Chicago Bears: Bummer start

The 100th NFL season kicked off on Thursday and there are high expectations for the monsters of the midway. However, Chicago Bears fans were disappointed and the players heard some boos throughout the game.

It’s only week 1 and the Chicago Bears lost in week one last year but rebounded afterward. The Bears have 10 days off before week two but Mitchell Trubisky had a very rough game, throwing an interception in the last two minutes of regulation to seal the game to the Green Bay Packers. Monday morning quarterbacking will be Friday morning quarterbacking and the debate will start, why did the Bears lose? The yellow flag, the biggest part.

The Packers to their credit played suffocating defense, but penalties killed the team all night. The Bears had 10 penalties for 107 yards and too many of them stopped potential scoring drives. The next question is are the Bears as good as some have predicted? One game is not time to panic but this should be a message that despite the feeling, the team should not think they are better or worse than they believe.

Tribusky threw the ball 45 times and that was too many passes when there were situations where the Bears should have run the ball. What is the biggest factor that led to the Bears losing? There will be debate on this but without the penalties, especially offensive, that was the single biggest factor that kept the Bears from winning. While the Packers defense made life difficult for the Bears offense, the penalties only complicated their efforts to win.

During the broadcast on NBC, Cris Collinsworth brought up a good point, the first game, the players are not accustomed to the grinding season routine and after a while, the players tend to get a little tired. Losing the way they did especially against your arch rival is tough to swallow but all wasn’t lost. The Bears defense played real well, as illustrated in this tweet.

https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1169796207738150912?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1169796207738150912&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbssports.com%2Fnfl%2Fnews%2Fpackers-vs-bears-final-score-chicagos-offense-struggles-as-green-bay-wins-low-scoring-game-on-the-road%2F

The Bears-Packers rivalry is the longest one in the NFL and considering this game was the first game of the season on NBC, it is not uncommon for teams to show their rust. There were more punts than points and the Chicago Cubs scored more runs than the Bears scored points. To put into perspective how suffocating the Bears defense can be, even Aaron Rodgers said the Bears defense will “give a lot of team struggles.”

Tribusky overthrew too many passes that could have resulted in big plays and he needs to focus on improving his accuracy going forward. In short, this game was there for the taking and in any sport, losing these toss up games are the hardest ones for fans to accept.