The Chicago Bears got their slow-starting offense rolling in the first half — they had 225 yards and 14 points — but Sunday’s 34-17 loss to the Detroit Lions was never really close, not after two early turnovers and a slew of penalties and not against the high-octane Lions offense.
The result was the ninth consecutive Bears loss — the second-longest single-season losing streak in team history — and it dropped them to 4-11. It’s a lot more of the same as the team struggles to the finish line with interim coach Thomas Brown.
Diving in on what went wrong, the little that went right, a few potential coaching candidates and more in 10 thoughts.
1. They call it Stumble Bum.
The Lions say it’s the name of the play they used early in the third quarter when quarterback Jared Goff looked like he was lunging off a barstool after being served one too many at the company holiday party and running back Jahmyr Gibbs dived for an imaginary fumble.
All the while, tight end Sam LaPorta sneaked along the formation and behind the coverage for as easy of a pitch-and-catch 21-yard touchdown pass as you will see.
As much as anything else, the sleight-of-hand play was an in-game interview by Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson for the Bears head coaching job. We’ve seen on television how creative Johnson can be directing the NFL’s highest-scoring offense. He designs passes for offensive linemen, runs hook-and-ladders regularly and most importantly has a knack for getting everyone involved almost every week.
Imagine Bears President/CEO Kevin Warren and general manager Ryan Poles looking on and saying, “How creative can you be?”
Johnson shrugs and replies, “Want to see something cool?”
Johnson, players said, took notice of how hard Bears defenders reacted to fumbles in general, and they cited a play in which Green Bay Packers quarterback Jordan Love fumbled — accidentally — and recovered to connect with tight end Luke Musgrave for a big gain.
That happened early in the fourth quarter of the 2023 season opener at Soldier Field. Love recovered his own fumble and found Musgrave to be the only player on the left side of the field, connecting for 37 yards. Had Musgrave not fallen down, it would have been a walk-in touchdown. The Packers scored on the next play.
So the Lions, who have had the play in their offense for a few weeks, repped it about four times in practice. Last Monday, Johnson asked Goff if he could intentionally fumble the football before recovering it and then making a play.
Say what?
“I said, ‘I don’t know about that,’” Goff said. “We kind of got off that pretty quickly and we were just like, ‘Let’s just pretend we’re falling or pretend I’m fumbling, but I’m holding on to the ball.’ That part where Gibbs dives really sells the play. I’m only doing half of it. It worked like a charm.”
After Goff stumbled and as soon as Gibbs went to the ground, Lions players were yelling, “Ball!” That’s why you saw Bears players, for a second, lose any focus in coverage.
Let’s not pretend the Bears were back in the game, but they had given themselves a chance to make it interesting. The Lions were ahead 27-14 — the Bears had made it a two-score game just before halftime — and on the play before the chicanery, officials tacked on 15 yards to a short pass for unsportsmanlike conduct against cornerback Jaylon Johnson.
“After a penalty, we’re thinking they are going to run it,” said safety Jonathan Owens, who got caught with his head in the backfield when LaPorta turned upfield. “They got the look they wanted to run it and they executed.”
LaPorta ran a tight end leak route. You’ve seen Cole Kmet hit on that before. LaPorta delayed, dragged across the field and then turned it into a wheel route. Nasty stuff. There was no one near him.
“I didn’t see Goff (stumble),” Owens said. “I saw the running back (Gibbs). I saw him go down. They were all yelling, ‘Ball!’ It was a great play. It was one of them where everyone is looking in the backfield and you never see LaPorta coming from the other side.
“We call it an, ‘Oh, crap!’”
To the Lions, it’s Stumble Bum.
“No particular reason, I don’t think,” LaPorta said of the name. “Just something fun. Cool to get that one off the call sheet and come up with a touchdown.”
Owens said it wasn’t until the players got to the sideline that they got a better idea of how they’d been hoodwinked.
