adam

NE played the easiest schedule in NFL history last year and somehow lucked into the easiest path to a Super Bowl as well (home against LAC and HOU, and then DEN w/o Nix). So them about to be 5-5 is not surprising at all. I would say they are probably a fringe playoff team, but get 4 automatic wins a year against NYJ and MIA. The Hutchinson injury is huge. He was one of the best Edge in the NFL, yet the DET defense was 30th in yards and 17th in pts. I would suspect both of those get worse with Hutchinson out. They were one of the best in sacks and pressures with most coming from Hutchinson.

Halfway through Johnson's 2nd year as HC, he already has 4 more wins than Eberflus did in 3 full seasons. Johnson - 18-8, 1-1 vs Eberflus - 14-32 Johnson has coached in 9 total losses, 6 of the losses were when the defense allowed 27 or more points. The Bears are 3-6 in those types of games in the regular season, and 1-0 in the postseason. The Bears are 15-2 under Johnson in the regular season when the defense allows less than 27, Lions 19-16 in 2025 and 9-3 in the Monsoon Bowl this year. That got me thinking to look back at each loss and see what happened: 2025 - Week 1 - MIN - Ben Johnson's first game as HC. Bears lead 17-6 heading into the 4th Quarter and the defense shits the bed, allowing 21 4th quarter points, McCarthy gets a game ball for 143 passing yards. Bears lose by 3. As much as you want the offense to score more, 24 pts against Flores in Week 1 is pretty good. This one was on the defense. 2025 - Week 2 - DET - The Johnson era is off to a terrible start. The Bears get dominated by the Lions. The defense allows 52 points and it could've been more. Bears lose by 31. The biggest loss for Johnson as a coach. Not many teams win when their defense allows 52 pts. 2025 - Week 8 - BAL - Another defensive failure. 30 pts allowed to Tyler Huntley, 14 pts allowed in the 4th quarter. Offense left too many pts on the field, but defense was terrible. Bears lose by 14. Probably the first all-around loss, 16 pts for the offense is not enough, and 30 pts is too much. Full team loss here. 2025 - Week 14 - GB - Bears down 14-3 at half, make it a game, but ultimately the defense can't stop TDs. 3x Explosive TD Passes allowed is the difference. Bears lose by 7. Game was close but with was probably another full-team loss; offense needed a little more and defense needed to be a little tighter. 2025 - Week 17 - SF - Highly competitive game, but the Bears defense allowed 6 TDs and lost by 4. This was a defensive loss. 2025 - Week 18 - DET - At the time, it felt like the Bears backed into the playoffs and Division with 2 straight losses. Compared to the previous game against DET, this one was closer, but the defense couldn't make a stop and DET got the walk-off FG to win by 3. Offense only scoring 16 was the difference; this was an offensive loss. ----------------------------------------------- 2025 - Divisional Round - LAR - To think the Bears had the ball on the LAR 48 after LAR possessed the ball in OT, and they lost the game is still a tough pill to swallow. Too many turnovers, Moore giving piss poor effort. The defense held the LAR juggernaut offense to 17 in regulation and 20 in OT with LAR getting 2 possessions in OT. So thru Johnson's first season, 7 total losses, it felt like 2 full team losses (BAL and GB), 3 losses by the defense, and 2 losses by the offense. However, one theme about 2025 was the officiating; the Bears were on the wrong side of a ton of calls, but they were not good enough to overcome them. ----------------------------------------------- 2026 - Week 2 - MIN - In a literal monsoon, Swift fumbles at the one, Caleb gets hurt, Santos has a FG blocked, and Bagent can't do anything; Bears lose by 6. This is one of those throwaway games. Reminds me of Fields/Eberflus beating SF in the monsoon in Week 1, then the Bears went 2-14 the rest of the way. 2026 - Week 5 - GB - No Caleb, no Sweat, no Gordon, no Monangai. Simmons not on the team yet. Still would've liked a better effort from the defense; 2x 40+ Yard TD Passes to Watson is unacceptable. Lost by 24, second-biggest loss for Johnson. Would definitely want both sides of the ball to be better, but hard to gauge the offense without Caleb+Monangai, and the defense without Sweat+Gordon, and no Simmons yet. How many teams win when you have 4-5 of your top 10 guys out, on the road? Very few. Year 2 feels completely different, the Bears two losses have had external factors directly impact the games, and now they are not letting bad officiating beat them. The worst loss in terms of opponent record was losing to the then 2-5 Ravens who finished the season 8-9. Every other loss for Johnson has been to a winning team.

