Five big takeaways from Chicago Bears’ primetime loss to Los Angeles Chargers

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – The Bears defense had a rough night against Justin Herbert and the Chargers on Sunday at SoFi Stadium.

Justin Herbert threw three touchdown passes and the Bears offense, led by backup quarterback Tyson Bagent, struggled to keep up. Matt Eberflus’ Bears lost, 30-13, and dropped to 2-6 on the season.

Here are the five big takeaways from Sunday’s game.

1. Poor tackling effort sinks Bears

A defense can’t have one of its worst tackling efforts against Herbert and the Chargers. That is simply a recipe for disaster. It’s exactly what happened Sunday in California.

It all started with the first touchdown of the game, when Bears linebacker T.J. Edwards flew right past Chargers running back Austin Ekeler. Edwards’ attempt at an arm tackle never had a chance.

Later, cornerback Tyrique Stevenson whiffed on a tackle against tight end Donald Parham Jr. near the goal line. Parham scored a touchdown just before half. It was a back-breaking score after the Bears had finally put points on the board. The Chargers went into halftime leading, 24-7.

“Just better tackling,” Stevenson said when asked about the play. “Force him back inside to my teammates that are coming. So just better tackling on my end, pretty much.”

Herbert completed his first 15 passes and made it look easy against a lackluster defensive effort from the Bears. The Bears were without starting safeties Jaquan Brisker (illness) and Eddie Jackson (foot).

“[We] didn’t play up to our standard,” Edwards said. “I felt like I left some plays out there. It just goes back to the fundamentals.”

2. For now, Bagent is a backup QB

Over the last two weeks, Bagent showed exactly why – at this point in his young career – he’s a backup. He operated the offense well against the Raiders last week, when the offense didn’t put the game on his shoulders.

But when the Bears fell behind on Sunday, Bagent and the offense couldn’t keep the chains moving well enough to keep up with the Chargers’ high-powered attack. A good backup will beat bad teams. Asking a backup to match up with Herbert is just unfair.

Bagent did throw the ball down field more than a week ago. He attempted 11 passes that went 10 yards or more beyond the line of scrimmage. He completed four of them, and two were picked off.

“I feel like there were a lot of plays where I’m getting through my reads and making the correct throws,” Bagent said. “Then I think there are a couple where – I haven’t watched the film yet – but off the top of my head a couple where I maybe forced the issue a little bit.”

The Bears are hopeful that starting QB Justin Fields will be back next week against the New Orleans Saints. That, however, is not a given. Fields’ thumb has to show the necessary improvements.

“That’s out of my control, so I’m going to attack the week the same way I always do, but everything stays the same,” Bagent said.

3. Velus Jones Jr. drops a sure touchdown

A lot of things went wrong Sunday night, but nothing is more deflating than dropping a sure touchdown.

Bears second-year receiver Velus Jones Jr. had everyone beat on a second down midway through the second quarter. Jones was wide open in the end zone. Bagent saw him and unloaded a deep ball over the defense.

“Yeah, I felt good about it,” Bagent said of the throw.

And then Jones fell down. He tripped over the turf, still had a chance to catch the football on his back, but couldn’t haul it in. The Bears wound up scoring on the possession, but the play was the perfect example of what could have been for the Bears.

A deflated Jones said after the game that the ball was “a little under-thrown,” but mostly pinned the blame on himself.

“It’s not an excuse,” Jones said. “It was a catchable ball. I mean, I had it. It’s just, it’s real devastating when you prepare all week and put in the extra work that’s needed and you catch a ball like that 100 times after practice, 100 times on the JUGS [machine]. And that small window of opportunity, you get to show what you can do and it don’t happen for you.”

It’s not an excuse. It was a catchable ball. I mean, I had it”

—  Velus Jones Jr., Bears receiver

The Bears have tried again and again to involve Jones in the offense, but his trip up was another chapter in what has been a tough go for the 26-year-old. Jones has caught only 10 passes in his career, thus far. He has been valuable as a kick return man, but his integration into the offense has not progressed.

4. Blown dead too early?

The Bears planned all week to call a deep shot to Darnell Mooney on their first play of the game. They received the opening kickoff and Bagent unleashed a bomb on first-and-10. Mooney caught it and hit the ground. A defender had touched him, but that was prior to him catching the football. He popped up and ran toward the end zone, but the refs blew the play dead.

After the game, Mooney did not feel like the play should have been blown dead.

“I felt like I got up fast,” Mooney said. “Then I was just turning over and started running and the whistle started blowing.”

It went for a 41-yard gain anyway, but the Bears couldn’t pick up a first down after that and they were forced to punt. Eberflus felt that Mooney could’ve gotten up more quickly.

“I just told Mooney that he’s got to get up and be convincing,” Eberflus said. “When he gets up – go. That’s what I told Mooney afterward. He needs to get up and go house the thing and let them make the decision.”

The Bears had another play blown dead later in the game when tight end Cole Kmet broke a tackle a split second after the refs blew his forward progress stopped. That play was in the red zone and Kmet probably would’ve scored if the refs let them play on. Kmet said afterward that he could see the play going either way.

Those plays might not have changed the result, but they could’ve made things interesting.

5. Bagent’s arm is fine

Any discussion of Bagent not having a strong arm is overblown. He aired it out plenty on Sunday. Mooney has seen it every day in practice.

“He can throw really good,” Mooney said. “We’ve had some times when we’ve been throwing routes on air. He has a bomb on him.”

Throwing the ball deep on the first play was a clear endorsement of Bagent’s arm. The Bears heard the chatter about his arm strength. They wanted to address it with that play call.

But as the game wore on and the Chargers took a lead, their defense sat back with two high safeties and didn’t give Bagent any open space over the top. He was forced to take the short throws, which makes it hard to play from behind.

“You’ve just got to take what they give you,” Bagent said. “There’s check downs on every play. There’s shorter routes on every play that we need to take advantage of and march down field.”

The Bears couldn’t string together first downs. They converted just six of 14 first down attempts and only one of four fourth downs.