Beware the Bad Side of the Bye

Off Weeks Historically Troublesome for Bears, Who Return to Scene of 'Fail Mary' Next Week

Head coach Ben Johnson and the Bears, who visit Washington next Monday night, are trying to reverse a trend that has seen Chicago drop 10 of its last 12 post-bye week games.

By Clete Campbell Windy City End Zone

It’s the one week of the season where even Ben Johnson sleeps well.

For it’s the one week the Bears are guaranteed not to lose.

Ah, the beloved bye week. It looks so good on paper.

But history has taught us to beware the bye’s fallout. For the Bears tend to celebrate their bye week by taking another game week off.

The Bears’ recent record post bye week is unbearably bad. Staring with the forgettable Marc Trestman tenure, the Bears are 2-10 following their bye over the last 12 years. Only the failure-to-launch New York Jets have a post bye week record as bad.

The Bears’ plus-minus scoring differential in those games, as the Sun-Times’ Patrick Finley notes, is minus-96 points.

“Put simply, the Bears have been horrendous following bye weeks,” Sports Illustrated’s Bryan Perez writes. “It's a trend that dates back to Marc Trestman, John Fox, Matt Nagy, and was continued by Matt Eberflus.”

The Bears’ post-bye week meltdown last season was their worst bye week disintegration yet: the Fail Mary.

Cornerback Tyrique Stevenson’s ill-advised taunting of Washington fans left him out of position to break up Jayden Daniels’ Hail Mary game-winning touchdown pass to Noah Brown and prevent the Commanders’ manic 18-15 comeback victory over the sleepwalking-to-the-final-second Bears.

We all know the rest of the story of the 2024 Bears.

NFL schedule makers, always fans of soap opera drama, naturally scheduled the Bears’ post-bye game this season against you-know-who October 13 on Monday Night Football right back at the scene of the crime: Northwest Field.

Whether the league has cruel intentions or just is naturally looking for a big MNF ratings draw, Daniels and the Commanders (3-2) — coming off a 27-10 statement road win Sunday over Jim Harbaugh’s Los Angeles Chargers — offer a true litmus test of where Johnson’s 2-2 Bears are really at after the first quarter of the season.

Johnson and his staff haven’t been beaching it up over the last seven days with Coronas.

They’ve been studying who the Bears are over there he season’s first month, who the Commanders are and what they have to do over the season’s final 13 weeks become a winning football team in 2025.

“What we do well, and what we can sink our teeth into,” Johnson said of his staff’s prep work this week. “And whether we want to pivot a little bit in certain spots, whether that’s personnel-driven or schematic, that can get us better going ahead.”

For sometimes in the NFL, no opponent tests you like your bye week.

“This year, Williams and the Bears will have a primetime opportunity to exorcise those demons, and the post-bye demons that have haunted Chicago for more than a decade,” Perez writes.