Bears and Mitch Trubisky keep talking about everything but the obvious: His poor play

The amount of energy that Mitch Trubisky and the Bears put into not talking publicly about his quarterbacking deficiencies is impressive. It must be exhausting, too.

For the last three years, we’ve heard all about Trubisky’s leadership ability, his enthusiasm, his work ethic, his desire to be great, etc. His tendency to overthrow receivers is glossed over in favor of grand speeches about his passion for film study.

Remember the “little things’’ he planned to work on during training camp? It was a classic.

“I think it could be as simple as cleaning up in the locker room, just simple things like that,’’ Trubisky said. “Keeping your room neat, cleaning up in the locker room, making sure you’re properly warmed up for practice, getting recovery, eating right — little things like that.’’

His good housekeeping vow had come from a leadership book coach Matt Nagy had read.

Cleanliness is to football what large biceps are to poetry.

Now the Bears are telling Trubisky to work on his body language, which apparently was a mix of Indo-Somber and Germanic-Grave during the Bears’ loss to the Chargers last week. Nagy told him to watch the TV broadcast of the game. There, Nagy said, Trubisky would see a quarterback who was not exactly the wind beneath his teammates’ wings.

“I watched the game to really see my facial expressions, my body language and what I’m really doing during the game . . . and how my teammates see me,” he said. “That helped me see . . . how I can be even more positive on the sidelines — be more vocal, more hand gestures and just get back to being myself.

“Especially through times of adversity, they’re always looking toward the leaders. They’re always looking toward me and seeing how we’re going to react, how we’re going to bounce back and be positive. . . . You’ve got to be excited for the opportunity. You’ve got to continue to come to work and have fun.”

Bad body language is a product of bad play. It’s not the other way around. Mitch’s 81.4 passer rating isn’t going to soar when he starts high-fiving his teammates after one of his interceptions. And teammates aren’t going to look upon a peppy quarterback as a leader if he can’t get them into the end zone. Everything seems backassward here. Backassward — the Official Language of the Chicago Bears.

Few football coaches with mediocre quarterbacks are going to state the obvious, that their guy couldn’t complete a pass to the person next to him on a packed train. We all know this.

But you’d think that somewhere in there, Nagy might slip and acknowledge that Trubisky is not close to being a good quarterback. Playing well is the only thing that matters when it comes to playing quarterback. Instead, we’re talking about body language. The closest Nagy will come to harsh criticism is to say that Trubisky is in a “lull.’’ Nagy did speak volumes about his trust level with the offense when he chose a field-goal attempt on second down late in the Chargers game. Chose that over his quarterback and his running back.

Trubisky did have some nice throws Sunday, more than he has had in quite a while. Nagy called those throws “special.’’ But then you watch what the 49ers and Jimmy Garoppolo are doing offensively, and you see what special is. Let’s not even talk about what Garoppolo, acquired in 2017 for a second-round pick, might have looked like in a Bears uniform. Let’s not make you cry.

A bad interception and a fumble by Trubisky last week more than offset the nice throws he had against the Chargers. That’s the problem. The problem is not body language. It’s not that Trubisky cares too much. It’s that this is who he is. I believe general manager Ryan Pace knew that in the offseason when he said he was looking for “incremental improvement’’ from Trubisky. Incremental improvement from a third-year quarterback on a team with Super Bowl dreams? Was Pace out of his mind? No, I think he saw the truth.

The conspiracy theorist in me wondered if that was the reason Nagy didn’t play Trubisky in the preseason. Why let some exhibition-game interceptions create a massive negative vibe in town?

I know: crazy talk. But these Bears will drive you crazy.

They’ve put a lot of energy into avoiding the obvious with Trubisky. They seem to be more concerned with creating a leader than salvaging a first-round draft pick. Again, backward. And exhausting, for everyone.

They play in Philadelphia on Sunday. They have a three-game losing streak. Their offense was atrocious in the red zone last week. The one shining light was rookie David Montgomery, who rushed for 135 yards and a touchdown. More of that, please. And more carries for Trubisky. Running is what he does best. A few good rushes will improve his body language. He’ll be happy. He’ll lead his teammates. And the locker room floor will be immaculate.