Bears can offer us only indigestion this Thanksgiving

First off, all you fools who think the Bears should tank the rest of their season to get a high draft pick in 2015, just stop.

Even if the Bears try really hard, they can’t be as bad as the dreadful Jets or Jaguars. The Buccaneers are terrible, too. The Titans are horrendous. And that’s not even mentioning the Raiders, a franchise that resembles a renegade spaceship with demented warlocks at the throttles.

That the 1-10 Raiders have even one victory is incredible. They narrowly beat the Chiefs the other night for that solo win, in something harking to scenes from a low-budget zombie movie in which the zombies ultimately triumph even though most of them get their heads blown off and others stagger blindly into giant airplane propellers and the like.

I need to continue. Not only did the Raiders, who were trying to hang on to their 24-20 lead with a minute left in the game, receive three defensive penalties in one play, they also celebrated a sack so emphatically and insanely that two players were actually well behind the line of scrimmage as Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith called the next play.

There is dumb. And then there is Raider dumb. It is the kind of thing that lowers one’s IQ just from observation.

Folks, the Bears are not yet within nose-blowing proximity of such. Oh, they could get there. But not now. Not without much more failure.

But I digress.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1KzLodrrXU&w=560&h=315]

Because even if the Bears tanked all the way to 5-11 (the worst they can do) and got an early draft pick, they likely would select another first-round Shea McClellin or Gabe Carimi. Or — hey-hey! — Michael Haynes. Or David Terrell, Cade McNown or — my personal favorite — John Thierry, who, as we were told when he was taken by the Bears with the 11th pick in 1994, really nailed that pre-draft combine stuff. Maybe he’s still nailing it. Not that it has anything to do with playing football.

So the Bears want to win every game from here on. That’s how sports should be played, you know.

They want to win Thursday in Detroit, against the 7-4 Lions, even though they’re seven-point underdogs.

Even though Ndamukong Suh is snorting about, waiting to body-slam Jay Cutler once more and maybe this time cave in his rib cage for good measure.

‘‘We’re going to get their best shot,’’ Cutler said Tuesday. ‘‘Since we only have a day-and-a-half of preparation, we have to get back on it.’’

Many wary fans do not wish for a Bears win, only a Bears survival. Going into Ford Field, where the noise is painful and the roar of a lion accompanies most everything the Detroit fellows do, it’s hard to envision the Bears having any comfort level at all.

But let’s imagine the Bears somehow pull this one out. Why not? It’s not like there isn’t parity all throughout the NFL, unlike between, say, Ohio State and Indiana.

As my colleague Mark Potash so insightfully put it the other day, the Lions are the Bears of Detroit. Like, when was the last time the Lions played in the Super Bowl? How does never sound?

There still is the lingering sense, like the scent of a hamburger after the grill is out, that the Bears’ offense might someday open up and be prolific. Can it do that?

After all, if it can’t, then why have Brandon Marshall on this team? Why have Matt Forte or Alshon Jeffery or Martellus Bennett? And why — to the point — have Cutler himself?

Even if there’s nobody better in the draft or free agency or on the planet, if he can’t lead the Bears to improbable wins from time to time, then why not dump him and run the single wing with four tailbacks?

The Bears are 5-6, and if they win out — yes, it sounds absurd, but bear with me — they could possibly make the playoffs at 10-6. Aaron Rodgers could get hurt. The Eagles could fold. The Cowboys and Lions and Seahawks and 49ers could all crumble into the sea, or prairie dust.

It could happen.

Most people picked the Bears to go 10-6 or 11-5 or 9-7 this year. What if the Bears end up where they were expected, only just through a weird route?

Why not beat the Lions and be 6-6?

Because the Bears are lousy, you say.

Thanksgiving Day is doomsday.

Believe it.

Email: rtelander@suntimes.com

Twitter: @ricktelander