The Chicago Bears have quickly lost their contender status.
The Chicago Bears were once a 5-1 team that took down Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, as their ferocious defense looked good enough to carry them deep into the playoffs. Over the last few weeks, however, Nick Foles and the offense have looked completely outgunned, and those poor performances have been reflecting in the betting line for their next Monday Night Football matchup.
The Bears’ magic has totally ebbed away, as they are underdogs at home against Kirk Cousins and the Minnesota Vikings despite the superior defense and record to this point.
The Chicago Bears’ offense is a complete mess right now
While Foles did manage to get some garbage time stats that made his box score look better against the Tennessee Titans, he was held scoreless for most of the game by a poor defense playing without pass rusher Jadeveon Clowney. While the Bears are 3-0 in games Mitchell Trubisky has started, they have slipped to 2-4 in games that Foles has been the starting quarterback.
The Vikings, a team that was starting to put some feelers out there for some of the better quarterbacks in the 2021 draft, have now won two straight against two divisional opponents in Green Bay and Detroit, almost entirely due to Dalvin Cook establishing himself as the best running back in the league during the 2020 season. The Bears might have a good defense, but they don’t have the offensive firepower to go toe-to-toe with the Vikings if Cook has another big game.
With struggling second-year back David Montgomery now in the concussion protocol and potentially unavailable for this game, Bears fans might need to hope that handing it to Cordarelle Patterson on a jet sweep 19 times ends up being lethal enough to sink the Vikings.
Unless Foles turns into Sid Luckman, don’t expect Minnesota to be much of a welcome reprieve for this struggling offense.