(Photo: Bob Kupbens, USA TODAY Sports)
LAKE FOREST, Ill., — Chicago Bears tight end Cole Kmet has seen a lot of losing both as a player and as a fan. Growing up in Lake Barrington, Kmet has been a lifelong Bears fan, enduring some tough seasons. And since he was drafted in 2020, he's yet to be on a winning team and has faced some tough losses.
That includes this season where the Bears have lost nine straight games after a 4-2 start. In his five seasons with the Bears have lost five or more games in a row in four of them, including 10 straight back in 2022, a year in which they were tanking for a draft pick. But eventually, all the losing takes a toll on you as Kmet points out.
"Shoot, I mean for me, it's been a lot, man. This isn't easy. For sure, for me a lot of individual mental battles you go through in your head. I feel like I've definitely been through a lot here. I've been through my fair share of losing streaks. This is definitely not easy. This has definitely been a mental battle, trying to grind through this from a mental standpoint."
You can see where Kmet is coming from.
Losing this much and having losing streaks is never easy. It takes a toll as the playoffs are out of reach again for the Bears this season. But for Kmet, it's not an excuse. He has a job to do and work on himself to get better.
"And in terms of everything just from my standpoint that I've been through and trying to deal with this, I know there are areas that I look at myself where I've got to be better and I've got to do a better job and I've got to do more on the field. It's just tough to be in this spot right now," Kmet said. "I feel I've been in this before. It's just tough to see things going down the way that they have been. But look, this is the situation that we're in and that I'm in."
On top of it all, Kmet will face another coaching change this offseason. The next hire will be the third head coach that Kmet has played under for the Bears. He's also watched numerous head coaches come here and fail to find success aside from Lovie Smith.
As the Kmet family watches their son go through this, his father offered some words of encouragement to get through this tough season.
"I thought I had a good talk with my dad the other day about perspectives moving forward. At this point, he had a great thing that he said to me," Kmet said. "It's like as dark as this might seem in the moment right now, you've got to have perspective as to what you get to do. He was saying he'd given anything to go back and just to play one more game, to be in the shape that I'm in right now and to go out and play football. I think that's kind of the perspective that I want to have going forward for these last four and just enjoy being out there with the guys, put some really good stuff out on tape and just enjoy each other's company while we go do it. That's kind of where we're at at this point."
Although it's been an up-and-down year for Kmet, he has the right mindset for the rest of the season. And the hope is that the franchise finally finds a solution this offseason to solve a lot of problems which would benefit a lot of people inside Halas Hall including Kmet.