthrew Moore, who appeared to slow his pace near the end of his route. It was an uncatchable ball but an unmistakably bad look for a veteran player – especially one who raised eyebrows earlier in the week when he answered a reporter's question about the offseason by saying he was thinking of "vacation.'' Yes, context was missing in many of the conversations about Moore's comment, but a captain of a team mired in a long losing streak must more carefully consider how his words will be parsed and how his body language will be studied.
--- Linebacker Tremaine Edmunds makes too much money to make such little impact. Too often, that's evident for a player the Bears guaranteed $50 million. The most obvious example Sunday came on the Lions' first scoring drive when Edmunds failed to get off blocks or create more resistance. His pass breakup in the fourth quarter with the score 34-17 doesn't make up for Edmunds being largely underwhelming. He made one solo tackle. Worse, seeing Edmunds struggle to justify that investment only makes Roquan Smith's emergence as a perennial All-Pro linebacker harder to watch. Poles, you might recall, considered Smith a bad fit for the Bears defense and not worth the kind of investment the Ravens were willing to make.
--- Goff gave MVP voters something to think about against a dispirited, disinterested Bears defense. Forget all that pregame nonsense about Goff playing in only his second outdoor game of the season or his previous December struggles in Chicago. (That 2018 game was against a legit Bears defense, not a bunch of players in vacation mode.) This time, Goff completed 23 of 32 passes for 336 yards and three touchdowns, the most impressive an 82-yard beauty to Jameson Williams, who beat Tyrique Stevenson and Jonathan Owens for an easy touchdown that reminded people how good Goff's arm is.
The "Ja-red Goff" chants actually were heard the first time in the third quarter after Goff successfully executed one of those Johnson trick plays they love so much in Detroit. Goff intentionally stumbled making his drop, coinciding with running back Jahmyr Gibbs dropping the ground and drawing the defense's attention to the commotion in the backfield. Meanwhile, tight end Sam LaPorta snuck behind everyone for a 21-yard touchdown pass once Goff regathered himself, according to the play.
The inspiration for the play was something Johnson noticed on tape of a Bears-Packers game in 2023 when Green Bay quarterback Jordan Love dropped the ball, recovered his own fumble and found Luke Musgrave wide open for a big gain. Something about the way a defense flinches during a stumble gave Johnson the idea. Smart guy. Super quarterback.
--- Speaking of Johnson, he did nothing to diminish his status as one of the leading candidates to be the next Bears head coach. The Lions moved the football with ease, on the ground and through the air, amassing 475 yards with as much efficiency as creativity. The Lions schemed receivers open and ran defenders over, whatever was required. Before kickoff, NFL Network reporter Tom Pelissero reported that Johnson – who will be pursued by every team with a head coaching vacancy – will be “intrigued by the Bears job.”
If the Bears end up hiring Johnson, rest assured on the day that he's introduced at Halas Hall, he’ll reference the three-play, 70-yard, 19-second drive by the Bears at the end of the first half when describing Williams’ potential. On that drive, Williams flashed his elite arm talent with a 25-yard strike to Moore and then a 45-yard dart to veteran receiver Keenan Allen for a touchdown. That sequence alone gave Johnson enough reason to consider the job; a franchise quarterback can be hard for any new head coach to find, and the Bears already have one.
--- Just before that explosive Bears drive to end the half, their defense made it easier for the Lions to pad their lead with another undisciplined mistake. On fourth-and-1 at the Bears' 25-yard line, Goff barked signals at the line of scrimmage as the clock ticked toward the two-minute warning. It was obvious by Goff's gesticulations that he was trying to draw the Bears offside and – for any smart player paying attention – it was obvious the game clock would hit the two-minute warning two seconds before the play clock would expire. The Lions never planned to snap the ball. But Bears rookie Austin Booker jumped offsides anyway because Chicago isn’t coached well to avoid such mental errors. Four plays later, the Lions scored another touchdown. Because, of course they did.
--- In a scary scene in the second quarter, Bears left tackle Braxton Jones lay on his back and clutched his helmet with both hands, a player clearly in pain. Medical personnel rushed to examine Jones, who suffered an ankle injury and was carted off the field.
Jones started after missing the Bears’ loss to the Vikings last Monday due to a concussion. His replacement that night, Kiran Amegadjie, was a healthy scratch against the Lions so Larry Borom – who was inactive only six days earlier – replaced Jones. The inconsistent approach with Amegadjie reflects a front office and coaching staff in conflict over how to develop a rookie third-round draft pick, something Warren shouldn't ignore when evaluating Poles' roster-building.
--- May everyone in a Bears locker room full of too many veterans who never learned how to win and too many young players struggling to learn how take a cue from tight end Cole Kmet, whose touchdown reception made Sunday no easier for him to stomach.
"It's hard for me to be real with myself to find positives,” Kmet said. “I'm kinda done doing that.”
We're all kinda done thinking the Bears are capable of change.
David Haugh is the co-host of the Mully & Haugh Show from 5-10 a.m. weekdays on 670 The Score. Click here to listen. Follow him on X @DavidHaugh.