LAKE FOREST, Ill. -- The 2023 Bears have had to navigate adversity on and off the field since the season began.
I could run down the laundry list of tumult that has overtaken Halas Hall, from the resignation of defensive coordinator Alan Williams in Week 3 to the Chase Claypool meltdown and the firing of running back coach David Walker.
The Bears also lost their first four games, including blowing a 21-point lead to the Denver Broncos in Week 4. They missed starting quarterback Justin Fields for four weeks due to a thumb injury. He returned just in time for them to blow a 12-point lead with under five minutes to play in Detroit against the Lions.
Stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Chicago sports teams! Sign up here for our All Access Daily newsletter.
Despite all of that, head coach Matt Eberflus kept the team pulling in the same direction. As Eberflus' seat started to warm early in the season, general manager Ryan Poles gave a strong vote of confidence in Eberflus' ability to lead them through the swell of adversity.
I never got the sense that Eberflus' seat was as hot as those on the outside wanted it to be. The Bears continued to play hard. The locker room is tight-knit and always believed that, once fully healthy, the wins would start to come. The Bears hung together not because of some magic dust Eberflus sprinkled in the locker room but because they trust in each other and are steadfast in their confidence that this core will turn it around.
The wins started to come. The Bears won three out of four and entered Sunday with almost complete control of their playoff destiny. The Bears' defense suffocated the Browns for 55 minutes and entered the fourth quarter leading by 10.
But, as has happened twice before, the Bears failed to finish and gagged away a double-digit, fourth-quarter lead in a 20-17 loss.
A third meltdown loss likely puts Eberflus' job back in the crosshairs. At the very least, there's less certainty he'll return in 2024 than a week ago.
His job status might very well depend on whether or not he can keep this group together and playing hard with their playoff hopes dashed.
"Really, it’s just relying on the relationships of the men and the guy next to you," Eberflus said Monday at Halas Hall. "We believe in the man next to you, and that’s so important for us. The relationship piece and how hard we work. The guys are tight. We’re just going to keep pulling together. That’s what we’ve been doing all along, and we’re going to keep doing that. It’s going to be evident in our work, OK, that we put in for this week, and it will be evident in the play we put in on Sunday."
CHICAGO BEARS
Eberflus said he'd meet with each player individually and have a meeting to see where they are at to make sure the bottom doesn't fall out.
The Bears are a 5-9 team that could very well be 8-6. But they've been saying "could" and "should" all season. Little has changed.
If Eberflus' future with the Bears depends on his team sticking together and fighting through the finish, he'll probably be in good shape.
This isn't a team ready to throw in the towel.
“I won’t say we’re at a breaking point," safety Eddie Jackson said after the loss in Cleveland. "We’re tough. We’re a tough group of guys. We continue to rally around each other. When things go bad, it’s just — this one is just, it sucks. It really sucks."
Should the Bears flush another improbable loss and respond to finish the season strong, Eberflus likely will point to the culture he's instilled since he arrived.
But the reality is that what will save him is the locker room bond that the Bears believe is the catalyst for a rise back from the ashes. Veteran leaders like Jackson, Tremaine Edmunds, and Jaylon Johnson have helped fortify that connection and belief in the group's potential.
"Adversity, it brings out the character in a person and the character in a team," Edmunds said Monday when asked why the Bears won't pack it in. "I look at it as a prerequisite of advancement. As long as we take it like that, as long as that's our mentality, you know nothing can stop us. No matter what people say, no matter what's going on on the outside world, as long as we believe as a unit, as long as we believe as an individual, because man, that's where it starts at. You've got to look at yourself in the mirror. I've got to look at myself in the mirror and say what can I do to be better. And if everybody is thinking like that then we will be better.
"This is just a storm, man. Obviously, we had some momentum. Another storm just came my way. But it's not about the past. It's about what are we going to do moving forward. And I know that we had a great group of guys. You know, just their leadership, man, just seeing how guys are responding to it. Obviously, everybody is hurt. But coming into the locker room today, coming into meetings today, and just hearing guys just wanting to get better, I think that's a positive that I think steps in the right direction because it's easy to hang your hat. It's easy to hang your hat when things are negative. But the true test of a man is: How do you judge this man when you face a little bit of adversity? I take my hats off to everybody because everybody has the right mindset. Everybody has the right frame as far as getting better. And when you have that, I mean, the sky is the limit."
The Bears have three winnable games in front of them on the schedule.
The 3-11 Arizona Cardinals come to Soldier Field on Sunday, followed by an Atlanta Falcons team that just lost to the Carolina Panthers and is making a quarterback change. A season finale against the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field is the toughest test, but Matt LaFleur's team has dropped two in a row and just got diced up by Baker Mayfield.
The Bears see a strong finish ahead and believe that will set the course for what can be a special 2024, with most, if not all, of the current core returning.
"It’s hard," tight end Cole Kmet said. "This is my fourth year in this. It’s tough, man, it’s tough. You come here every day wanting to build a winner out of this. It’s tough to have games like and games we’ve had like this prior, where we’ve been in reach of winning the game and should win the game, and it doesn’t come out like that. It’s tough. It’s tough coming in this morning. That’s the feeling. You know, we should have had this one the other day, but we’ve got resilient guys in this locker room, and I think that’s been proven over time.”
If they can prove it one more time, Eberflus' job likely will be safe -- taking one giant decision off Poles' plate in what is expected to be a potentially transformational offseason.