“People run that play (leak route) all the time,” he said. “We have seen that play but not like that to have the guys falling. Saw still pictures on the sideline. You could see Goff was stumbling and you could see the running back rolled on the ground. We were kind of like, ‘What’s going on?’ We’re looking for the ball and next thing you know, quarterback is throwing it.
“It’s like the fake in baseball, where the runner is walking off the base and then you tag them. Same thing.”
Same thing if one out is equal to six points — more of a cushion than the mighty Lions (13-2) would need against the Bears, who have only two remaining chances to stop the skid that began with the Hail Mary way back on Oct. 27 at Washington.
Early game woes that have plagued the Bears of late — they had gone three consecutive games without scoring in the first half — finally ended. Caleb Williams threw touchdown passes to Kmet and Keenan Allen in the second quarter. But the Bears were down 20-0 before they got in the end zone as Williams and Rome Odunze botched the handoff on one play and Odunze fumbled for two quick turnovers.
Williams finished 26 of 40 for 334 yards and the two scores — the 45-yard shot down the sideline to Allen for a touchdown was a beauty — and extended his streak of pass attempts without an interception to 326, the sixth-longest single-season streak in NFL history. Few teams are built to play from 20 down against the Lions, and the Bears sure as heck aren’t one of them.
Detroit got 109 rushing yards from Gibbs and 143 receiving yards from Jameson Williams, who scored on an 82-yard bomb. Goff completed 23 of 32 passes for 336 yards and three touchdowns. The Lions piled up 475 yards on offense — they didn’t really need to do anything in the fourth quarter — and were 7 of 12 on third down.
It would be surprising if the Bears didn’t request an interview with Johnson. They’ll have to see specifically what NFL guidelines are for the upcoming hiring cycle, and one source said the league is expected to release that sometime this week. It also would be surprising if Johnson didn’t take an interview with the Bears. Where it could go from there, who knows?
Johnson is so creative, there are plenty of other intricately designed plays he could review with the Bears, ones he didn’t draw up specifically to use against them.
“Ben, that was one of his brainchilds,” Lions coach Dan Campbell said. “It started that way, and then we massaged it and worked it. How do we make this thing better? And then just Goff and Gibby and LaPorta and the O-line making it work. We cooked it all week and they did a heck of a job.
“Those make you feel good because everybody is invested in it. It’s fun. It’s different. It’s sound. I know it sounds crazy but it’s sound. It’s like dribbling the ball on the ground.”
Gibbs said he used to be surprised by the different stuff Johnson came up with on a regular basis.
“Now,” he said. “I expect something every week.”
Swing tackle Dan Skipper, who has a touchdown catch this season, said it’s one way to keep things fun for the players.
“The well is deep, man,” he said. “There is a bunch of stuff. You don’t know what is going to be up each week.”
This week, it was Stumble Bum, which led the Bears to exclaim, “Oh, crap.” Either could be used to describe the Bears season.
2. Left tackle Braxton Jones was lost for the final two weeks of the season with a gruesome lower left leg injury.
Early indications are Jones, who returned after missing last Monday’s game at Minnesota with a concussion, may have avoided a very serious injury.
Lions defensive tackle Levi Onwuzurike powered between Bears center Coleman Shelton and fill-in left guard Jake Curhan on a drop-back by Caleb Williams. Onwuzurike lost his balance and went down, and his right knee pinned Jones’ right ankle to the turf. Pushed back, Jones’ weight transferred to his left leg and his ankle buckled underneath his body as he went down backward.
Medical staff put an air cast on Jones’ left leg before he was taken by cart to the locker room. I’m told the fibula is fractured and Jones is scheduled to meet with a specialist Monday, with surgery likely to be performed this week. A source said the belief is Jones avoided potentially serious ligament damage or multiple fractures.
Jones has a long road to recovery ahead. It could be a four- or five-month process to return to the field after surgery, but it could have been significantly worse. He’s not out of the woods yet. They’ll need to see what doctors say, but the hope is it’s a simple fracture that needs to be stabilized with surgery.
