Nine weeks ago the Chicago Bears were on the verge of winning their fifth game.
They started their celebration a little early.
Bears defensive back Tyrique Stevenson was caught waving to the home crowd at FedEx Field while their Washington Commanders team was on the verge of losing, 15 to 12. All that was left for the home team was a Hail Mary pass from mid-field with little time on the game clock.
Jayden Daniels, the Commanders quarterback, had already taken the snap and began his desperation moves to avoid a sack and get off the 54-yard throw when Stevenson noticed the play had begun. In response, the Bears defender ran towards the scrum in front of the endzone and leaped up to tip a ball that was short into the endzone and the waiting hands of Noah Brown.
Touchdown Washington!
Commanders win, 18-15.
The Bears allowed their fifth win of the season to slip away like a hungry child allowing her ice cream cone to fall from her grip on first bite. A child in that situation would cry, the Bears did too. Stevenson apologized to the Chicago fans and promised better behavior in the future. As for me, I figured, and wrote the next week, that while it was Stevenson who took most of the blame for the lapse in judgement, the team was probably more complicit in the trap of overconfidence and that Chicago getting their fifth win of the season was probably further off than the team currently expects.
Even as I wrote that assessment in October, I didn’t imagine Chicago’s fifth win was this far in the future. In fact, we don’t know how long the Bears have to wait for their fifth win of 2024 after blowing that chance in Washington … because it still hasn’t happened.
Chicago has changed offensive coordinators, their head coach and numerous personnel adjustments in an attempt to get that fifth win … and still no luck.
Now, Chicago has been good enough on a few occasions to take advantage of generous point spread lines. In mid-November, they lost by only a single point to the Green Bay Packers while getting six on the spread. They got three or more against the Minnesota Vikings the following week and lost by only three points, 27-30. On Thanksgiving, in Detroit, they made a second half comeback to cut the final margin of defeat against the Detroit Lions to three points while getting double digits on the line.
Because in that game former head coach Matt Eberflus so mismanaged the final minute of game clock and then tried to defend his actions in postgame interviews, the front office dismissed him.
His interim replacement, Thomas Brown, has had no success in his first three games at the helm of the sleeping Bears. He has lost both the game and generous points spreads to the San Francisco 49ers, Minnesota Vikings and Detroit Lions. Tonight, his team is getting another bloated line of four points when they host the Seattle Seahawks.
What we have here are two major factors working against each other.
First, late in the season when one team needs the game and is playing an eliminated foe, the team with nothing to play for has a huge edge over the team trying to make the playoffs.
Advantage Bears.
The Seahawks, after a narrow loss last Sunday at home to the Vikings while their division leaders, the Los Angeles Rams, were beating the Jets on the road, brings these two NFC West Division teams into this week’s play with Los Angeles one game up in the standings. They play each other next week, and for that game to have meaning the Seahawks need to win tonight or have the Rams get upset on Sunday by the Arizona Cardinals at SoFi Stadium.
The Seahawks don’t just need to win, they need help, which swings the pendulum of motivation from their home hosts tonight to the road favorites.
Advantage Seahawks.
What that leaves us with is two advantages on opposite sides and a disadvantage for us to make a recommended play on this Thursday night affair.