SANTA CLARA, Calif. – Let’s just get this out of the way. Let’s take a look at how the Chicago Bears responded to the San Francisco 49ers’ 38-13 win on Sunday.

“We kicked ourselves in the butt,” interim coach Thomas Brown said. “There’s no other way to say it. So I’m just going to be direct, honest and open about the things that happened.”

So much for a potentially energetic effort by the Bears in their first game since Brown replaced fired head coach Matt Eberflus.

What about that terrible first half in which the Bears were outrebounded by – wait for it – 319-4 yards?

We repeat: 319-4!

“They just got big chunks,” linebacker TJ Edwards said. “It’s hard to stop against such an explosive team.”

How in the world are these Bears, as ragged, exhausted and despondent as they are, going to regroup and refocus to play not just one, not two, not three, but four more games before this season is theirs comes to a merciful end?

“No one is going to save us,” Montez Sweat said. “We are grown men. We just have to address it next week and get back to work.”

Tremaine Edmunds added: “This is a business. We have no other choice. We have to put in the work, get better and find a way to win.”

Gross. All that.

The last-placed Bears are completely out of sorts.

What a disaster.

On the bright side, the Bears didn’t have to deal with the agony of a playoff loss for the first time in four weeks. So that’s it, right?

But they also received a sobering reminder of how broken they appear to be, as an injury-depleted 49ers team, which entered Sunday’s game with a three-game losing streak, pressured them at every stage from the start.

In a very one-sided first half, the 49ers had a 14-1 advantage on first downs and built a 24-point lead.

Quarterback Brock Purdy had completions of 23, 33, 20, 32, 27, 23 and 32 yards in the first half and had 258 passing yards before halftime.

The bears? Their longest play of the first half went 7 yards – a dart from Caleb Williams to DJ Moore over the middle. But two incompletions, a 7-yard sack and a punt immediately followed. Because of course it was.

The Bears’ first-half drive charts: Punt, punt, punt, punt, punt. The last four of those possessions ended in third-down sacks.

Once again, the Bears were behind and chasing.

“It’s not something you want to do,” Williams said. “When you are behind in games you have to come back and that is a bigger task. And you don’t want to have to deal with that in every game.”

But the Bears have done that in almost every game this season. Their opponents have scored first 12 times in 13 games. The Bears trailed by nine at halftime.

And during this current seven-game loss? Well, the Bears played 427 minutes and 50 seconds of football, but only led 1:06 in the first half and 9:57 total.

Slow starts have become a calling card. But why exactly?

“That’s a great question,” Brown said Sunday. “If I had the answer, I would have fixed it already. It’s about understanding how to fit into a game, stay on the turf, convert on third downs and keep some drives going. That will be a focus for us in the future.”

Unfortunately, there may not be a parachute for this free fall as the failure increases with each passing week.

What if the Bears never get the fifth win that Tyrique Stevenson celebrated eight weeks ago?

What happens if this current seven-game slide reaches 11?

What then? Shouldn’t Bears President and CEO Kevin Warren deepen his assessments as he oversees the big restart in 2025? Shouldn’t Warren take a detailed look at how a season that was once so promising and optimistic turned out? The terribly wrong?

Just two years ago, the Bears received unwavering forgiveness as they stumbled through a 10-game losing streak at the end of their season. Many thought this was the best. The Bears’ roster was in the midst of unraveling in the first year of the Ryan Poles era. And through losses and losses and losses and losses, the Bears failed to make it to the No. 1 overall draft pick. All this ineptitude was seen in Chicago as a convenient path to a better future.

But what about now? What if these Bears, who began this season with playoff aspirations and entered the bye week at 4-2, somehow managed to break the record for worst single-season loss in franchise history? What then? Could Poles become the next Halas Hall leader called to the front of the room for a pass/fail evaluation?

You can’t rule that out. It shouldn’t be ruled out.

Honestly, it’s hard to believe this group still has four games left. And after Sunday’s loss, it’s difficult to be confident that the Bears will be even remotely competitive in the final month of the season, especially when they play four likely playoff teams.