Bear Digest

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly from Bears Loss to Cardinals

Analysis: Everyone was worried about Tyrique Stevenson but pretty much the rest of Bears starters were the goats this week in a 29-9 loss.

Gene Chamberlain

James Conner breaks tackles Sunday at Glendale, Az as the Bears defense struggled in all areas of a 29-9 loss.
James Conner breaks tackles Sunday at Glendale, Az as the Bears defense struggled in all areas of a 29-9 loss. / Michael Chow/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
In this story:

It's always said defense travels.

Apparently it had plane reservation issues for the Bears this week.

The Bears always think they have a shot in road games because of their defense, even though it's only a theory at this point.

They can't prove this to actually be true because they haven't actually won a road game this year. They haven't won a Sunday day game since Matt Nagy was coach.

Winning in London, a neutral field, over an opponent arriving late because of a hurricane doesn't count.

And Sunday the defense they did bring along didn't arrive with injured Montez Sweat or Kyler Gordon or Jaquan Brisker in the lineup. It didn't even have Tyrique Stevenson after his Hail Mary fiasco last week and his subsequent reported walk off the practice field on Wednesday, even though someone should have told Jay Glazer, who broke this story for Fox, that they didn't actually practice Wednesday. It was only a walk-through.

Eventually, Stevenson did play after two series and needed to because replacement Terell Smith became another injury victim with an ankle.

It's assumed the defense will return in its regular state. The offense is a no-show.

An honest look at the good, the bad and the ugly from Sunday's 29-9 loss by the Bears to Arizona would actually be a bad, worse and ugly, or foul-smelling, worse and ugly.

There actually was good, though. No one cares about it, but it was there.

So here's the good, the bad and the ugly from Sunday's loss.

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The Good

Kicker Cairo Santos

A a 53-yard field goal in the desert rain, and hail. Or at least his field goal came after the hail but when it was raining. Apparently someone needed to watch the Weather Channel because they had the roof open during an Arizona storm. Then he made another 53-yarder and a 29-yarder to keep them within 14-9 until just before halftime.

Punter Tory Taylor

A 54.5-yard average, a 67-yard punt, a yard short of his best, and one more inside the 20. Taylor keeps getting them out of holes but his coverage team betrayed him on a 27-yard punt return by Greg Dortch that set up the Cardinals for their first touchdown at the Bears 41.

CB Tyrique Stevenson

If he didn't like the way things went last week and the penalty the team gave him of missing two series, then at least he didn't sit around pouting. Stevenson tied for a team high seven tackles and had two pass breakups including a brilliant one on Marvin Harrison Jr. He couldn't make up for the Hail Mary but did all he could to take away the aftertaste. The rest of the defense seemed to have the bad taste in its mouth.

WR Rome Odunze

His connection with Caleb Williams as a fellow rookie seems to be real. He put up his second 100-yard game but more important was 87 of the yards and four catches came in the first half when the Bears still were in the ballgame.

DB Reddy Steward

He got to rotate into the coverage in his first NFL action and stripped the ball, leading to an Elijah Hicks recovery.

The Bad

S Kevin Byard

One of their most consistent players had a few missed tackles, including one on Trey McBride when he was stiff-armed that allowed the Cardinals to score their first touchdown. He also was on the side where Demercado broke his touchdown run and merely needed to turn him back inside to end the half. But he let himself get blocked and then didn't get to the outside of Demercado to turn him back in so someone else could help with the stop.

DT Gervon Dexter

It was definitely not Dexter's best game defending the run as a few of the bigger gains happened after he overran the play in his gap and left a big hole for the back to exploit. The other thing Dexter did wrong was a "leveraging" penalty for putting his hand and weight on the back of Arizona's right guard while leaping at a field goal that had put the Cardinals up 10-6. Instead, the penalty gave them the chance to go for a touchdown and a 14-6 lead. This is a penalty but the replay didn't necessarily confirm it actually happened because it's questionable that he really gained an advantage by what he did, and that's a requirement.

LB Tremaine Edmunds

He wasn't alone in misplays but on one third down pass he had Emari Demarcado trapped merely by turning him back inside. Instead he let Demercado get to the outside for an easy first down on a basic play. The Bears defense was out of sorts and committing fundamental flaws all day.  He also missed a tackle on an inside run by Conner. In all, the linebackers weren't there when needed against the Cardinals' gap blocking scheme.

LB T.J. Edwards

When you give up a season high of 213 yards rushing to the Cardinals, the linebackers all are in line for criticism. Missed tackles and not being in a gap was a common occurrence against the Arizona running game.

RB D'Andre Swift

The safety was his fault for a low block on a pass in the end zone. His running didn't impress on this day, either, but not much anyone did on offense did.

WR Keenan Allen

He dropped an 8-yard pass on third down in the second quarter when he had a first down, killing a drive and forcing the Bears to accept a 53-yard Santos field goal.

The Ugly

Coach Matt Eberflus

At least he came out after the game and owned the bad blitz call that Demercado used to break free for a 53-yard TD. Maybe he was thinking too much about last week when they didn't put pressure on Jayden Daniels on the Hail Mary but a blitz left no one back to help the safeties, who were blocked on the play. Just not the time to apply a blitz.

Eberflus also deserves criticism for the weird penalty on Stevenson of two series on the bench. It was like a token penalty and initially hurt a defense already without three starters.

Whatever happened to the HITS principle? It didn't look like they were following it in this game on defense.

Offensive Coordinator Shane Waldron

Waldron didn't have a goal line play snauf again, but again their offense came out throwing up a blank in the first quarter.

He's not the one throwing the passes or reading the defense. Williams is but Waldron should have simply had plays to target Cole Kmet specifically. They never targeted one of their big weapons for the second straight week.

QB Caleb Williams

Errant passes, poor footwork when he throws deep, being ill at ease in the pocket and running out of it too much and taking another sack that helped take them out of field goal range for the second straight week were part of his struggles. It's almost like Jekyll and Hyde with Williams on the road. He has a 67.2 passer rating on the road and 105.1 at home after Sunday's loss.

The Injury List

Never good when the starting right tackle has a knee injury and now Darnell Wright is a concern with left tackle Braxton Jones already out. Then there's Terell Smith with an ankle injury, Jaylon Jones with a shoulder injury and maybe the most costly injury, a pectoral injury to Andrew Billings. The big guy has been a key to their run defense and also their interior pass rush.

Add all this to Montez Sweat, Kyler Gordon and Jaquan Brisker, and the Bears could be without six starters next week if nothing improves.

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.