NFL Week 6: Will Rome Take London? 10 Bold Predictions for the Chicago Bears
On Sunday, Chicago faces the Jacksonville Jaguars at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Will there be any Bears anarchy in the U.K.?
THE YEAR WAS 2019.
A home-schooled singer/songwriter by the name of Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O'Connell released her debut album.
NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir became the first two women to walk on the moon.
Jennifer Aniston joined Instagram and garnered over 1 million followers in a mere five hours.
And in way less resonant news, an average Chicago Bears team travelled to England, where they stared down an average Oakland Raiders team.
Both squads rolled into Tottenham Hotspur Stadium with a record of 2-2, but on paper, the Raiders — who were quarterbacked by the mercurial Derek Carr — seemed to be a safer bet than Chicago, whose offense was anchored by journeyman Chase Daniel.
Sure enough, the Oakland D abused poor Chase, intercepting him twice and sacking him four times on the way to a 24-21 comeback win.
Now keep in mind that nary a single Bear from 2019 remains on the Chicago’s 2024 roster, so it’s not like there were a bunch of dudes on this week’s overseas flight grumbling, “This time around, London is ours!”
There were, however, a bunch of dudes who grumbled, “Man, I hope Chicago Sports Stuff includes me in their Thursday bold predictions!”
For a small handful of lucky Bears, that wish is granted.
1) This Will Be the Rome Odunze Game
This tweet comes courtesy of Da Bears Blog’s Editor in Chief:
This week, a serious role for the rookie shall be found.
Odunze is quietly having a solid freshman campaign, leading the team in average yards per reception (13.7), and placing second in targets (29) and third in receiving yards (206). Our Texas Instruments calculator tells us that those 206 yards are a mere 88 behind D.J. Moore’s team-leading 294.
Jacksonville’s pass defense is hot garbage, standing 31st in the league in both yards and touchdowns allowed. More egregiously, this is their game number six, and they’ve yet to grab a single interception.
What likely has Rome most licking his chops is the fact that in last Sunday’s tilt against Indy, the Jags’ secondary was destroyed by Colts receiver Alec Pierce to the tune of 134 yards and a tuddie.
Pierce is Indy’s WR3, and Odunze is Chicago’s WR3, so the transitive property tells us that Odunze will rack up 134 and a tuddie. Plus he and his game ball will very much enjoy their flight back to Chicago.
2) Montez Sweat Will Be Montez Sweat
Statistically speaking, Tez’s 2024 has been a bust.
He’s managed just 8 tackles, an average of 1.6 per game, as opposed to last season’s average of 2.8. And he’s sacked opposing quarterbacks just twice, an average of 0.4 per game, in contrast to last season’s average of 0.7.
According to the numbers, Sweat is kinda-sorta half as good this season as he was in 2023. The eye test, however, tells us that he’s still a beast.
The Jags have allowed 13 sacks, tied for seventh-most in the league, so Sweat won’t have too much of a problem dumping signal caller Trevor Lawrence not once, not twice, but 2.5 times. And he’ll make it look easy.
3) Jaylon Johnson Will Deliver a Career-First
Here’s a surprising stat: Five games into his fifth NFL season, the Bears’ near-superstar corner has yet to record a single sack.
As a defensive play caller, Bears HC Matt Eberflus isn’t particularly exotic, preferring to rely on effort and athleticism, which doesn’t allow for bring-the-house blitzes. (Granted, his second-level defenders have performed so well that bring-the-house blitzes haven’t been super-necessary.)
But on Sunday, in an effort to end this game before the half, Flus will send the dogs early and often, which will lead to Johnson getting off the sack schneid.
4) Gerald Everett Will Out-Target Cole Kmet
In 2024, tight end/podcast host Cole Kmet has hauled in 21 of his 24 targets for a reception percentage of 87.5%.
In 2024, tight end/not podcast host Gerald Everett has hauled in 7 of his 9 targets for a reception percentage of 77.8%.
If the Bears do indeed take an early, insurmountable lead, that’ll allow Waldron to get cute, and what better way to get cute than to feed a TE2 who’s as sure-handed as his TE1? This cuteness will lead to 5 targets for Everett and 4 for Kmet.
