The Eagles sent the Soldier Field crowd home early with a 29-14 win over the Chicago Bears, and have outscored opponents by 58-24 to start the season. Well, it wasn’t the encore performance they were looking for.
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A few series later, Wentz engineered an eight-play, 68-yard drive for the visitors’ first touchdown of the night, Ryan Mathews backing out of a plugged hole and slithering into open space to his right, with the Bears’ Willie Young desperately clawing at the air where Mathews had been. He finished the game with five catches for 49 yards and a touchdown. He didn’t go out of bounds quickly enough on a short run in the second quarter and was flattened by Chicago’s Danny Trevathan.
Two Jay Cutler turnovers, an injury to Cutler’s throwing hand, a Jeremy Langford lost fumble and four injured starters on defense led to the worst half of football for the Bears in the John Fox era.
Beating the Cleveland Browns without any major blemishes was one thing, but handily beating the Bears on the road on national television was another.
Outside linebacker Pernell McPhee wasn’t happy after Cutler threw a head-scratching second-half interception, a play that ultimately led to an Eagles’ touchdown and all but ended the game.
According to Cutler, he aggravated the injury on Monday when he was sacked by Eagles defensive lineman Destiny Vaeao. Hoyer completed 9 of 12 passes for 78 yards. Although Caleb Strugis missed the extra point, the 21-second sequence changed the game. A year ago he had five (one interception, one forced fumble, three fumble recoveries.) In Week 1, he tipped a Robert Griffin III pass which was intercepted by Rodney McLeod.
Running the two-minute drill to close the first half, Wentz displayed touch and a rocket launcher on consecutive plays, both for first downs, before dropping a would-be touchdown in the bucket down the left sideline to Jordan Matthews. The Eagles drove all the way to the 2-yard line, and Pederson kept his offense on the field on a fourth down. With Kevin White and Eddie Royal back healthy after missing much of last season, Jeffery doesn’t appear to have a dominant market share on the targets in Chicago. But the Eagles believe in what they’re building and it’s shown in two games, and two wins that have kicked off the Pederson Era the right way.
In the first half, the Eagles needed to settle for field goals instead of touchdowns.
But it doesn’t matter if the quarterback can’t get the ball to them. The Bears have rushed for more yards than only six teams and have an offensive line that seems incapable of protecting the quarterback or creating running lanes. He did throw a attractive dime to wide receiver Jordan Matthews right before the end of the half, though Matthews dropped it.
With Cutler throwing off his back foot on the next play from scrimmage Bradham intercepted a pass apparently intended for Alshon Jeffery, who was about 10 yards behind him, at the 30 and returned it to the 2.
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Sturgis brought the Eagles within 7-6 with a 29-yarder at the end of an 11-play, 77-yard drive.
