Bears: The hits just keep on coming

The Chicago Bears season is coming dangerously close to spinning out of control.

My oh my, how the fortunes of the Chicago Bears have changed so dramatically in the last 12 months. They entered this season with incredibly high expectations, after finishing 12-4 last season and falling just short of advancing in the playoffs.

However, to say the 2019 season has gotten off to an inauspicious start would be a dramatic understatement. Mitchell Trubisky has looked awful, as has Matt Nagy’s play-calling and in-game management — so much so, that many fans (perhaps hysterically) have taken to Twitter to call for Nagy’s and Ryan Pace’s jobs.

Instead of talking about a team working toward its goal to win a Super Bowl, Nagy has spent much of his press conference time diagnosing Mitch’s issues, defending his own decision-making, and explaining why some players have skipped out on talking to the media.

In other words, it’s safe to say the honeymoon period is over for Nagy. The Bears, more than anything, need a win. They need to build some positive momentum and begin to change the narrative — and it needs to happen immediately.

Unfortunately, that day won’t be today, as the focus is now on another critically mismanaged situation by the Bears and their coaching staff. After refusing to attempt to gain additional yardage on the final field goal attempt on Sunday (a miss by Eddy Pineiro), Nagy vehemently defended his position. This position drew the ire of many fans who felt Nagy was playing too conservatively.

Well, just as the flames of that fire were starting to die down a tad, Pineiro came in like a giant fan to the flames.

Pineiro was asked whether he wanted to be on the left hash for the final kick. Instead of tactfully avoiding the question and accepting responsibility for missing, he answered — honestly. But in doing so he inadvertently threw his coaching staff under the bus as he indicated it was not his preferred spot.

Let’s take a second to break this down. Nagy had nearly a minute and one timeout to try to gain additional yards to make the kick shorter. He chose not to do that. So looking at it another way, he had nearly a minute and one time out to put the ball exactly where Pineiro wanted it. But he failed to do that.

So we are left to ask ourselves why? Did Nagy not know Pineiro’s preference? Did he ask? Did special teams coach Chris Tabor know? He certainly should, so did he communicate that to Nagy during the final drive? If not, why? Did Nagy and Tabor communicate the plan to Mitch and he simply kneeled in the wrong direction? At this point, we don’t know, but this will no doubt come up the next time Nagy speaks with the media.

Whether we get a response, particularly a satisfactory one, remains to be seen. But suffice it to say, you can add this to the laundry list of things Nagy has had to discuss this season that he probably never thought he’d have to.