When it’s all said and done, Chicago Bears fans will be glad to forget the 2010s decade. It was one of the most miserable in franchise history. Just two playoff trips and three winning season. Both postseason runs punctuated by absolutely brutal endings. Losing to the Packers in the NFC championship and of course the Double Doink against Philadelphia. The rest of the was a whole lot of ugly.
So here’s a fun question. If you had to think up a single play that best puts the entire 10-year span in a nutshell, what would it be? Brad Gagnon of Bleacher Report found it and unsurprisingly the moment found its way onto a list of the 10 worst plays of the 2010s. Now it wasn’t going to beat out all-time classics like the Butt Fumble or that baffling Colts fake punt formation against New England. Still, the Bears had their spot.
What was the play? None other than Marcus Cooper’s unforgettable blocked field goal return in 2017 that should’ve been a touchdown but he ended up fumbling at the one-yard line instead.
“The cornerback slowed down at around the 10-yard line and strangely decided to essentially walk it in, but he was tracked down by a hustling Vance McDonald, who forced a fumble on the one-yard line. The ball went through the end zone, but an illegal bat on Pittsburgh at least gave the Bears a chance to salvage three points with a field goal on an untimed down.
“That was just a mistake on my part,” Cooper said following the game. “I thought I was in [the end zone] but obviously I wasn’t.”
When the Bears managed to win in overtime, Cooper’s sigh of relief could reportedly be heard in Naperville.”
Chicago Bears winning that game saved Cooper from all-time status
Cooper should really count his lucky stars to this day that the game itself was early in the regular season and not the playoffs. The Bears did hold on to win 23-17 but that sequence was a reminder of just how undisciplined the team was. To slow down and casually strut towards the end zone was the height of disrespect and Cooper paid the price. Want to know how much that play affected his career?
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Through the first three games of the 2017 season, he logged 170 snaps on defense. After that game, he was practically relegated to the bench. In the final 14 games he played as a Bear, he saw just 79 snaps total. There is no way that is a coincidence. Odds are the coaching staff was livid with him after that play, almost costing them what should’ve been a momentum-building win. So as punishment they planted him on the sideline.
Cooper was out of the league by 2019. It happened that fast.
