Bear Digest

Playoff chances part of the good, the bad, and the ugly in Bears win

The victory by the first-place Bears has them poised to lock up a playoff spot as soon as next weekend if things break right.
Gene Chamberlain|
D'Andre Swift celebrates one of two touchdown runs on Sunday at Soldier Field against Cleveland.
D'Andre Swift celebrates one of two touchdown runs on Sunday at Soldier Field against Cleveland. | Matt Marton-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

Nearly lost in the excitement of a Bears rout of Cleveland and the shocking turn of events involving Green Bay was another situation resulting from the Lions' 41-34 loss at L.A. to the Rams.

The Bears, who are now seeded second in the NFC, can clinch a playoff spot next weekend by beating Green Bay, if Detroit also loses on Sunday at Ford Field against Pittsburgh.

The Lions now have six losses, and with a loss to Pittsburgh and seven defeats, and a Bears win over Grenn Bay, Detroit would be three in back of the NFC North leaders with two left.

The Bears finish with the 49ers and Lions the last two weeks, but have eyes only for Green Bay at this time.

“We're definitely a better football team than we were that first month of the season, and probably these three opponents we're playing coming up, they're all going to say the same thing," coach Ben Johnson said. "At this point, I know we're a good football team. I know we're a good football team, and I'm looking forward to seeing this competition over the next three weeks, as they are.

"I think our players are excited to be in this spot they've put themselves in. We're 10-4 and we've got a lot to play for here over the next three weeks. Really in this league you can't ask for a lot more than that.”

There was also bad and ugly besides the positive news flowing the Bears' way. Here's this week's Bears good, bad and ugly.

The Good

Caleb Williams' confidence

Williams' second TD pass to DJ Moore looked like he just threw it up for grabs at the back of the end zone. Then Moore appeared and took it between the arms of defensive backs for the 22-yard TD.

It sure seemed Williams just threw it up for grabs, anyway.

“No, I can make any throw," Williams said.

Normally such arrogance would invite comparisons to Cade McNown.

Instead, it was refeshing because there have been far too many Bear QB who can't make any throw.

D'Andre Swift's near miss

Another big Bears rushing day with 142 yards on 33 carries was somewhat disappointing in one respect. D'Andre Swift needed only 2 yards for a 100-yard day and thy couldn't squeeze in a carry somewhere to get him over the mark.

Swift had 98 yards on 18 carries and two touchdowns, but the last TD he scored was the highlight play, with a sharp cut and then some shifty running in the secondary for a 17-yard TD.

"He ended up squeaking through there," Johnson said. "I thought he was actually going to get tackled. There was a couple guys surrounding him, and he's a hell of a back for us. He made a really good play for us to put up seven points on the board.

"He squeaked through a couple arm tackles and made a great play."

Help arrives

All season long the Bears' pass rush has been either Montez Sweat or a blitz. Early on it also included Gervon Dexter but his pressure had slowed to a halt.

On Sunday, Dexter was one of four Bears who made five sacks of Shedeur Sanders. He had only half a sack over his previous six games. Sweat didn't have to make any.

Grady Jarrett made his first Bears sack.

T.J. Edwards made one on a blitz in the A-gap.

And Austin Booker made a pair of sacks as help finally arrived to assist Sweat.

The five sacks was the most by the Bears as a team since they beat Washington 40-20 in Week 5 of the 2023 sason.

The Bad

Tough warmups

Some teams have tough, physical training camps or practices.

The Bears apparently have some really tough warmups.

For the second straight week a player who had been deemed healthy enough to play came up with an injury during pregame warmups.

The foot stress fracture Rome Odunze has was aggravated just before gametime when he was slated to start, just like the previous week when Kyler Gordon aggravated a groin injury.

Johnson had no postgame update on the injury's severity. When Gordon suffered his, it resulted in a trip to IR.

"I really don't know right now the extent of it," Johnson said. "Something like that happens right before a game and you're solely focused on getting the next guy ready to perform at a high level.”

The next guy was Luther Burden and he had six catches for 84 yards.

Third-and-long blitz

Dennis Allen has a habit on third-and-long of blitzing when teams have low likelihood of converting for a first down. Getting impatient burned the Bears in the first half on third-and-10 with a 42-yard completion to Isaiah Bond. They came with a five-man rush.

Bond also caught a 47-yarder, as well, and again it was against a five-man rush.

It doesn't seem wise to blitz a team in obvious passing situations in their territory when you have a lead and are dominating their offensive line the way the Bears did in this game.

They were burned by the Packers a few times in similar situations last week.

Myles Garrett's record pursuit

Garrett got his sacks, 1 1/2 in his one, and is 1 1/2 from setting an NFL record for a single season at 23.

Ozzy Trapilo had gone into the game without a sack allowed since he became left tackle starter, according to Pro Football Focus. Garrett is bad. He's just one bad dude.

The Ugly

Streak buster

Cairo Santos had made 84 straight Bears field goal tries inside 40 yards. Then he missed a 35-yarder Sunday in the first half when he could have provided a three-score lead going into halftime. Santos did make a 41-yarder later and had two excellent kickoffs that it in the landing zone and pinned the Browns back at the 20.

The cold

Bear weather? Bears, with exception of polar bears, don't even like 8 degrees with -2 wind chill like it was when the game started.

A total of 54,051 braved the conditions.

Just guessing there will be less no-shows for December games when Kevin Warren gets that dome built, in the year 2525.

Surprise!

Browns guard and former Bear Teven Jenkins left the game with a shoulder injury.

Of course he did.

While in Chicago, he had a collection of games he failed to finish, including six in one season.

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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.