The Chicago Bears deserves to be a 2020 playoff team.
I just wanted to get it off my chest, as several fans have criticized the Bears for coming back into the postseason with an 8-8 record.
The NFL approved a 7th playoff team at each conference starting this year, Bears won enough games to qualify for the last seed in the NFC, so they deserve their place in the tournament.
They can be defeated by the New Orleans Saints on Sunday, but they can also cause the upset. You did to know that since the 2000 season, there were 5 teams to enter the playoffs at 8-8 and these teams were 4-1 in their first game?
But if the Bears want to make it through, they will need defender Mitchell Trubisky to play the best football of his life. The game plan for the three-game winning streak was exposed shortly after Bears faced a better defense at the Packers. We even saw some of the boots and launches planned by the Jags two weeks ago, but Jacksonville’s pass defense was terrible, so Trubisky was able to find some open receivers anyway.
The Saints have an even better defense than the Packers, so things can get ugly, but once the whistle blows, anything can happen.
Let’s take a trip for some NFL Power Rankings to see what the experts are saying about the Chicago Bears in the playoff.
As it is a league of defenders, Sporting News went ahead and ranked the 14 QBs of the playoff team.
14. Mitchell Trubisky, Bears
Trubisky’s contract is a constant topic of conversation in Chicago, and he begins his second playoff with questions about whether it can be the long-term answer. Trubisky had 10 TDs and five interceptions in his last five games, but he will be pressured to give more shots against Saints in the NFC wild card round. The Bears have been protecting themselves well in the last three games, but need to improve even more to give Trubisky a chance.
Ringer ranked only the playoff teams this week and they have Bears 13th.
There is no denying that Bears’ attack looked better and worked more effectively with Mitchell Trubisky back in the center in the last six games. But there is a very significant gap between being better and being good, and we saw how their passing game is limited in Chicago’s defeat by the Packers on Sunday. Trubisky finished 33 from 42 to 252 yards and an interception on the 35-16 loss.
This NFL Next Gen Stats approval chart tells a very vivid story about the Bears approach.
This is a photo of an offensive coordinator hiding his quarterback. Bill Lazor is going to have to open things up a bit so that the Bears have any chance of defeating the Saints on Sunday. More importantly, Trubisky will have to hit a few more shots.
Bears were 13th according to Bleacher / Report, which also ranked only the playoff teams.
The Chicago Bears enters the postseason in an unenviable position among this year’s participants.
Of the 14 teams in the playoffs, Bears was the only team that retreated. The Pittsburgh Steelers and Kansas City Chiefs lost in Week 17, but each had numerous healthy holders on the sideline.
The Bears gave everything they had against the Packers in Chicago, and yet they were easily defeated.
But after the defeat to Green Bay, coach Matt Nagy told reporters he is not interested in people defaming Chicago’s legitimacy as a playoff team.
“No one is going to take what these players have done to recover in the past three weeks, to put us in a position to make it to the playoffs,” said Nagy. “And they did it. And nobody is going to take that away from these players and coaches ”.
The 2020 Bears have been everywhere. After starting 5-1, they lost six games in a row before recovering a three-game winning streak to return to the playoffs. They made some changes in the season as a defender, and the defeat in week 17 leads them to a confrontation with the Saints in New Orleans.
It’s too much of a roller coaster ride for Gagnon to take the Bears seriously as anything more than a team heading for a Big Easy defeat.
“In any other season, Bears would clearly be the worst team on the playoff field,” he said. “This year, they were rescued by NFC Least. There is no way to support Mitchell Trubisky and Matt Nagy in January, even though they have advanced late and the defense is strong. “
CBS Sports moved the Bears up to two positions to 13.
They were eliminated by the Packers, but returned to the playoffs. They face a difficult first test in New Orleans.
USA Today’s Touchdown Wire also has Bears at age 13.
The Chicago Bears is in the playoffs.
Of course, the focus in this “win and win” game for the Bears was on quarterback Mitchell Trubisky. His recent series of good games would be put to the test, and if you expected the young QB to really turn the page, you might be disappointed. An excellent example came at the end of the game in a 4 to 1 situation, where Trubisky rolled to the right and launched what should have been an interception, luckily for him it was discarded.
But while the Bears were losing to their rivals, the Green Bay Packers, the Arizona Cardinals were losing to the Los Angeles Rams. This resulted in the Bears sliding into the final playoff position based on their better winning percentage in regular games than the Cardinals.
Read it all over again and tell me if you’re confident in the Bears next week.
Pro Football Talk is like that.
14. Bears (No. 14; 8-8): Ryan Pace and Matt Nagy will probably be back. Whether Mitchell Trubisky joins them may depend on what happens on Sunday in New Orleans.
Here’s what Yahoo Sports had to say.
14. Chicago Bears (8-8, LW: 14)
Yes, the Bears returned to the playoffs at 8-8. Ask 18 NFL teams whose seasons started if they would switch places with Chicago.
Sports Illustrated had the Bears like that.
14. Chicago Bears (8–8)
Highest vote: 14 (4)
Smallest vote: 19 (1)Bears retreated to an NFC playoff spot, but 8–8 with a # 7 seed is still enough to stay in the top half of our survey.
NFL.com is keeping the Bears in Day 15 In general.
Call it a march to nowhere: with a 21 to 16 drop at the start of the fourth period, the Bears advanced 51 yards in 15 moves in an onslaught that took Chicago to the Packers’ territory and covered more than eight minutes of play. But Mitchell Trubisky’s fourth-to-one pass to Allen Robinson fell incomplete, and two Packers touchdowns later, Chicago was on the wrong side of an explosion. The Bears went back to the playoffs anyway (thank you, Cardinals), but it’s hard to have a lot of faith in a team of Matt Nagy who resurrected his season in December by putting on some of football’s worst defenses. Chicago’s momentum of advancement was interrupted when the competition improved, and now the Saints wait on Sunday. Be careful.
USA Today has that.
16. Bears (13): Notable Matt Nagy led this team to eight wins and in the postseason, but Chicago’s 1-6 record against winning teams is probably predictable for the playoff.
What are your thoughts on the regular season’s final power ratings.