It’s a shame because when Jones has been on the field — he also missed two games in the middle of the season with a knee injury — you can make a case he has been as consistent as any offensive player. The bar isn’t really high for that accolade, but the Bears’ issues on the offensive line start from guard to guard and it’s where I believe the focus will be in rebuilding the line in the offseason.
Now with Jones injured — he will become the third offensive lineman placed on injured reserve, joining Ryan Bates and Bill Murray — it creates more questions about the unit projecting ahead to the offseason and 2025. Jones is in the third year of his four-year rookie contract and will be evaluated by a new coaching staff.
“I told Braxton I love him and all of that,” Williams said. “You know, it’s tough. But we’ve got to find ways to — it’s a part of football. It’s probably the worst part about football — the injuries and your big players going down. But it is a part of football. And we’ve got to find ways as a team to have that next guy up and go in and execute, do the right thing.
“That even means, for me, when we get a lineman in like we did, understanding that this is (his) first snap, and we’ve been in the game and the D-line is flowing and the offensive line is flowing and this is (his) first snap and getting the ball out of my hands. So many different situations that happen in football and throughout the games that I have to take into account but also everybody else.”
How the Bears pivot for Thursday night with the Seattle Seahawks coming to Soldier Field remains to be seen. Larry Borom replaced Jones. Kiran Amegadjie, who started in place of Jones against the Vikings, was inactive. That wasn’t necessarily a demotion of Amegadjie. The Bears needed a backup center with Doug Kramer inactive because of a shoulder injury and they elevated Chris Glaser from the practice squad to fill that role. Borom offered a little more versatility as a reserve because he also has the ability to play guard.
3. No one has benefited more since Thomas Brown took over offensive play calling than Keenan Allen.
Allen made a nifty move on his 45-yard touchdown — it was a great throw by Caleb Williams — and now has five scores in his last five games.
Allen caught nine passes for a season-high 141 yards and the 32-year-old has certainly positioned himself for a one-year deal in free agency with the way he’s played down the stretch. In six games with Brown calling plays, Allen has been targeted 62 times and has 36 receptions for 453 yards (12.6 average) with five touchdowns.
In his 12th season, Allen doesn’t have the play speed he possessed earlier in his career. That’s evident. But Allen, who is earning $23.1 million this season, remains a crafty route technician who can diagnose coverage as good as or better than any player in the game.
That was the case late in the second quarter after Williams’ 25-yard pass to DJ Moore moved the Bears to the Detroit 45-yard line with 46 seconds remaining in the first half. After a timeout, Williams and Allen had a little communication as the play was about to start with Allen split out wide to the right.
“Right before the snap, I saw obviously they had a two-out show,” Williams said. “And right before the snap, I yelled to Keenan because I was thinking it was going to be Cover Two. Keenan ran a great route. He ran it kind of perfect. We’ve practiced this route many times, and we were just on the same page right before the snap.”
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Allen’s perspective: “We got quarters. The corner kind of played it a little aggressive. Had an out and was able to beat him inside. Perfect ball. Was able to catch it and run.”
Allen faked an out route on rookie cornerback Terrion Arnold and when he turned it upfield, safety Ifeatu Melifonwu was late arriving from the middle. Allen ran away from both of them and, believe it or not, the 46-yard touchdown — the 66th of his career — was his longest.
“Nah,” Allen said. “Don’t do me like that.”
Look it up. Allen had a 43-yard touchdown on a pass from Philip Rivers in 2013. And he had a 42-yard touchdown reception from Rivers in 2017. This was his longest.
We’ve seen Allen fill the role the Bears envisioned when they traded with the Los Angeles Chargers to acquire him. That’s worked here lately. He’s been that target in the middle of the field and he’s made plays on the outside. With one more touchdown this season, Allen will tie his career-high of eight (2013 and 2020).
But the offense has been broken in that the Bears have not been able to run the ball effectively with any consistency. They had 59 yards on 17 carries against an opponent that has been ravaged by injuries on the line and at linebacker. It’s tough to keep pounding the rock when you’re chasing 20-0 right away.