As a bonus boldie, we’ll give Everett his first TD catch as a Bear. And as a bonus bonus boldie, Williams will let Everett keep the ball.
5) Roschon Johnson Will Slightly Out-Touch D’Andre Swift
Swift’s last two weeks as Bear have been damn good ones — 285 all-purpose yards, a pair of touchdowns, and a whole lot of quieting the loud haters. (Confession: I was one of the loud haters.)
That all being the case, it would make sense to make Swift a major part of the game plan, rights? Right..but, as noted in boldie #4, this is the ideal game for Waldron to get cute, and forcing the ball to the RB2 — who’s tied with D.J. Moore for the team lead in touchdowns (3) — is as just about cute as it gets.
So while Swift will see 5 targets out of the backfield, Johnson will see 15-plus rush attempts, as opposed to Swift’s 9.
The fact that Swift will find pay dirt for the third consecutive game will make him feel better about Sunday’s ball distribution.
6) Caleb Williams Will Shred the Jacksonville Secondary
It’s been a joy to watch Williams’ weekly growth, especially considering that fellow rookie QB Jayden Daniels — who was drafted by Washington at #2, one spot behind Williams — already looks all growns up.
But we’ll always remember Week 6 as the magical moment when Williams made it evident why Chicago opted to roll the dice on the USC product.
On Sunday, the Commanders are making the short roadtrip to Baltimore, where Daniels will have to deal with a Ravens defense hungry to atone for last week’s bed-shitting performances against Cincy, a track meet during which they stood around, mouths agape, scratching their tushies, and picking their nose, all while watching Joe Burrow rack up 392 yards and 5 touchdowns.
As Daniels gets sacked twice, picked twice, and held below 275 total yards, Williams will top 350 passing yards, toss a couple of touchdowns, and break a run of 25-or-more yards, the longest scamper of his career.
7) Tank Bigsby Will Wildly Out-Perform Travis Etienne Jr.
As of this writing, Etienne is listed as questionable for Sunday’s outing (shoulder), so this bold prediction could prove to be eminently un-bold.
Even if Etienne does take the field, he could well be compromised, and what with Montez Sweat all up in Trevor Lawrence’s grill (see boldie #2), Jacksonville OC Press Taylor will be forced to lean on his running game.
Bigsby is coming off the two best games of his NFL life — last week, he rushed for 101 yards; the previous, he went for 90 — so with Etienne on the bench (or on the field and invisible), expect Tank to top last week’s career-best rushing yardage total by 3 yards.
Nothing bolder than picking an exact yardage number, amirite?
8) Cairo Santos Will Break a Franchise Kicking Record
Predicting field goals is a fool’s game. But I’m celebrated for my foolishness, so LFG.
Robbie Gould holds the Chicago Bears’ record for longest field goal with 58 yards. (Santos’ career long is 55.) Mac Percival and Roger LeClerc both connected on 5 field goals in a single game, also a Chicago record. One of those kicking records will fall on Sunday.
Which one? No clue. Because predicting field goals is a fool’s game.
9) The Chicago D Will Hold Christian Kirk to One Catch…or Less
The 2024 season hasn’t been a great one for Christian Kirk — but it’s not all his fault. The Jags’ well-paid (maybe overpaid) receiver has seen 4-or-less targets in three of Jacksonville’s five games, so you can blame the offense, or the play calling, or some combination thereof.
Please keep that in mind as we take a peek back to Week 2, when the Bears held Houston’s WR2 Stefon Diggs to a season-low 6 targets.
We can all agree that Houston’s C.J. Stroud is way better at throwing footballs than Jacksonville’s Trevor Lawrence. And we can also agree that Houston’s Stefon Diggs is way better at catching footballs than Jacksonville’s Christian Kirk.
Logic dictates that if Chicago held Diggs down, they’ll hold Kirk further down, so the Jags WR2 will be a less-than-non-factor.
10) We’re Looking at a Euro-Beatdown, Y’all!
So the Bears will head into their bye week with a record of 4-2.
Not bad. Not bad at all.