Just imagine if the Bears had beaten the Vikings on Sunday.
We wouldn’t be hollering that they lack intensity, focus or closing will. We wouldn’t be wondering why the head coach hasn’t been fired. We wouldn’t be thinking about the next ridiculous way they will lose a game.
We would be celebrating one of the greatest comeback victories in Bears history.
To remind you:
With the Bears down by 11 points in the final minute, rookie quarterback Caleb Williams completed a one-yard touchdown pass to Keenan Allen with 29 seconds left. He then threw a two-point conversion pass to DJ Moore. The Bears recovered the ensuing onside kick, and Cairo Santos kicked a 48-yard field goal to tie the score as time expired and send the game to overtime.
The comeback to tie was thrilling, improbable. Just the odds of recovering the onside kick at that point were one in 15.
The Bears even won the overtime coin toss when the Vikings’ C.J. Ham picked tails.
The script was written. A Disney movie! David slaying Goliath! Well, at least the lousy Bears beating a Vikings team that hasn’t been to the Super Bowl in 47 years and never has won one. Indeed, the Vikings’ odds of winning the Super Bowl this season, according to BetMGM.com, are +2,000.
At any rate, a victory would have been a nice, heartwarming hug for an increasingly coldhearted Chicago fan base.
But almost on script — not the fantasy screenplay with Donald Duck and Pumbaa cheering — the Bears failed. All they had to do was score a touchdown on the first drive of overtime, and the game would have been over.
Of course, they didn’t. Williams scrambled for one yard, then was sacked for a loss of 12. Then the Bears got an indefensible delay-of-game penalty. Now it was third-and-26.
Right there, you had to stop and marvel at whatever it is that makes the Bears the Bears. After two downs and a penalty — on maybe the most critical series of the game — they had managed to go backward 16 yards.
Your mind reeled. You hallucinated. You watched coach Matt Eberflus on the sideline with his trim goatee and hip hairstyle. You watched him remain expressionless. Anybody home?
You watched it all and felt that ageless, impotent fury building inside you like too many jalapenos on a late-night burrito. All Bears fans could think, channeling Olympic figure skater Nancy Kerrigan after she was whacked on the knee by a creep named Shane Stant, was: ‘‘Why? Why? Why?’’
Well, of course, it’s because you’re a Bears fan. Likely born here or moved here or somehow feel a bond with this hapless franchise. You have known misery without relief. I’m sorry. I am.
I mentioned the Vikings’ Super Bowl failure. The Bears themselves haven’t been to a Super Bowl in 18 years and haven’t won one in 39 years. Anyway, if the Bears had beaten the Vikings, we’d be giddy. Simple, little things mean all.
We’d be recalling that astounding game against the Browns on Nov. 4, 2001, when the Bears made up 14 points in the final 28 seconds to tie and won when safety Mike Brown intercepted a pass by Tim Couch in overtime and ran it back for a touchdown.
What good does it do to get close and lose? That’s the philosophical question. Optimists will say it shows how near you are to greatness. Pessimists will say it’s because you know how to lose. Realists will shrug and say you’re bad until you prove you’re not.
Chicago fans are gaga over Williams’ pretty good game. Nobody here seemed to notice that Vikings journeyman Sam Darnold outplayed him. Both threw for more than 300 yards and two touchdowns, and Williams passer rating was a very nice 103.1.
But Darnold, playing with his fourth team in seven years, had a rating of 116.1. Did anybody notice this former Jets failure had six consecutive completions, plus a run for seven yards, in overtime to set up the game-winning field goal?
Nah. The announcers sure didn’t notice. But unbiased observers likely did. Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell did.
‘‘Show me somebody who had a better game at the quarterback position,’’ he said.
So what we have here in Chicago is what could have been. What never is. Moral victories. The fantasy of success. Wait till next year. It’s coming. Year after year.
Little things will win you games. And little things just happen to escape the Bears.