See, this is what happens when you start winning or winning starts happening to you.
That crazy and character-revealing joy called “hope” comes to visit you – and often never leaves. Like Ralph Kramden’s mother-in-law: “Like last time she only came for short visits for the holidays, Christmas and New Year. The only trouble is that she came on New Year and stayed ,Until Christmas!”
There are no rules of expectations, no guidelines, no sense of when they are not welcomed or when they are overstayed their welcome. So once the Bears found themselves racking up unexpected win after unexpected win and taking down every other NFC North team this season, guess who came over for Thanksgiving dinner?
And guess who’s in the armchair in the front room after the Bears’ Black Friday win over the Eagles?
Expectations have now taken up their sweet spot in this new Bears class.
That’s despite having the lowest percentage of any of the NFC’s top seven teams entering the playoffs on Friday, according to NFL.com. (At 8-3 and tied for the second-best record in the conference, the Bears had a 59% chance of making the playoffs, behind the Packers at 8-3-1 and the Lions at 7-5.) Even with Green Bay defeating Detroit on Thursday, the Bears have a “new” hope beyond anything the league’s Next Gen Stats playoff probability analysis could claim to reduce to mere hatred.
They are now expected to win games in which they did not actually win, because they can miraculously win all close games. Overachieving while still not reaching your full potential game-to-game. The exception is now that they have officially entered the NFC North conversation – forever. Worst case scenario, finish second in the division. That these Bears will not budge in any situation, in any game, against any opponent. That luck is going to be with the Bears, at least for the remainder of this season, if only to balance out their contrasting fortunes from last season.
The expectations are that what Joe Thuney, Darnell Wright, Kevin Byard III and Montez Sweat have been doing lately is the unbreakable, immutable, dependable ideal to this day. Expectations for Caleb Williams’ clutch gene. Jaylon Johnson, Tremaine Edmunds, TJ Edwards all expected to return. Expectations of finishing in the top five in sacks allowed and leading the league in takeaways. Expectations are that there will be no “must-win” games by 2026.
As is now expected, no team will ever score 52 on them the way the Lions did in the past and they will never lose a game even close to that margin this season. But also that something “weird” is about to happen in the final three minutes of the fourth quarter of the game, and that weird thing is going to be in the Bears’ favor.
Or, as ESPN 1000’s Peggy Kusinski told him when I asked him about this new realm of expectations that surrounds the Bears: “Ben Johnson doesn’t want to look out the side view or the rearview mirror, but just out the windshield — at what’s right in front of you. Well, Bears fans are looking through the windshield of every car stuck in traffic ahead of you, and they’re seeing nbaI’m cautious that my ‘navigation system’ (aka Johnson) will take me where we want to go, but I keep thinking, ‘He’s a man; They never stop to ask for directions, ,and it might take a little longer to get there,, ,
Metaphorically perfect. Hope always precedes expectations, and the Bears have basically sped up these existing expectations by a year.
A 2018 Psychology Today article titled “The Psychology of Expectations” stated that “Humans have a natural tendency to place their hopes for happiness on unfulfilled expectations.” Being on top of the NFC North at any time after Week 8 resulted in an increased “expectation of happiness” in these 773/312/708-shared area codes that can only possibly be matched by any other NFL team in any other NFL region. And that’s the New England Patriots, the unexpected owners of the best record in the league.
But their new hopes are not rooted in our urgency and desperation. The six Super Bowl trophies since our singles change the significance of how expectations are applied when the thirst-trap gap goes from seven years (2019) to 40 years (1986).
The Bears, if nothing else, have now earned all the expectations chasing them. Hopes that are waiting for the invitation of the doorbell to ring. Now the Bears just have to chase down and host a welcome late visitor. Meet the expectations they have unexpectedly acquired. Then, as Linus once told his best friend, “Keep your expectations low, Charlie Brown.”
And Charlie Brown’s first metaphorical enemy was football.
They will get a bye in the first round in the playoffs starting today.
Williams struggled for much of the game, completing 17 of 36 passes for 154 yards, one touchdown, one interception and a low 56.9 passer rating.
There is evidence everywhere that Johnson was ready to step into this job, and it mostly reflects his intelligence. But the way he has communicated since the day he moved into the head coach’s office at Halas Hall has helped him achieve a key part: player buy-in.
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