Allen has 966 career receptions so he needs 34 to become the 15th player in NFL history to reach 1,000. Kansas City’s Travis Kelce (996) and DeAndre Hopkins (982) could get there first but Allen should reach that plateau next season.
Whether the Bears re-sign him or not, we’ll have to see. Considering where the Bears are at right now — and their need to really prioritize both sides of the line of scrimmage — I wouldn’t bet on it. But he’s proven he’s got more in the tank this season and he’s performed in games that have been meaningless in the big picture.
“Just trying to do my job,” Allen said. “Keep fighting. Just keep putting good stuff on tape. You just got to prove it to all 32 teams. At the end of the day, that’s what it’s about. The last name on your back is really what matters. I ain’t ever gonna quit. Just going to keep going.”
4. Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson isn’t the only Dan Campbell assistant who will be in demand.
Defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn will be in the interview cycle and it wouldn’t be all that surprising for the Lions to need two new coordinators in 2025.
Glenn interviewed with the Atlanta Falcons, the Tennessee Titans and the Los Angeles Chargers last offseason. He’s got strong ties to the other two teams that currently have openings. Glenn, a two-time Pro Bowl cornerback, spent the first eight seasons of his 15-year career playing for the New York Jets. He finished his career as a player with the New Orleans Saints in 2008 and was a defensive backs coach for them from 2016 through 2020 before the Lions made him coordinator. He’s had other head-coaching interviews before, including with the Jets in 2021.
Glenn’s work this season — and it’s difficult to measure with statistics — is the most impressive of his coaching career. The Lions have been crushed by injuries and missing so many frontline players on that side of the ball could prevent them from chasing their first Lombardi Trophy in franchise history. Fewer injuries to key players have crippled other teams in the past and at 13-2, and coming off a 48-42 loss to the Buffalo Bills last week, the Lions are finding ways to stay in the hunt for the No. 1 seed in the NFC.
How bad has it been? In the first two series of the game against the Packers two weeks ago, the Lions used four players on defense who had joined the team that week. Defensive end Aidan Hutchinson, defensive tackle Alim McNeil, cornerback Carlton Davis and linebacker Alex Anzalone are big pieces to lose. Add in linebacker Derrick Barnes and defensive end Marcus Davenport and that’s a long list. Really, that’s just the beginning. Others have gone down too.
“We’re 12-2 and the sky’s falling?” Glenn said during his news conference last Thursday. “We’re going to the playoffs. We’re in the tournament. Why in the hell is the sky falling for us? What do we have to sit back and be sad? We let you guys do that.”
Glenn, 52, hasn’t changed what the Lions do scheme-wise to account for all of the talent that has been lost. He’s turned to the next man and the next man and the next man and if the Lions can make the NFC path to the Super Bowl go through Ford Field, maybe they have a chance.
“The next guy’s got to come up and play, that’s the reason why they’re here,” Glenn said. “And I’ve said this also, I’m not going to disrespect any of the players that we have here because they work their ass off just like everybody else, and I hope that you guys don’t do that also because they deserve a chance to go out there and play whenever their time is to go play. Our personnel department does a really good job of finding guys that fit who we are and we’re going to put them on the field and we’re going to play.”
The Lions entered this week No. 1 in the league on third down. Yes, they’ve been hit for a lot of points lately by the Bills and Packers but they’ve got the firepower on offense to play in games like that when required.
“We’re in Week 16 and I think our stats were a lot better, are better now than what it was early in the season,” Glenn said. “And that has a lot to do with the players. Our players understand exactly what our play style is. Even the new guys coming in, that’s been the most impressive thing to me is the new guys coming in, they’re saying, ‘Coach, we haven’t seen guys practice like this. We haven’t seen teams, we didn’t practice like this. This is why you guys continue to improve on the things that you need to improve on.’
“And I like to hear that, really, because it just gives me — it lets me know how other teams are operating and I think it lets us know as an organization that we’re doing things the right way. But those guys come in and they do a good job for us, so each week we look forward to the challenge of each team that we play, and we look forward to the challenge of we don’t want to take a step down as a defense, and I’m sure that the offense feels the same way.”
