The Bears left Lambeau Field with a mess on their hands, and it started to unravel fast. Chicago got shoved around, outplayed and beaten senseless by the Packers in a 31-7 loss that featured five turnovers and never really felt close. Two days after Mike Ditka died, Ben Johnson’s team was outclassed by Matt LaFleur in just about every phase.
There’s no way around the scale of the collapse. The Bears were crushed in Week 5, and the game was over long before the final whistle mercifully arrived. For a team that looked ready to take a step forward in some eyes, this was the kind of showing that forces a hard reset.
Tyson Bagent was at the center of the damage. A week after he looked erratic against the Jets, he carried those same habits into a far worse afternoon.
He kept forcing throws into coverage when he didn’t need to, firing passes 6-10 yards out in front of him with receivers blanketed. He was intercepted twice, but there were at least two more throws that easily could have gone the other way.
Bagent looked lost, overwhelmed and unprepared. Bears fans who had warmed to him have to face the reality that he’s a backup for a reason, and at best.
If Johnson was seeing it clearly, the change should have come much earlier.
There was one bright spot worth pointing out: Austin Booker. The third-year defensive end looked like a player finally turning flashes into something more consistent.
He sacked Jordan Love twice on one first-half drive and now has 4.0 sacks on the season. While the defensive line as a whole was ordinary, Booker’s effort stood out.
Everything else on the back end was a disaster, and Jaylon Johnson was right in the middle of it. The Bears’ secondary gave up huge plays all afternoon, and Johnson kept getting exposed on them.
He was beaten repeatedly and looked nothing like the corner Chicago once had. By the end of it, it was fair to say the Bears may need to find two new outside corners next year.
The run game didn’t help the offense survive the day, either. With Kyle Monanagai out, Roschon Johnson was asked to spell D’Andre Swift, and he brought almost nothing with him.
He never looked threatening, never created anything after contact and never showed a burst that could stress a defense. His 1.2 yards per carry summed it up neatly.
Salvon Ahmed should have been the one getting those snaps.
Chicago also got pushed around physically far too often. Even with Monangai out, the Bears still entered with one of the league’s better offensive lines, but it didn’t play like it.
The interior didn’t open much of anything, and whatever momentum Swift found came only in small doses. On the other side, the Packers’ patched-together offensive line held up against Chicago’s front well enough, while Green Bay’s speed and athleticism made the Bears’ secondary look helpless.
It was a flat, soft effort across the board.
Johnson’s own decision-making deserves a hard look, too. He got too cute, and LaFleur had him covered.
The play-calling was littered with head-scratchers, from the choice to keep feeding Roschon Johnson instead of elevating Salvon Ahmed to the red-zone calls that went nowhere. Going to Kalif Raymond on the perimeter twice in a row inside the red zone was questionable, and the 3rd-and-goal end-around to Luther Burden III was another one.
The biggest miss, though, was leaving Bagent in after halftime instead of turning to Case Keenum.
Injuries aren’t an excuse, but they’re part of the picture. Caleb Williams was already out, and the Bears also saw T.J.
Edwards, Dayo Odeyingbo, Tyrique Stevenson and Cam Lewis leave with injuries. That doesn’t explain the whole collapse, but it adds another layer to an afternoon Chicago would like to erase.
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