Bear Digest

Josh Blackwell's 'out of body experience' and Bears' good, bad and ugly

Josh Blackwell got to celebrate a game-winning blocked field goal and the Bears special teams produced the deciding play Sunday in a 25-24 victory over the Raiders.
Gene Chamberlain|
Josh Blackwell (39) celebrates after the game with teammates and Bears fans at Las Vegas.
Josh Blackwell (39) celebrates after the game with teammates and Bears fans at Las Vegas. | Stephen R. Sylvanie-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

Ben Johnson loved what he was hearing in his headset from special team coordinator Richard Hightower.

H.T., as he's known around Halas Hall, was a bit like Babe Ruth calling his shot against the Cubs in the World Series.

"He's kind of narrating in real time," Johnson said. "He said, 'Yeah (Josh) Blackwell is gonna get this one for us. He's going to come through."

Blackwell did deflect the 54-yard field goal try and it bounced harmlessly upfield as the Bears celebrate a 2-2 record.

"Out of body experience,”  was how Blackwell described the play for reporters.

The game was full of good points like this, along with bad aspects and, of course, the ugly stuf. Here they were from a 25-24 Bears victory.

The Good

Blackwell's block

The best part of the block is it happened because of something the Bears saw on film, much like what happened to them last year against the Vikings and Packers.

“Yeah, I mean, early in the week, we had looked at the film to see that they have a little tendency … their snap ability,” Blackwell said. “And we got close the first two kicks, and I was like, 'I'm going to time this up a little bit, and I'm going to get it.'"

The tendency they noticed was the snapper moving th ball a bit just before snapping it. So it was easier to time it.

“Yeah, seen that and got a good jump,” Blackwell said.

It was actually the Bears’ own long snapper, Scott Daly, who saw it on film and reported it. It takes a long snapper to know one.

It was the first blocked field goal for the Bears since Sept. 17, 2023, when Rasheem Green blocked a Chase McLaughlin 40-yard field goal try by Tampa Bay.

Kevin Byard's pick-2

The Bears free safety got Geno Smith passes twice in the first half and now has 32 for his career. He has more interceptions since 2017 than any active NFL player.

Rome Odunze

When the Bears needed a bigger gain in the passing game, the second-year receiver was there and his 27-yard TD catch was his fifth in four games. He's the only Bears receiver since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970 with at least five TD catches ovr their first four games in either their first or second NFL season.

Tory Taylor's wedge

He was better than U.S.A. Ryder Cup players with a punt bouncing dead on the 1-yard line late in the third quarter. The field position caused by that punt and Devin Duvernay's subsequent punt return set the Bears up and the 49 of Las Vegas and made possible a Cairo Santos 51-yard field goal that proved huge.

Cairo Santos's 50-somethings

With field goals of 51 and 52 yards, Santos now has 23 for his Bears career from 50 or longer and that ties him for the most in franchise history with Robbie Gould.

The Bad

Bears plus-zone offense

The Bears had the ball at the Las Vegas 24 after Kevin Byard's interception, moved to the Raiders 3 after a fumble recovered at the Las Vegs 20, at the Raiders 24 after another Byard interception, and all they had to show for it was two field goals. Maxx Crosby picked off a pass he deflected on one drive.

They were in the red zone four times and had one TD to show for those. Fortunately for them, that one TD was he game-winning score on D'Andre Swift's run.

Bears run blocking

There's just nothing there and no reason to try it on the ground most of the time.

Swift and Kyle Monangai carried 18 times for 56 yards, 3.1 yards a carry. They got 22 of those 56 yards on two runs. So they had 34 yards on 16 other runs, 2.1 yards a carry.

The ugly

Bears defensive front

It wasn't simply another sack-free game, the second in four games, but the run defense. They allowed 7.7 yards a carry and only 31 of the rushing yards came from QB Geno Smith. Raiders running backs and receivers gained 209 yards on 27 carries. Giving up a 64-yard touchdown run

The Stumble Bum

They tried running the same play Ben Johnson burned them with last year while he was with Detroit but it only resulted in Williams running for his life and throwing incomplete at the sidelines. The fake fooled no one, and you need to stop the pass rush somewhere. Thy were all on top of him before he could look upfield.

"They did a great job on defense," Williams said. "They ended up getting some run-through. I should have hit Rome even after the scramble. It’s frustrating that I missed that pass,

but they did a good job with defense, and they covered it out and got some run through. I couldn't go through the progressions."

The Bears' play overall

Ben Johnson used the word ugly to describe it, especially the first half.

"It's easy to get frustrated, but we don't panic," he said. "We just don't, that's not who we are and that's not what we do."

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.