It’s not a decision between Johnson and Glenn for the Bears. They could very well want to speak with both of them about their coaching job. Johnson is a more prominent name right now because he’s on offense — offense is always in demand — and the Lions have major firepower. But Glenn’s work is helping hold this team together and he’s got a personality that brings some swagger as well.
5. Nothing better encapsulates the Bears’ current funk than the possession to begin the fourth quarter.
They had first-and-5 at the Lions 22-yard line and came away with a Tory Taylor punt. How do you go from one to the other? A quick pass to DJ Moore for a 1-yard loss and a false start on fill-in left guard Jake Curhan made it third-and-11 from the 28. Then Caleb Williams was sacked for a 9-yard loss by ex-Bear Al-Quadin Muhammad.
From there, the Bears punted.
They trailed 34-17 at the time and it was highly unlikely they were going to claw their way back into the game. But that’s the kind of thing you watch and wonder, “How the heck did that just happen?”
Lions defensive end Za’Darius Smith has gotten a good look at the Bears for a while. Detroit traded with the Cleveland Browns for Smith to fortify their pass rush. Smith played in Minnesota in 2022 after a three-year run with the Packers. So this is his third team and fifth season in the NFC North.
His teams, including the Browns last year, are 11-0 against the Bears since 2019. Smith missed three of those games because of injuries.
“Hopefully one day Chicago will get it fixed,” Smith said. “Detroit went through the same thing for a lot of years. The Lions got it turned around. Hopefully the Bears get it figured out.”
I asked Smith if he believed Williams could be the quarterback to help the Bears turn the corner back to relevance and he didn’t hesitate.
“Yeah, for sure,” he said. “They get great guys around him and he starts leading a new group, he will be perfect.”
That will require a lot of work this offseason. There are too many instances week in and week out when you see things that are confounding. Punting after having first-and-5 at the opponent’s 22-yard line fits in that category.
6. A Lions fan from Texas made the play of the day at Soldier Field.
Ben Roth happened to be in the right place at the right time and might have saved the life of another fan on the field before the game.
Roth, a firefighter and paramedic from Frisco, Texas, is a Lions season ticket holder and attended the game with his 6-year-old daughter, Isadora. He’s in the area for the holidays, visiting the family of his wife, Brittany Roth, the swimming and diving coach at the University of North Texas.
Roth and his daughter were in the stands pregame near the Lions tunnel when he noticed a fan on the field wearing a North Texas shirt. They chatted and it turned out the guy on the field had two extra pregame sideline passes that he shared with Roth and Isadora.
They happily joined their new friend on the sideline.
“We were talking and all of a sudden I heard somebody say, ‘This guy just passed out,’” Roth said. “I am a firefighter and paramedic and he was 10 or 12 feet away. I recognized he was not doing well. I asked for the AED (automated external defibrillator).
“They thought he was having a seizure, and a lot of times when you’re having a cardiac event you can look like you’re having seizure activity. It’s called a cardiac seizure. It’s what we refer to in the medical field. It looks like a seizure but it’s cardiac-related.”
I’m told staff nearby quickly retrieved an AED from the visiting locker room and hustled it out to the field.
“When we put the pads on him, once the Bears staff brought over the thing quickly, I had some state troopers that were doing CPR with me because he did eventually lose his pulse,” Roth said. “We hooked the pads up to him and were able to recognize he was in a rhythm that needed to be shocked.
“We cleared the area. We shocked him and did CPR for a little bit more because sometimes a person can go back into cardiac arrest. He didn’t on the field.”
Roth said the man was responsive when he was loaded onto a cart and then transferred to a hospital. Talk about a chance encounter. Roth just happened to be at the game and by total chance wound up on the field after a random encounter because of a Mean Green shirt.
He attends four or five Lions home games a year, and this was an easy game to get to because it wasn’t far. Isadora came with him because Roth said his wife didn’t want to attend any more cold-weather games.
