The Bears lost 31-28 in overtime Sunday, and it was good.
By law in Chicago, that cannot be true. Any sentence containing “Bears,’’ “lost’’ and “good’’ is considered bad grammar and punishable by up to two years in prison. But rules are meant to be broken once in a while, and on a crazy, wild, ridiculously fun afternoon in Miami Gardens, Florida, the Bears played a game in which entertainment value was worth more than victory.
That might sound like heresy, and it might look all wrong in the win-loss column. But while the game was going on, while the yards were piling up and the goal-line fumbles were lying there like cars hanging over cliffs, it was impossible not to get caught up in the drama of it. It might not have been good for the team you were rooting for and it might not have been good for your heart, but it was good for the soul.
The Bears trailed 7-0 at halftime.
They roared back to take a 21-10 lead.
The Dolphins took advantage of a strangely porous Bears defense to tie it at 28.
Bears kicker Cody Parkey missed a 53-yard field-goal attempt with 1:55 left in overtime, leaving the door open for Jason Sanders’ 47-yard game-winner for Miami as time expired.
Try saying all of that in one breath. That’s how this game felt. And there was so much more to it than that bare-bones recap of how it played out.
Yes, Bears coach Matt Nagy, the offensive whiz with the bag of tricks, did go suddenly conservative in the play-calling that led up to Parkey’s miss. But to dwell on that is to miss the bigger picture, which was equal parts bright paint and adrenaline. The only surprise was that Sanders made his field goal. A tie would have been much more in keeping with the feel of this back-and-forth game.
Nagy is not guilty of blowing this game for the Bears. He’s guilty of straying from the spirit of an unbridled, free-range afternoon. His calling five consecutive runs to set up a long field-goal attempt was a sin against God and nature and Don Coryell.
The Dolphins had 541 yards of offense, the Bears 467.
The Bears averaged 7.3 yards per play, the Dolphins 7.2.
Miami’s Brock Osweiler, a pregame replacement for injured quarterback Ryan Tannehill, threw for 380 yards and three touchdowns. He also threw two interceptions, both to Bears cornerback Kyle Fuller.
Mitch Trubisky passed for 316 yards and three touchdowns. Oh, and he had a spectacularly bad fourth-quarter interception in the end zone that allowed the Dolphins to tie the game at 21. That’s how this game was, and maybe that’s how Trubisky is. But I’d take this Mitch over the one we saw earlier in the season. And last year.
“It was definitely a crazy game,’’ he said. “A lot of ups and downs. I’m proud of the way that we reacted to it and stuck together. Offense made great plays; defense made great plays. Offense made mistakes; defense made mistakes. Special teams did their thing, as well. That kind of roller-coaster game can go either way at the end, and it didn’t go in our favor. But it is fun to be a part of those.’’
Ups and downs? Yeah, you might say that.
There was the mind-blowing fumble by Bears running back Jordan Howard at the Dolphins’ 1-yard line late in the second quarter. A you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me fumble by teammate Tarik Cohen near midfield late in the fourth quarter.
A you-think-that’s-bad-watch-this fumble in overtime by Dolphins running back Kenyan Drake at the Bears’ 1-yard line that Bears defensive lineman Eddie Goldman recovered in the end zone.
That led to the missed Parkey field goal, the second-guessing and the rest of it.
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Of Nagy’s late-game play-calling, Trubisky said: “One hundred percent trust in coach Nagy and what he believes is best for this team. What he believes is what I believe is best for this team. Whatever he calls, we’re going to run it to the best of our ability.’’
Trubisky wasn’t good in the first half. At halftime, there was only one question: Would we look back on the six touchdown passes he had against the surrendering Buccaneers two weeks ago as a fluke? By the end of this game, we were talking about his 122.5 passer rating and a few ill-advised passes that somehow didn’t bite him.
The Bears’ defense, which had been among the best in the NFL through four games, was mostly absent. Outside linebacker Khalil Mack hurt his right ankle in the first half and looked like somebody else the rest of the game. Not Shea McClellin, but not Mack, either.
With him healthy, the Bears would have gotten more pressure on Osweiler, who wasn’t sacked. And perhaps Dolphins wide receiver Albert Wilson wouldn’t still be running all over the field. Maybe Cohen still would be.
Ah, but then we might not have had this Old West shootout.
The Bears fell to 3-2.
And it was good. Really, it was.