It feels like Simmons negates any benefit Cousins provides. With it being Week 18, there is a chance that Bryant is playing by then as well. I still think the monsoon game was completely weather-related.

That first MIN game was so fluky. Swift fumbled on the 1-yd line. Caleb got hurt, then Santos has his FG blocked, and even after all of that, they had 3 plays from the 12 to win it and Bagent shit the bed. I know the result is the result, but that was at least 10 pts off the board, if not more. For the next matchup, the Bears will have Simmons who would cancel out any benefit from Cousins. So it feels like the Bears will have the edge in Week 18. Not that you mentioned it, but in the other loss against GB, the Bears were without Caleb, Monangai, and Sweat, and obviously didn't have Simmons yet. Can you imagine how Cincy would look without Burrow and Lawrence? They probably wouldn't win a single game. The Bradbury thing will be interesting to watch. I think it will come down to if Caleb is comfortable with Jones or Bradbury more.

Week 10 - What to Watch MIN @ GB (MIN/GB - Division + Wild Card + Upcoming Opponents) Biggest game of the week for the Bears. GB favored by 3 at home. Cousins back for MIN. I am leaning towards wanting MIN to win, since GB still has Parsons coming back so they need to stack some losses before that occurs. NE @ DET (DET - Division + Wild Card + Upcoming Opponent) Detroit only favored by 2.5 but Pats defense looked terrible last week against GB. SF @ DAL (SF - Conference Bye, DAL - Wild Card) SF favored on the road by 4.5. A DAL win would be massive for the potential #1 seed. CAR @ NO (Wild Card + Next Opponent) NO is the next opponent, and the winner could be the South Division Winner. SEA @ LVR (SEA - Wild Card) With Cousins going to MIN, hard to see LVR winning this one. LAR @ ARZ (LAR - Wild Card) LAR is hit hard with injuries, but ARZ is also thin and injured (Wilson out for season).

Simmons may be the best non-QB on the team, instant All-Pro in the prime of his career. Still wild that we got him.

What a bizarre game. Past Bears teams would've lost by double digits. One of the crazier stats of all of them, TB lost 4 pts off the Bears 5 turnovers. They only got one FG and threw a Pick-6 on Bears turnovers.

Wild to see his games played history. Once he got hurt the first time, he never seemed to be able to stay healthy again. 2022 - Started 17 games 2023 - Missed 6 games (Neck) 2024 - Missed 5 games (Knee) 2025 - Missed 11 games (Ankle) 2026 - Missed 5 games (Knee) 27 games missed in the last 3.5 years, basically half the games.

I agree, run it down their throats until they stop you.

Leads the NFL in Rushing TDs (10) and is tied for the NFL lead in total TDs (10). He also has more TDs than the entire Chargers team (9) this season.

Speechless in Seattle?

Huntley now out of the season as well in Baltimore. Bagent to BAL seems more likely by the day (if the price is right).

With the win in SEA, he is now officially a winning QB, at 20-19 for his career. He is already 9th in Bears history for Passing Yards and should pass Ed Brown, Billy Wade, Erik Kramer, and Mitch Trubisky by the end of the year to move into 5th all-time (in Year 3 lol). He even has a chance to pass Jim McMahon for 4th. He has the lowest INT% of any QB in NFL history for the number of games he has played. Every game played, he sets the new record for that amount of game and pass attempts. Pretty wild. The Year 3 leap is here. He already has 2x 300-yd games (had only 1 last year), 3 games over 70% Comp%, his best game last year was 67.9%. He has never thrown more than 1 INT in a regular season game under Johnson, and his last 2 INT game was the 3rd game of his rookie season. He has thrown a TD in 11 straight games (that he has finished) dating back to last year. From watching the MNF game and even the NE game, Caleb has total command of this offense. This feels sustainable, and with the addition of Simmons, the defense should be more consistent.

We went from trailing in every game and needing magic to win, to leading in 88% of game time and closing games out.

A win against TB and they go 7-2 into the bye.