Time for Chicago's Bears to Go Back to the Drawing Board. Again.

It’s time to blow it up.

Sunday’s disaster against Detroit is just the latest clunker of the Pace-Nagy-Trubisky era. This group has had more than enough time to show its stuff. And what it has shown is that it is in over its head.

I don’t say this as a fan. I am not a fan. I am more of an interested observer. Decades of sportswriting takes the fan out of you. Plus, at this point, I am less interested in the NFL than I have ever been. Give me college football any day.

Didn’t start out the way. When I was young, it was all about the Bears. I find pro football pretty boring these days. It seems like a ton of fans are more interested in their fantasy teams than their actual teams.

The NFL looks to me like a homogenized, predictable brand of football when compared with the crazy emotions and variety of ways to play in college football.

That said, there’s no question the NFL is hugely popular. For all my disinterest, I still keep an eye on the the Bears, and have done so in one form or another for nearly 60 years.

I was a dedicated fan as a youngster, but even then I was a bit of a realist. The Bears won the 1963 NFL championship with a great defense that carried an uninspiring offense, aided by the gambling suspensions of Packers running back Paul Hornung and Lions defensive tackle Alex Karras, two key players on two key opponents.

When the Bears descended into unmitigated mediocrity in the late ’60s, we took heart from the simple pleasures. My high-school history teacher, a season ticket-holder, shifted from pulling out his flask after scores to bringing it out for first downs.

My friends and I enjoyed the way Virgil Carter, pressed into emergency quarterback duty, called plays that taped to his wrist. We were amused that another QB, Jack Concannon, acquired for Mike Ditka(!), liked to kneel in the huddle. We were proud that Concannon had a cameo in the football scene of the movie M*A*S*H.

In those lean days—before the NFL came up with the magic formula of expanded playoffs and fantasy football—Bears fans learned to take their pleasure where they could find it.

As a sportswriter, I enjoyed covering the Super Bowl Shuffle Bears as much as any team I was around in a four-decade career. This was not merely true because they were champions. It was also true because they won with smash-mouth Chicago style.

They also were down-to-earth good guys. Dan Hampton was always up for a quick nine holes between two-a-days in Platteville. Jimbo Covert was ready for a round of pinball in a Second Street bar.

But even that team ultimately disappointed themselves and the people who rooted for them by not adding to their dominant performance in 1985.

That’s the lot of Bears fans.

When I moved away from Bears coverage—to the Blackhawks and then to Big Ten football, I wanted to see them win because that was more interesting for the city, my friends and for me when I had time to watch. But it was no longer a fan thing.

That’s kind of where I’m at now. I don’t always watch the NFL. But when I do, I prefer the Bears.

Sunday was rock-bottom. Someone has to step up and speak for disgruntled Bears fans. Who have every right to be disgruntled.

Trying to pass on third down deep in his own territory and nursing a 30-27 lead, Trubisky was jarred into fumbling (shown above). The Lions proceeded to score and pull out a 34-30 win.

Improbable? Absolutely.

The last straw. It needs to be.

The loss was the Bears’ sixth straight, and it was filled with other gaffes.

When you are sloppier than the Lions, who have a long and frustrating history of under-achieving, things are really messy.

Everything about these Bears feel miserably off-kilter. It isn’t working. Ever since the doink-doink field-goal loss to the Eagles in the playoffs, the downs have far outweighed the ups.

That’s why I say, Blow it up.

The GM, Ryan Pace, the guy who decided Trubisky was The Next Great Thing, swings and misses too many times on talent evaluation.

Matt Nagy, who looked like a promising hire as coach, has proven time and again that he doesn’t get it.

And the Bears’ karma continues to be all wrong. They have enough talent on defense to be successful. Since that first Nagy season (12-4 in 2018), though, the sum of those parts has not added up.

On offense, they continue to have no chance because they don’t have a quarterback who can be a consistent winner. Trubisky, like Jay Cutler, doesn't see the field well enough to compete against quarterbacks who do. And there's a reason Nick Foles has moved around a lot.

I am not big on firing GMs and coaches as a knee-jerk reaction. When a team is struggling like the Bears, there is usually a big step back before things get better. And there is the uncertainty of finding a GM and coach who are better.

This situation reminds me of something that’s intrinsic to winning football teams and sorely lacking in losing teams. There has to be a trust and a belief throughout the organization.

There can and will be setbacks and problems. Good organizations pull together and weather them.

The Bears do not have that. At all.

Time to blow it up.