“It’s been special to be with (Isadora),” Roth said. “The Bears staff, the state troopers, myself and everybody involved was wanting to get this man to see his family and have Christmas and all that. The game was very secondary afterward. Family, holidays, that is the most important thing. I hope this man’s family gets to spend that time with him.”
Someone ought to figure out a way to get Roth and his family to a game with good weather — Super Bowl LIX will be played in New Orleans. He was the real hero at Soldier Field on Sunday.
7. Teven Jenkins appeared on the injury report with a left calf issue this week, the fifth body part he has been on the report for this season.
The left guard was questionable and the Bears decided to start him after he worked out in front of offensive line coach Chris Morgan and athletic trainer Andre Tucker on the field about 2½ hours before kickoff. He lasted into the second quarter when Jake Curhan replaced him. Jenkins was seen limping after the game.
Jenkins, a second-round draft pick in 2021, has missed only one game this season because of injury, the Week 11 meeting with the Packers when he had an ankle issue. But he’s really struggled starting and finishing games. The team has pulled starters late in some games this season so there have been games where he would have had 100% of the snaps if wholesale changes were not made in garbage time.
But there are five games in which Jenkins has had fewer than 75% of the snaps, forced out early. He’s been on the injury report eight different weeks for thigh, ribs, ankle, knee and now calf injuries. On one hand, you have to give him credit for battling through injuries to be available for games. On the other, you have to say this is a huge red flag that should prevent the team from thinking about re-signing Jenkins, who is coming out of contract, even if he was going to be a bargain.
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He missed five games due to injury in 2023 and there were two other games that season where he started and didn’t get 75% of the snaps. He missed four games due to injury in 2022 and had four games that fit that category where he had a start but didn’t get 75% of the snaps. Jenkins missed the first 11 games of his rookie season after back surgery.
Players with extensive injury histories rarely become models of durability as their careers advance. Jenkins has a hard time staying on the field and I don’t know that I’ve ever seen an offensive lineman come out of games with such regularity. There have been questions for my Bears mailbag this season that I’ve passed over, asking about the possibility of the team bringing Jenkins back because it’s clear they have to make other moves on the line as well. I don’t see it happening.
The Bears cannot re-sign Jenkins and act like there’s any level of expectancy that he will all of a sudden have improved availability. I imagine the front office reached this conclusion a while back but as this season grinds to an end — who knows if we see Jenkins back on the field again — the reality is inescapable. He comes out of games too often.
The best-case scenario for Jenkins, 26, might be signing a one-year, prove-it deal elsewhere. If he can shake the injury bug in 2025, that might position him for a lucrative multi-year deal. I imagine every team is going to be concerned about his durability.
8. We’ve gotten a good reminder this season of how great Mike Ditka was as a player.
Maybe that reminder hasn’t been necessary for everyone but I’ve always thought Ditka’s massive personality and role in the revival of the franchise as the coach of the Super Bowl XX team overshadowed — at least to a degree — his role as a player. He was fantastic, the first tight end enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1988.
Ditka’s record of 1,076 yards receiving in 1961 — the most by a rookie in NFL history — will fall this week unless something totally unexpected happens. The Las Vegas Raiders’ Brock Bowers, who had 11 receptions for 99 yards in a 19-14 victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, is up to 1,067 yards on 101 receptions. With two games remaining, only an injury will prevent the first-round draft pick out of Georgia from surpassing Ditka.
It’s amazing with the proliferation of passing offenses in the NFL that Ditka’s record has stood for 63 seasons. Kyle Pitts of the Atlanta Falcons is the only other rookie to reach 1,000 yards, finishing with 1,026 in 2021. Jeremy Shockey had 894 for the New York Giants in 2002 and Sam LaPorta of the Detroit Lions had 889 last season. Keith Jackson (869 in 1988) and Charle Young (854 in 1973) of the Philadelphia Eagles are the only other rookie tight ends to eclipse 850 yards.
Ditka piled up his totals in a 14-game season, while Bowers will have two more games and will probably only need 16 to set the record. Bowers passed LaPorta two weeks ago for the most receptions by a rookie at the position.
