Bear Digest

Power Rankings Accurately Reflect a Bears Double Defeat

A dip in the confidence of power ranking pollsters in the Bears is reflected after they managed to turn one bad loss into two.

Gene Chamberlain

Caleb Williams looks on with dejection during Sunday's 29-9 Bears loss to the Cardinals.
Caleb Williams looks on with dejection during Sunday's 29-9 Bears loss to the Cardinals. / Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images
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Everyone should have seen it coming and some people did.

Shortly after Sunday's disaster in the desert for the Bears, quarterback Caleb Williams was asked if he felt like the defeat in Washington by Hail Mary pass had impacted the team.

"I think early on in the week I think we could have done better overall of bounce-back better than that," Williams said. "I know it's a tough loss. It's tough lregardless of who you are in the facility, if you're out there making plays or if making decisions up top."

The Bears lost to the Cardinals in the days immediately following their loss to the Commanders.

In this week's power rankings, The 33rd Team's Marcus Mosher pointed out the impact of turning a loss into two losses. Many others have done the same.

However, Mosher added an element to explain why.

"Young teams often let one loss snowball into another," Mosher wrote. "And that's what happened to the Chicago Bears in Week 9 as they let the Hail Mary loss to the Commanders impact their play against the Cardinals this week."'

The Bears are still a young team. They had the eighth youngest roster coming into the season and that's with a few old players on it like Marcedes Lewis and Patrick Scales, tipping the scales so to speak.

It still doesn't excuse the way the coaching staff handled the entire situation.

The power rankings this week reflect lack of confidence in the Bears, their coaching staff and their ability to get back into the mix.

SI.com: 19th

They dropped one spot and Conor Orr mounted a defense of sorts for Matt Eberflus from fan criticism for his blitz call before the end of the half Sunday, pointing out they all wanted him to blitz on the Hail Mary.

"For example, Eberflus blitzed Kyler Murray before the half—the exact thing that the fans, in hindsight, wanted Eberflus to do against Jayden Daniels on the Hail Mary drive—and it yielded a 50-plus yard rushing touchdown," Orr wrote.

Guess what? Two different situations. The Hail Mary was the final play. They didn't know for certain the run Arizona broke was the last play of the half. There was plenty of time for a ball carrier or receiver to go out of bounds, resulting in a field goal, or even to throw it, get up to the line and down the ball for a field goal try. But there were only two seconds left in the game and only one option left to the offense on the Hail Mary. The blitz was the entirely wrong call against Arizona, a terrible call.

CBS Sports: 18th

They dropped four spots and Pete Prisco, one of their most staunch supporters in power rankings this year, has given up the ship.


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"So much for all that talk of this team possibly being a playoff team," Prisco wrote. "They looked lifeless against Arizona."

ESPN: 20th

Down goes the elevator as they dropped five spots. This week's theme for ESPN was the team's most important remaining game and it was an easy one. This week against New England.

Yahoo Sports: 19th

A real drop of six spots after being dominated and Frank Schwab says the Bears coaching staff is on a "bad run." "It screwed up the Washington game ad had major mistakes in the Cardinals loss too," Schwab wrote.

NFL.com: 17th

Dropping them four spots, Eric Edholm, cancels the playoffs for the team.

"Even the Bears’ defense, shorthanded as it might have been last week, has regressed," Edholm wrote.

USA Today: 14th


Nate Davis still has them in the playoff pool range at 14 but slipping three spots. That's not all that's slipping.

"The offense is slipping – 24 points during the current two-game skid–and so might confidence in HC Matt Eberflus," Davis wrote

The 33rd Team: 17th


Dropping only one spot for getting clobbered Sunday, Mosher finds the bottom line for the Bears as well as he did the essence of the game.

"Chicago is still a talented team, but that was not a game that it should have lost in Arizona," Mosher wrote.

Pro Football Talk: 20th

Down three spots and Florio's comment about the Hail Mary shows the Bears needed some aspirin.

"The Hail Mary hangover lingered longer than it should have," Florio wrote.

The Athletic: 20th

Dropping from 17th an the theme this week didn't really fit the mood in Chicago. It was to write something nice about the team. Their choice? "Tory Tayor was a good pick"

The Sporting News: No. 18

They were dropped four spots by Vinnie Iyer and their terrible road record under Matt Eberflus isn't blamed entirely on the coach.

"The Bears are facing additional growing pains with Caleb Williams leading to some winless road woes," Iyer wrote.

Twitter: BearsOnSI

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

BearDigest.com publisher Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.