Bear Down Baffa

As much as I want to be excited that the Bears won, and at 8-7 are now firmly in the playoff picture, I just can’t help but wince.  Sure, we just put together our second 3-game win-streak, which kind of nullifies our 6-game losing streak (no it doesn’t).  But after clawing our way back above .500 for the first time in 41 days, the Bears are still just 1-5 against teams with winning records.  That means that 7 of our wins have come against losing teams who’s combined records are just 30-75 (.286).  And yet we somehow control our fate:  if we win, we’re in.  But we have to beat GB, which we’ve only done 3 times in our last 20 tries (15%).  If we lose, we still get in if AZ loses too.  So just like the COVID vaccine, the Bears will get 2 shots to stay alive through this hoax of a season.

If the Bears only played teams with losing records,
we’d probably make the playoffs much more often

The Low Down
JAX got on the board first, including scoring on 2 of their first 3 drives.  But the Bears took a 13-10 lead into the half after kicking a FG at the buzzer, as things were fairly even to that point.  Then in the 2nd half, Mitch led us to TDs on each of our first 4 drives.  He scored so often that Nagy took him out to let Foles hand the ball off until time expired, which is a first for the Bears – a QB getting pulled because he’s playing so WELL.  The Jags didn’t score again until the final minutes, when we’d already had 41 points, so it was pretty much over mid-way through Q3.  But it should’ve been.  This is the 1-14 Jacksonville Jaguires we’re talking about, people!

Boy, it takes a LOT of sucking on an opponent’s
part to make Mitch – and our O – look this good!

Mitch led us to scores on 7 of his 9 drives, including 5 TDs.  He did throw a pick, but he only 3-and-outed once, and he even ran for a TD.  We averaged gaining 50 yards per drive, and with our average starting field position being our 35, there were only 65 yards to gain.  Of those 585 possible yards, we gained 420 (or 72%), which is stellar.  But all this does is prove what we already knew – Mitch is great against shitty teams.  And his numbers weren’t even really that much better than the bum he stole his job from, former Bear Mike “Giraffe Knees” Glennon.  Mitch was 24/35 for 265 yards, 2 TDs, 1 INT, and a 97.9 QBR, while Glennon was 24/37 for 211 yards, 2 TDs, 2 INTs, and a 75.4 QBR.  So again, it’s not like Mitch and the Bears all of a sudden became good or something.

Remember when we paid this guy $19M for just 4 games?
And then after we benched him to start Mitch, we cut him?

On a side note, SF’s Robbie Gould missed 2 FGs and a PAT against AZ in a game we needed the Cards to lose.  I suspect foul play, but his 9ers managed to hang on.  Gould is now just 77% over the last 2 seasons.  And with Cairo “Head Shoulders Knees And Toes, Knee” Santos engaged in the greatest Bear’s kicking season ever, moving on from Robbie now looks like a smart move.  Santos went 2/2 Sunday, extending his consecutive FG streak to 24, which ties Gould’s franchise record (‘06).  Incidentally, the 3rd longest Bear streak (17 straight) is shared by Gould (‘15) and Butthead (’86).  If Santos hits his next attempt, not only will he set the streak record, but if he doesn’t miss more than once, he’ll also set the team record for FG% in a season (he’s currently 93.1%).  So Sunday could be a big F-U to Robbie that’s been 5 years in the making.

Santos wears #2 to Gould’s #9 –
because Gould makes about 4½ times as much as Santos

Outlook
AZ lost and the Bears won, so the two of us are tied at 8-7.  TB (10-5) won, so they’ve locked in 1 of the Wild Card seats.  But the other 2 are still up for grabs.  The 2nd seat is currently owned by LAR (9-6) while the 3rd is temporarily ours via tie-break with AZ.  Conveniently for us, the Cards and Rams play Sunday, so one of them will take a loss.  And because we take the tie-breaker from AZ, all we have to do is match them – win, lose or tie.  But Ram QB Jared “Why Don’t You Just Fuh” Goff broke his throwing-hand thumb and is now unlikely to play.  So we may “have” to beat GB just to get in.  But even if we do, we’ll have to travel to GB, NO or SEA in the 1st round.  So, uhm, good luck with that.

If our defense can step up, like Roquan “Made In Taiwan”
Smith did Sunday with 2 INTs, we may just have a chance

Weirdly, if we win and AZ beats LAR, the 3 of us would finish tied at 9-7, and the Rams would be left without a seat – even though they beat us this year.  But if we lose and AZ beats the Rams, then we’re out, and they’re both in.  But if AZ loses, no matter what we do, we and the Rams are in.  The easiest way in would just be to win Sunday, but beating GB would require by far our best game of the year.  So we’re going to have to reach deep into our bag of tricks, and maybe even cheat.  The Cards and Rams play @ 3:25 pm CST, which is the same time as the Bears game now because we were just flexed back 3 hours.  Here’s the simplest way of looking at our playoff chances:

If we snooze, we lose

Quotes of Note
CBS sideline contributor Jay Feely, on Nagy before the game:  “Their head coach, who got hired because of his play-calling abilities, gave up play-calling duties.” ~ Right, remind me again why Nagy’s still here?  Like, what do we need him for?

Nagy, to himself:  “He’s right – what AM I still doing here?!”

Comcast’s Olin Kreutz, on not being fooled by our weak schedule of late:  “The Bears have scored 30 points in 4 straight games against 4 teams who average giving up 30 points a game…(But) can they compete in the playoffs?  Can they compete against top tier football teams?” ~ Unfortunately, the answer to both of those questions is a hard no because that sounds like an 8-8 team to me.

Mitch, hanging onto our season – and his job – for dear life

Kreutz, on the Bear’s needing to run the ball:  “You are a running football team.  That’s what you do, you run the football and you play defense…This is their recipe for beating GB next week.  This is how they have to do it because you’re not going to out-score the #1 scoring offense in the NFL.” ~ The Bears couldn’t out-score the #TWENTY-1 offense, Olin.  That is, unless someone discount double-checks Rodgers before game time…

If we advance, it’ll be on David Montgomery Ward’s back

Comcast’s Alex Brown, on the Bear’s chances moving forward:  “From this point on, you’re not playing any (more) bad teams…it’s all playoff teams.  And what I saw in the first half ain’t gonna cut it.” ~ He did go on to say that the 2nd half was good enough, but against GB, it’ll probably be over before then.  So I guess we should all pray for the Bears to have a fast start.

“And God shined His light down upon Cairo…” (Leviticus 5:17)

Comcast’s Lance Briggs, on facing GB this Sunday:  “This team coming up is arguably the best team in the NFC.  So now…we’re gonna find out what this Bears team is made of.” ~ Unfortunately, whatever it is that the Bears are made of, it probably has Covid.

Sure, Florida, just go ahead and get out there and
mingle.  It’s not like there’s a pandemic or anything.

BEAR DOWN!

#2ShotsToStayAlive
#LetsGoRams!

© 2020

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