Why Matt Nagy Is Afraid of the Jaguars ... Seriously

The next obvious step for the Chicago Bears after a win as big as Sunday's is the natural letdown.

With the Jacksonville Jaguars (1-13) now leading in the race to get Trevor Lawrence, it's difficult to see how they would want to step up and fight against the Bears after working so hard to pull ahead of the Jets for the first pick in the draft.

So the Bears should be able to anticipate the Jaguars will look like a group of zombies? Forget looking past anyone, says Bears coach Matt Nagy.

"Well, note it's two real simple things for us," Nagy said Monday. "No. 1, if anybody watched that Rams-Jets game yesterday you can see what it means to play in the NFL. It does not matter—your record."

The Jets ruined their perfect 0-13 record by knocking off the NFC West-leading Rams 23-20 to fall behind Jacksonville in the race to draft Lawrence, a win now being welcomed by Jets fans like it was COVID-19.

"And No. 2, we haven't done anything yet," Nagy said. "So that's the way we approach this thing.

"We fought through this six-game losing streak. We're currently on a two-game win streak but that means nothing."

Nice try, Mike Zimmer https://t.co/ChwGwel6DN
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After the Bears lost their sixth straight, Nagy talked to the team and said they need to win four straight.

"Now we've won two, but you can't get to four without three. So I really believe that our guys will understand that," Nagy said.

Modern math aside, it isn't simply the Rams game with the Jets that has Nagy's antenna in up position worrying about an upset.

"You know, Jacksonville has been in some tight battles now, they've been in a lot of tight games," Nagy said.

In back-to-back games the Jaguars lost 27-25 to Cleveland and 27-24 in overtime to Minnesota before getting blown out in their last two against Tennessee and Baltimore.

Nagy just showed a clip to his team last week of the end of the Vikings-Jaguars game, as the Bears prepared to face Minnesota.

James Robinson ran up the middle for 15 yards with 13 seconds left and the Jaguars got to the line quickly to spike the ball and try a game-winning field goal of 62 yards as regulation time expired, but Chas McLaughlin's kick failed.

The Vikings then won it in OT.

Considering how teams often pull starters at the end of the regular season to rest them for a playoff game if home field is wrapped up or a postseason seed secured, it seems logical for Jacksonville to pull its starters and play for the loss if they want Lawrence.

Of course, the Bears don't view this as a possibility.

"And so, this team is fighting and they're playing hard and we know that," Nagy said. "So the last thing we're going to do is look past anybody and that's just not where we're at.

"So we're going to be completely focused."

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