Windy City Gridiron
The Chicago Bears were humiliated on Sunday.
There’s no other way to put it.
There was plenty of hype heading into this one as Ben Johnson returned home to Detroit to face his former team. The game was competitive for the first 30 minutes.
The second 30 minutes weren’t even watchable.
The Bears trailed 21-14 late in the first half. At that point, the Lions went on a 31- 7 run. Jared Goff looked like he was Rembrandt. The Lions did whatever they wanted through the air. They did whatever they wanted on the ground. The defense handled the offense with ease. The Bears were outclassed in every aspect of the game.
For the first three years of Ryan Poles’ tenure, we heard about the culture he and Matt Eberflus created. The Bears were assembling a group of high-class individuals who worked hard and shared the Bears’ vision.
By midway through the 2024 season, it was clear that culture was a fabrication. It was a mirage. Matt Eberflus thought his locker room would hold itself accountable. He didn’t think they needed to be micromanaged. He was wrong. “Fire Matt Eberflus, and it will all look better!” Once Eberflus was gone, Thomas Brown coached this team hard, but the effort didn’t improve.
“Bring us a coach that will hold the locker room accountable!”
Enter Ben Johnson. Johnson has shown accountability. Johnson has shown attention to detail. Johnson has been everything that the players said they wanted. But that’s the effort they gave on Sunday.
The Chicago Bears’ defense has given up 694 yards and 73 points in their last five quarters of play.
The offense on unscripted drives has scored just 24 points in two games.
The team is averaging 7.5 yards per play on their two opening scoring drives, and just 4.8 the rest of the game.
When Ben Johnson can’t script exactly what the offense needs to do, they fail.
It’s been three different head coaches, four different play callers, five different offensive coordinators, four different defensive coordinators, and a partridge in a pear tree.
At some point, you have to look at the players, and when you do that, you have to look at the man who built the roster.
Here’s looking at you, Ryan Poles.
The Chicago Bears have a Ryan Poles problem. It’s becoming more glaring every day.
The roster has holes, and it’s something that many fans didn’t want to hear about in the offseason.
The Bears hired Ben Johnson, and nothing else seemed to matter.
For the GM, that felt like when Matt Eberflus got a haircut and grew a beard and everyone looked at the new look, but seemed to forget that he wasn’t a very good head coach.
The Ben Johnson hire was fabulous, but it doesn’t change the shortcomings of the GM.
Ryan Poles’ winning percentage is a mere 28%. That averages out to 4.8 wins per season. He’s yet to have a winning record. We’ve heard the excuses.
3-14 didn’t...