The one number no tight end is likely to pass any time soon is the average per reception Ditka had in 1961 — a whopping 19.2 yards per reception. Ditka, when he was elected to the Hall of Fame, credited George Halas with “inventing” the position. Soon, others like John Mackey, Dave Casper, Charlie Sanders, Ozzie Newsome, Jerry Smith, Kellen Winslow Sr. and Jackie Smith followed.
“We were the first to flex (split) the tight end and throw to him,” Ditka said, according to the Tribune’s Don Pierson. “He created the position of a tight end that was going to catch the ball and prevent double coverage.”
Bowers, the 13th pick in the draft, has been a huge hit for a Raiders team that has otherwise struggled across the board. Hopefully, the light shines on Ditka when Bowers passes him. It’s incredible that a receiving record like this has held up as long as it has when you consider some of the greats at the position in some high-profile passing attacks.
9. Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Justin Fields was inactive for Saturday’s loss in Baltimore with an abdominal injury.
That eliminated the slim chance he could have played enough at the end of the season for the draft pick the Bears are receiving from Pittsburgh to improve.
The Bears will get a sixth-round selection from the Steelers as compensation for Fields. The pick would have improved to a fourth-rounder if he was on the field for 51% of the team’s offensive plays. Fields started the first six games of the season before being replaced by Russell Wilson. Entering Saturday, he had played in 408 of the team’s 933 offensive snaps (43.7%), according to Pro Football Reference. Fields was probably going to have to play the final 3 1/2 games to reach 51% but when he was forced out on Saturday, that sealed things.
Now that we know it’s a Round 6 pick for Fields, here is a look at the Bears’ draft capital, eight picks total, in 2025:
- Round 1
- Round 2
- Round 2 (from Carolina)
- Round 3
- Round 5
- Round 6 (from Pittsburgh)
- Round 7 (from Cincinnati)
- Round 7 (from Cleveland)
Right now it looks like the Bears will have three picks in the top 40 and four in the top 75.
10. Fifteen of the Bears’ 17 opponents for the 2025 season are known.
We know the Bears will have home and away games against NFC North foes. They will have home games against the Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants, Cleveland Browns and Pittsburgh Steelers. They will have road games against the Philadelphia Eagles, Washington Commanders, Baltimore Ravens, Cincinnati Bengals and Las Vegas Raiders.
Hanging in the balance is a home game against the corresponding finisher in the NFC South and a road game against the corresponding finisher in the NFC West. If the schedule were based on the current standings, it would mean a home game against the Carolina Panthers and a road game against the San Francisco 49ers. But it’s not locked in.
The Panthers are 4-11 after a 36-30 upset of the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday. They are in last place but only 1½ games behind the New Orleans Saints, who are 14-point underdogs Monday night in Green Bay. If the Saints lose, they would be only one game ahead of the Panthers.
Here are the remaining schedules:
- Panthers (4-11): at Buccaneers (8-7), at Falcons (8-7)
- Saints (5-9): vs. Raiders (3-12), at Buccaneers (8-7)
The 49ers are in last place in the NFC West at 6-9, a game behind the Cardinals and two behind the Seattle Seahawks. The 49ers lost to the Cardinals in Week 5. Keep that in mind for a potential tiebreaker.
Here are the remaining schedules:
- 49ers (6-9): vs. Lions (13-2), at Cardinals (7-8)
- Cardinals (7-8): at Rams (9-6), vs. 49ers (6-9)
- Seahawks (8-7): at Bears (4-11), at Rams (9-6)
10a. The Bears remained ninth in the draft order based on Sunday’s results, last in a group of three teams at 4-11. The win by the Panthers dropped them to No. 7 in the draft order. If that holds, the Bears would be picking at No. 39 and No. 41 in the second round with the No. 39 pick coming from the Panthers in the March 2023 trade.
10b. The Seahawks opened as three-point favorites over the Bears for Thursday’s game at Soldier Field.
10c. Happy holidays.