INGLEWOOD, Calif. — Everybody loves SoFi Stadium, the sparkling diamond of the NFL, except the Bears.
They’ve played here only three times, but each visit has been an embarrassing unraveling of progress they mistakenly believed they’d been making. The Chargers exposed them in a 30-13 clobbering, knocking coach Matt Eberflus and his team back to reality.
The Rams did that to Matt Nagy in this building in each of his last two seasons, also in nationally televised games, hastening his exit at a time he, too, thought the Bears were on the upswing.
The Chargers dropped the Bears to 2-6 on Sunday, one game worse than where they sat at this point last season, and kept Eberflus from his first back-to-back wins. He now stands 5-20 with the Bears, and it looks increasingly unlikely that he’ll be able to dig himself out of that hole.
“We did a terrible job tackling … and that led to big plays,” cornerback Jaylon Johnson said. “It’s frustrating because we know we can do better.”
The Bears are miles away from respectability, and that can last only so long before it becomes untenable for Eberflus. He didn’t bother to use his timeouts in the final minutes as the Chargers drained the clock. There was no point.
The Chargers are hardly a heavyweight and have been in their own crisis with a losing record and pressure mounting on coach Brandon Staley. They’re middling, which is exactly the type of opponent with which the Bears should be able to trade punches.
But for all of their shortfalls, the Chargers have two things Eberflus and general manager Ryan Poles haven’t been able to find. And they happen to be the two most important things for any team: a quarterback and a pass rush.
The Chargers went in with quarterback Justin Herbert and pass rushers Khalil Mack and Joey Bosa. The Bears countered with rookie Tyson Bagent and journeymen defensive ends Yannick Ngakoue and DeMarcus Walker.
They’d have a better chance with Justin Fields, who missed his second game while recovering from a dislocated thumb, but how much better? There’s no assumption they would have been in this game with him starting.
The Bears’ bigger problem Sunday, the one Eberflus seemed so confident he could solve in the offseason, was that Herbert looked as comfortable and casual as could be in the pocket. Eberflus’ and Poles’ plan to “dent the pocket” from the inside isn’t working, and Herbert was sharp enough to make them pay for it.
He completed 15 of his first 16 passes to put the Chargers up 17-0 and finished 31-for-40 for 298 yards and three touchdowns for a 122.7 passer rating.
“It was solid when we had some pressure,” Eberflus said, though that rarely happened. “I’m always going to say it needs to be more.”
Eberflus’ shortcomings were especially evident on defense, his specialty for three decades before taking this job. The Bears looked better over the three games leading into their visit to the Chargers, but those opponents were poor offensively or, in the Vikings’ case because of Justin Jefferson’s absence, limited.
Eberflus talks constantly about fundamentals, but there was linebacker T.J. Edwards missing a tackle on Chargers running back Austin Ekeler on a 39-yard touchdown catch early. Edwards could’ve stopped Ekeler for a three-yard loss but flailed and fell as he ran by him. He and cornerback Tyrique Stevenson also whiffed on tight end Donald Parham as he muscled into the end zone just before halftime.
Stevenson committed a costly pass-interference penalty in the second quarter, too, that erased what would’ve been a third-down stop.
There was little about the Bears that reflected what Eberflus always says should be their identity.
“The last three weeks our tackling has been really good... but today wasn’t what I wanted it to be,” he said. “We’ve been working our tail off on it in practice. We’re working on our angles. We’re working on that exact thing, and it’s been paying off for us. Today, it did not.
“It always comes down to fundamentals to me.It’s about being in there and having the right mindset and understanding how to attack the football. Once I got them in locker room there, they were good the second half.”
This isn’t a throwaway season, and it’ll be difficult for Eberflus to defend how things the things he’s saying aren’t showing up on the field.
