His Bears had enough trouble trying to stop the Houston Texans on third downs, the tipping-point down and which the Texans converted 12 of the 20 times they reached that point. But John Fox would ask for a second opinion on one of those conversions, if he had it to do all over again.
Houston quarterback Brock Osweiler sneaked for what officials ruled was a first down on a third-and-one from the Chicago 22 on the second play of the fourth quarter with the Bears clinging to a one point lead at 14-13. Osweiler appeared to come up short, but the chains moved, and three plays later Osweiler completed an 18-yard throw to wide receiver Will Fuller and the Bears never led again in a 24-13 loss.
Had the challenge been successful, the Texans might’ve settled for the short field-goal attempt (which would have lessened the final margin of victory Or they might’ve gone for the conversion on fourth down.
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Fox was questioned on the non-challenge and said after the game that challenges on spots of the football rarely result in reversals. But on Tuesday, looking back with the benefit of more replays and hindsight, Fox conceded, “Yeah, I think at the time if I had the ability to see what people get to see at home, with yellow lines and blue lines and all the things ... I think that ... we might have won it.
“Hindsight I wish I would have challenged it. My experience has been especially after a measurement — it wasn’t one of those bang-bang plays where all of the sudden the other team’s in hurry-up — you have time to look at it, have people see it upstairs and all that. We had all day. They measured it. Even at the measurement, it was by a hair.
“So whenever there’s a scrum like that in a quarterback sneak, my experience has not been good as far as the spot specifically. If they ruled it a first down, if there’s not irrefutable evidence, it doesn’t change.”