The Chicago Bears hurt themselves by making the playoffs last year
The one factor that cannot be overstated is what the Bears accomplished last season. While Mitchell Trubisky seemed to find new life during his second stint as the starter in 2020, Chicago was simply beating teams that were beatable. There was nothing impressive about their mini-run at the end of the season.
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Beating the Houston Texans, Minnesota Vikings and Jacksonville Jaguars meant absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. First and foremost, we saw exactly who the Bears were in Week 17 when the Packers still handled business. Chicago got into the playoffs by a technicality, essentially. They lost, yet were still in because of help from other teams.
This was nothing to be excited about, and as we found out in their Wildcard game against the New Orleans Saints, indeed, none of what happened over the prior month mattered. The Bears showed up lifeless and without any sense of direction on offense against New Orleans, only mustering nine points in a playoff loss.
Fast forward to draft season, and here we are looking at the Bears with the 20th overall pick. Normally, that would mean last season was somewhat of a success. It’s something to build upon. Instead, most fans feel as though this team should have finished with a much higher draft pick based on how lowly the offense looked all season.
At pick No. 20, the Bears can’t even begin to fathom fixing their most glaring issue — quarterback. If Pace is going to end up with one of the top quarterbacks in this year’s draft, he’ll have to mortgage a boatload of future assets — all thanks to one, small, meaningless and lifeless playoff run.