Speaking to the media Monday, Bears coach Matt Nagy didn't mince words when discussing Sunday night's abysmal 41-25 loss to the Packers in Green Bay.
Nagy described his team's performance as "flat-out embarrassing" and "ridiculous" and warned "we better wake our tails up." Dominated on both sides of the ball, the Bears trailed 41-10 entering the fourth quarter en route to their fifth straight loss.
"Every freaking coach on the staff, every player, better wake up and start understanding where we're at," Nagy said. "Have some personal pride. Have a freaking sense of urgency. Know where we're at. Have some pride into who we're playing for and why we do this and then go find a way to win as a team.
"That's my challenge to every single person in that building this week, is that. Yesterday was flat-out embarrassing and our guys know it. I'm not telling you something they don't know. They know it. But we're going to step up and all coaches, all players, and we've got five games left. For us, it's our own personal challenge as to where we're at and how we're going to do this thing. But that performance yesterday is ridiculous and can't happen and obviously that starts with me."
In losing their fifth straight game at Lambeau Field, the Bears committed three turnovers on seven possessions through the first three quarters and allowed Packers superstar Aaron Rodgers to throw four touchdown passes without recording a sack, takeaway or even a quarterback hit.
"I'm hoping that really none of us slept last night because of where we're at and what we did and what we didn't do," Nagy said. "That's going to be where I'm at [and that's] where our players need to be. If you really care and you understand what we put out there last night, you'll fix it. And so that's going to be the challenge moving forward here, but there's some personal pride here involved in moving forward."
“Every freaking coach on the staff, every player, better wake up and start understanding where we’re at.” Bears coach Matt Nagy
Nagy knows that if the Bears' downward spiral continues, his job could be in jeopardy. But his focus remains on finding solutions for what ails his team rather than his employment security.
"That's all a part of our business," Nagy said. "When we sign up for this, every one of us—not just head coaches but coordinators, position coaches, all of our families—we all sign up for that. That comes along with where we're at. I can't worry about that right now. What I have to do is make sure that whatever we're not doing, we get it fixed and we get it right.
"We want to make sure that we are winning football games, and so when you lose five in a row like this for us, you've got to come up with different solutions, different answers and then you've got to have that pride … Our guys do care. I know that about our guys, I know they care. I felt that last night in our locker room, I felt it. But now it's about doing it, and it's as simple as that."
With five games remaining in the season, every Bears player and coach is responsible for helping to right the ship.
"Let's face it, we've all been in sports our entire life—most of us—and we've all had some highs and lows," Nagy said. "Right now is an extreme low. It's not fun, not at all. It stinks. But if you fight, if you care, if you have a little pride, if your DNA allows you to get a little pissed off and angry, maybe then good things happen.
"We've got to collectively come together, which we're doing, but we've got to do it on Sunday, Saturday, Thursday, whenever the heck the game is. That's when we've got to do it. It can't be talk, it can't be going through the motions throughout the week. We need to do it every single day in practice. Every single day in the meeting [rooms]. There's an obsession about it. You love what you do. You have a passion.
"Are you watching extra film? Are you getting your rest when you need to get rest? Are you getting the JUGS [machine] after practice? Are you doing the extra work, or do you just think you don't have to do that because we can just go play football? That's not the case. Are you studying? Are you watching your iPad? Are you asking coaches questions? Coaches, are you talking to your players?
"That's where there's some soul searching. That's what the soul searching means. It doesn't mean point fingers. It doesn't mean blame. That's not what we do, that's not how we roll. But you better have some stinking fire and you better have some care. And if you have that, I promise you with the talent that we have, good things will happen. But you've got to do it. Enough is enough. We all feel it. You guys feel it, we feel it, trust me. But you've got to do it."
Nagy clarified that players have already been working hard on and off the field; he just wants to see them do even more.
"All these guys are studying, they're working hard, they're practicing," Nagy said. "But if you're catching 10 balls at the JUGS [machine] after practice, go catch 20, right? If you're a guy that's watching three hours of video in one night, go watch four and get that extra hour in there. I think this is more about the extra because, obviously, right now we need to do a little bit more … I'm not insinuating by any means that they're not doing it, I'm just saying do more."
