I, for one, am getting sick of the Chicago Bears slander. Somehow, the Bears are still a joke, according to all of the pundits. The Bears are still a laughing stock on Twitter. Even the sports books consider the Bears as a joke. For the week 6 game against the Carolina Panthers, who are missing their best player, Christian McCaffrey, the Bears were still an underdog. So I would to take this opportunity to tell all of the haters, respectfully, to get fucked.
I am a realist. I'm not going to sit here and tell you that the Bears are a legit Superbowl contender. At least not yet. There is still work to be done on offense, no doubt. You cannot deny that Nick Foles has brought a spark to this team though. Not to mention he came over in the strangest offseason in NFL history, with no OTAs, a limited training camp, and no preseason games. So It makes sense that they are not firing on all cylinders yet.
The defense on the other hand, is absolutely firing on all cylinders. They forced 3 turnovers and had 4 sacks. The defense continued their outstanding play in the redzone, limiting the Panthers to 1 touchdown in 3 red zone trips. The d-line was in the backfield the entire game. The linebackers were flying around making tackles (Roquan Smith and Danny Trevathan combined for 22 tackles). The secondary had probably their best game, coming up with 2 interceptions. Not to mention Eddie Jackson forced a fumble and had a pick-6 called back due to a lame pass interference call.
The Bears win in week 6 against the Panthers was not a perfect game, and I think the players would be the first to admit that. However, it was a total team win. This team has grit, and they are so much fun to root for.
Speaking of grit, or lack there of. The reason the Bears are now in first place is because the Packers lost a game to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I'm sorry, I said "lost a game". I should have said absolutely quit when their prima donna quarterback threw a few interceptions and got sacked in the second quarter. I mean, talk about an absolutely gutless performance. I write all of this fully aware the Packers will likely beat the Bears this season, possibly twice. I don't think the Packers are a bad team, but I cannot get over how uninspired they looked for the last 3 quarters though. Say what you want about the Bears, but this team has fight in them. I cannot imagine a scenario where they just quit on a game, like the Packers did today.
Anyway, Bears looked great on defense, and...well fine on offense, but still got the win. And the Packers got smoked, which made for one of the happiest Sundays I have had in a long time. The Bears do have a pretty tough schedule coming up. They travel to Los Angeles to play the Rams next week on Monday night. Then home against the Saints, followed by a trip to Nashville to play the Titans. The next 3 games are really going to do a lot in terms of telling the Bears are for real or not. Even if they go 1-2 over those games, they will still be 7-3 for the stretch run and will be in good shape to make the playoffs.
In summary, the Bears are 5-1, and in first place in the NFC North. If that doesn't get you excited, I legitimately don't know what will.
Bear Down.
Lavs