Bears don’t have explanation for sinking once-promising season

It was ‘‘What Can I Possibly Say Day” on Thursday at Halas Hall.

The offensive coordinator, star running back, starting quarterback and coach marched up to the rostrum to be grilled about those things for which there is no defense.

When somebody asks you, in essence, Why are you and your team so pitiful? what, really, are your choices for answers?

A. Let’s start with all the blown assignments made by the low-grade morons that surround me.

B. We coaches and/or players are lazy and untalented.

C. I, personally, am unworthy and should be fired immediately.

D. All those problems have been fixed.

E. I have no freaking idea.

Nobody would dream of saying A, B or C. Those mandate instant career death. They were not hinted at in the answers.

And D is an answer the Bears gave last week before the Packers game, after they had been routed 51-23 by the Patriots and had two weeks to prepare for Green Bay and then got Brazilian-waxed 55-14 by the Packers. In those two games, the Bears gave up 80 points in the two first halves and scored seven.

So D is a lie that will not go down the gullet again.

So E, it was.

‘‘If we knew, we probably wouldn’t be here,’’ quarterback Jay Cutler said of what is wrong with the team he theoretically leads. ‘‘I don’t know, there’s a lot of things that have happened.’’

Yes, a lot of things have happened. Such as a kick returner who insists on running out balls from deep in the end zone and a veteran linebacker who made a bad call against the Packers, which resulted in a 73-yard Aaron Rodgers-to-Jordy Nelson TD pass. And a defensive coordinator who presides over the worst defense (points-wise) in the NFL, and an offense that is impotent and a ship that not only has no rudder, but is surrounded by sharks.

The Bears seem incapable of scoring more than 28 points in a game. And they’ve scored 28 only once. Last season, they scored more than 28 points six times.

Failure at every turn is impossible to defend. One can only throw out scapegoats, hide or scream, ‘‘I have no clue!’’

There is, on review, another tack — that taken by coach Marc Trestman. It entails saying almost nothing and absolutely nothing of substance.

The shell-shocked coach — ‘‘confounded’’ was his postgame response in Green Bay — cannot possibly worm his way out of any of this mess with words. And so his answers were clipped, snappy, beyond vanilla to white.

‘‘What we’re doing is very simple,’’ he said. ‘‘We’re focusing on the details with each and every player, through the coaches, to get ready for the Vikings. It’s really that simple.’’

Ah, and E=mc2. So they say.

This is the week from hell in the Bears’ dismembered world. What can anybody say to defend the wholesale chaos within a team we once thought had Super Bowl qualities?

If the 3-6 Bears don’t beat the 4-5 Vikings this Sunday at Soldier Field to see who gets out of the NFC North basement, they might find themselves booed in a way that hasn’t happened before.

Here’s a simple question with maybe a simple answer: Why does returner Chris Williams take deep end-zone kicks and insist on bringing them out, even if he only makes it to, say, the 12-yard line? I asked Trestman this.

‘‘Everything we do, we have rules and guidelines,’’ he said. ‘‘And for competitive reasons, I’m not going to answer the question directly.’’

OK. But either those guidelines are not being followed or they say, perhaps, ‘‘Have fun out there! Run it back from the third row, if you can.’’

I don’t blame Trestman for saying nothing. Words are useless at this point.

You do have to wonder, however, about that verbal loose cannon, Brandon Marshall, the Bears wide receiver who inexplicably rose to the bait tossed out by some Lions fan/clown, who insulted Marshall and his mom on, yes, Instagram, the new communication highway for the lazy, cowardly, bored and Bear-baiting.

No, it’s not nice when a guy calls your mom a ‘‘whore.’’ But who is this person, anyway? A nobody. There are many in this world of 7.1 billion.

But Marshall got incensed, Instagram-ed back and asked the guy to fight him in a ring for $25,000. Marshall would pay if he lost. If the clown lost, he would do, per Marshall’s rules, 100 hours of service in an orphanage. And apologize to Marshall’s mom.

The clown has not agreed. Maybe he weighs 100 pounds. Maybe he’s a 12-year-old girl. Who knows these days?

But why, Brandon, why?

Good lord, nobody on the Bears needs any distractions whatsoever this week.

The Bears are professionals, and football is their work, allegedly their passion, their essence. And the leading receiver wants to battle an idiot in the ring a la Danny Bonaduce and Donny Osmond? Or Joey Buttafuoco vs. Joanie ‘‘Chyna’’ Laurer?

Or — here we go — Jose ‘‘Four Finger’’ Canseco against Hong-man Choi back in 2012? Canseco got mauled by the 7-2, 352-pound Choi in seconds. Absurd.

Bears, just win. OK?

Email: rtelander@suntimes.com

Twitter: @ricktelander