No one was yelling Super Bowl or bust about the Bears going into this season. They didn’t even have to be good.
In the wake of firing Ryan Pace and Matt Nagy, the bar was at an all-time low for Ryan Poles and Matt Eberflus: Just give some hope that this team is headed the right direction.
Six games in, signs of progress are scant.
Regardless of the outcome against the Commanders on Thursday, this was an uninspiring performance against an awful opponent.
No one figures more prominently in the Bears’ future than Justin Fields, who is already on the clock in Year 2 to prove he can be their franchise quarterback. Otherwise, they’ll be drafting high, and that’s a prime opportunity to change course.
Fields has played exactly one good game, and it’s too late in the season to keep calling this an adjustment period to the new offense under coordinator Luke Getsy. This was his sixth game in the system, and he has been working on it in practice for months.
Facing one of the worst pass defenses in the NFL, Fields didn’t get the Bears on the scoreboard until midway through the third quarter on a 40-yard touchdown heave to Dante Pettis. It was an excellent throw, both in terms of Fields’ accuracy and his recognition that he had a free play because the Commanders had too many men on the field, but there haven’t been enough of them.
His performance against the Vikings — 15 of 21 for 208 yards and a touchdown for a 118.8 passer rating — felt parade-worthy only because of how dismal the passing game had been before that. With a clearer perspective, it would only be significant if it was a gradual step toward something much better.
Fields still sat near the bottom of the NFL in passer rating, completion percentage and yardage, ranking slightly ahead of castoffs Mitch Trubisky and Baker Mayfield.
Fields’ play hinges on him more than anyone else, but no one could claim the Bears have properly outfitted him personnel-wise. He’s playing with budget-friendly offensive linemen and receivers, and that makes an already hard job much harder.
Getsy is equally unproven, and while he conveys confidence at every turn, his assessment of the offense often veers sharply from what is evident to everyone else on game days.
There are big questions defensively as well, and that’s a larger concern because it’s Eberflus’ field of expertise. The early indicators that he had the defense on track have faded.
The Bears looked far better defensively against the Commanders than they did four days earlier when Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins lit them up, but that’s thanks largely to a step down in competition.
Commanders quarterback Carson Wentz has played so poorly that coach Ron Rivera called him out for the team sitting in last place in the NFC East. When does that ever happen in the NFL? Even Nagy defended Trubisky to the point of delusion at times.
The Commanders entered the game 26th in scoring at 18 points per game, a hair ahead of the Bears.
The rookie class could spark some optimism, but who exactly is thriving other than safety Jaquan Brisker?
Fellow second-round pick Kyler Gordon looks like he’ll need a lot more time to develop into the cornerback they envision. Third-round wide receiver Velus Jones is off to a rough start and fumbled away another punt Thursday, this time at his own 9-yard line to set up a Commanders touchdown that gave them a 12-7 lead with 7:21 left. Likewise, left tackle Braxton Jones has ample work to do to secure his spot for 2023.
Maybe the Bears will fix some of this by the end of the season — merely being watchable would be an upgrade — but that requires a lot of trust. And with a first-time general manager and head coach, Poles and Eberflus aren’t entitled to that. Real results are required.