Brock Purdy had little problem shredding the Bears secondary or getting the ball out to beat Eric Washington's blitzes. / Cary Edmondson-Imagn Images
Nothing Bears interim coach Thomas Brown could say would have adequately provided hope for something better coming from the team any time soon.
So his postgame press conference became one where he repeated he, coaches and players have to do a better job, and several times said they had their rear ends kicked.
This much was apparent to all who saw a team outgained 319 yards to 4 in one half of football.
Caleb Williams suffered the same struggles he usually does in road games, especially against good defenses. And this was the league's 11th-ranked pass defense but one capable of far more than they showed against the Bears if they had Nick Bosa on the field.
This was possibly the most disappointing aspect of a miserable 38-13 Bears loss.
This was not a good 49ers team. It was one without seven to 10 key players and one with a 5-7 record. An objective look at the schedule would say they had just played their most winnable game. Yet the 49ers handed the Bears their most lopsided loss this season, at least by point differential if you're keeping track at home.
A few players performed like they cared. Most struggled.
Here's the good, the bad and the ugly from the worst defeat the Bears suffered since Week 3 at Kansas City in 2023, when they were beaten 41-10 by Matt Nagy's team and the world saw Taylor Swift in the Chiefs luxury suites and later with Travis Kelce for the first time.
Six punts and a 52.7-yard average with two more adding to his Chicago rookie record for punts inside the 20-yard line said Caleb Williams was wrong. After all he was the one who joked with the Aussie on draft day that they wouldn't need him much.
The toe-tapping catch in the corner of the end zone for his first touchdown was enough to put him in the winner's column but he added another TD with an excellent route to stay away from Fred Warner, but was targeted just five times for four catches and 42 yards but had a team-long catch of 17 yards, which isn't exactly going to pad anyone's yards per catch or a QB's yards per attempt.
He dropped a two-point conversion that could have left the Bears within two touchdowns and two two-point conversions. The worst part about it was one of their chief weapons didn't get targeted another time in the game.
While his passer rating of 116.9 and two TD passes say he played well, the real truth was in his yardage and the sacks he took. He had 27 passing yards at halftime with a long of 7 yards as they fell behind 24-0, and at game's end he had been sacked seven times while throwing for only 134 yards.
All the pregame hype about the Bears getting a big boost from a coaching change proved a bunch of baloney. Brown can't really be blamed for this but he did hype it himself a bit during the week with the talk about how he wanted them playing violently and how he likes a physical style. They absorbed more punishment than they gave out. Walk softly and carry a big stick is the best policy. The Bears played far more physical and efficiently on defense when Matt Eberflus was coach. He had them rallying to the ball so they could stay in games against the Lions.
He doesn't get many sacks for someone with the biggest contract on the team, so when he has the QB dead to rights and his hands and body on one he needs to drag him down. Sweat looked ready to smash Brock Purdy into the turf but somehow Purdy bucked him off like a bronco in a rodeo. This happened before the game had been decided, so it mattered.
It would be easy to single out Braxton Jones for this but he wasn't alone. Coleman Shelton was giving out free passes, as well. Caleb Williams held the ball too long at times but with pass blocking like he had, anything longer than 1.5 seconds was too long.
Including linebackers Tremaine Edmunds and Jack Sanborn, the Bears played pass defense iike they had changed schemes when Eberflus went out the door. How in the world does tight end George Kittle get so wide open on six catches for 156 yards like he did when everyone who has seen the 49ers play know he is the main target?
The Bears wanted to be aggressive and make a statement in Brown's debut. They blitzed plenty, which is not something the Matt Eberflus defenses did often. And after the first few times the 49ers hit them with a variety of screens another routes or running plays designed to discourage such tactics. The secondary looked vulnerable all game and Purdy had a 145.4 passer rating.
All of the players who ran their mouths all week about how they needed the coaching change and about the rot going on within the team under Eberflus, as well as the postgame explosion by Jaylon Johnson ultimately made everyone look rather silly when they come out and play the way they did in on Sunday.