There were a few bad omens heading into Sunday’s Bears game against Detroit. They had lost six straight to the Lions (something they had not done since 1968-71) and had dropped six straight home games.
Fortunately for Chicago fans, both streaks are over thanks to the Bears’ 17-14 win on Sunday.
“[It] feels great, just because I know how good of a team we are,” receiver Eddie Royal said. “It’s been frustrating losing games when we know that we’re a lot better than that.”
More to the point, “bad” is a good thing in the right context, once you get past a few negative aspects from Sunday’s game.
Bad planning: Remember when Jordan Howard left the game briefly in the first quarter? According to the Bears radio broadcast on 780-AM, the rookie running back was not wearing an athletic supporter and took a shot to the man zone. Dude, in a brutal game like football, you cannot take those kinds of chances.
Bad to the bone: Despite his earlier injury and questionable uniform choices, Howard was in beast mode Sunday. He rushed for 111 yards on 23 carries and had three catches for 21 yards.
“He’s huge,” Royal said of Howard. “I saw it in training camp; I thought, ‘This kid’s going to be a great player for us.’ Just his physical nature running the ball, defenses are going to get tired of tackling him. He got those extra yards for us today and he did a great job.”
Badass: Receiver Alshon Jeffery had a ho-hum game Sunday (3 catches, 46 yards). However, those stats were enough to make him the first Bears wide receiver this century to compile more than 4,000 receiving yards. Jeffery now has 4,045 in his career and is closing in on Matt Forte (4,116) for sixth on the team’s all-time list.
Bad blood: Connor Barth is not doing much to get on Bears fans’ good side. The kicker missed a relatively short field goal in the home opener, prompting “Robbie!” chants in hopes that the Bears would re-sign fan favorite Robbie Gould (they didn’t). Fast-forward to Sunday, when Barth pushed a 50-yarder wide, and only an interception by the Bears in the waning moments of the first half kept that mistake from hurting even more. Keep practicing, we guess.
Bad calls: There were two on the same drive by John Fox in the second quarter. First, the Bears coach lost a challenge on a pass to Kevin White that was ruled incomplete. Several plays later, Joique Bell was stuffed on fourth-and-1 at the Lions’ 36, turning the ball over on downs.
Bad karma: This came in the form of penalties. Bears defensive linemen Cornelius Washington and Willie Young both committed infractions in the second quarter that inched the Lions upfield, and they capitalized with a field goal. Those are the kinds of miscues that can haunt you later. Fortunately for Washington, he erased some of the bad vibes with a sack in the fourth quarter.
Bad ankle: Being totally literal with this one. White left the game in the third quarter with an ankle injury and did not return.
Bad egg: Early in the fourth quarter, a fan ran onto the field, completed about a 50-yard route and was squashed by security after going into a slide near midfield. This runner happened to be wearing a gorilla suit and an “All Lives Matter” T-shirt, though we won’t make any political interpretations here.
Bad mamma jamma: Two Bears in particular deserve this distinction: Brian Hoyer and Eddie Royal. The former threw for 302 yards and two touchdowns and did not turn the ball over. The latter hauled in seven passes for 111 yards and a TD. One of Royal’s highlights was a 64-yard reception on third-and-11 that set up the Bears’ second touchdown.
“I told [Royal] I thought he was going to the house, but he said the guy had the angle on him,” offensive lineman Kyle Long said. “He does it all. … He’s a smart guy and knows where to be and when to be and how to be there, and you saw that today.”
A few more games like that and fans will start forgetting the Bears began the season 0-3.
@redeyesportschi | chsosa@redeyechicago.com
![There’ll be more than one story to write about “Sundance Institute x Chicago,” coming to town June 28-30. Consider these to be some preliminary questions to be answered in a couple of months. A sort of pop-up import, sponsored by the Chicago Film Office and Choose Chicago, the city’s tourism bureau, “Sundance Institute x Chicago” is the power of branding incarnate. The event will consist of a modest four-screening package of titles that premiered in January at the annual Sundance Film Festival of Park City, Utah fame. The off-screen activity’s the apparent bigger deal: panels, discussions, filmmaker-centric meetups, patterned after […]](https://www.chicagotribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/CTC-L-Sundance-01.jpg?w=579 "There’ll be more than one story to write about “Sundance Institute x Chicago,” coming to town June 28-30. Consider these to be some preliminary questions to be answered in a couple of months. A sort of pop-up import, sponsored by the Chicago Film Office and Choose Chicago, the city’s tourism bureau, “Sundance Institute x Chicago” is the power of branding incarnate. The event will consist of a modest four-screening package of titles that premiered in January at the annual Sundance Film Festival of Park City, Utah fame. The off-screen activity’s the apparent bigger deal: panels, discussions, filmmaker-centric meetups, patterned after […]")
