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When Chicago Bears head coach Matt Nagy met with the media one day after his team’s embarrassing 41-25 loss to the Green Bay Packers, he was visibly frustrated. As was every Bears fan that watched that debacle on Sunday Night Football.
And there’s plenty of reasons for Nagy to be frustrated. The entire team performed poorly, from the abysmal offense to the usually-dominant defense. But on Monday afternoon, Nagy made the mistake of taking a swing at his top defense for one poor performance, while his offense continues to be an absolute embarrassment.
The defense definitely deserves a bulk of the criticism for giving up 41 points, their most since Dec. 2016, and looking like they’d given up, especially at the end of the third quarter. But Nagy’s anger was directed to the wrong unit.
“That’s not who we are as a defense,” Nagy told reporters Monday. “That can’t happen. And our defensive guys know that. You have to be able to shut them down and not allow 16 first downs in 36 plays, 5 of 6 on third downs and three touchdown drives.
“They need to understand where we’re coming from with that and how we feed off of them as a defense. They’ve done a hell of a job all year long, but yesterday was not where we need to be.”
Of all the possibly bad things to happen against the Packers, the Bears defense coming out with that performance was among the most surprising. This was a Chicago defense that has been top-notch all season and hadn’t given up 30 points all season.
Then again, this isn’t a performance that’s likely to be repeated. This defense has been among the best all season. Which can’t be said about Chicago’s offense, which has been one of, if not the worst in the NFL.
But when you start calling out the one unit that’s carried your team to its five wins, that’s when you’re asking for trouble.
“See, here’s what you’ve got to understand: These guys know how much I have their backs as players,” Nagy said. “This is not news to them. They know how they played. They get it.
“This isn’t a blame game… But what I’m saying is that our defense understands and they know how significant and important they are to this team.”
While Nagy might think he’s rallying his team, it certainly sounds like he’s placing the blame on his defense when they’ve been the ones that have carried him through his three seasons as head coach.
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