Seahawks most to blame after getting smacked by Bears on Monday Night Football

The Seattle Seahawks had another middling performance in Week 8. Seattle got smacked around by Chicago in a 34-17 blowout loss in front of the 12s at Lumen Field. The Seahawks and their vaunted "Dark Side" defense were no match for Ben Johnson and the Bears. Chicago rolled to an easy victory while Seattle was left with several burning questions.

The Seahawks are now 4-4 on the season and still alive in the NFC West division race. However, Seattle cannot afford to loss any more divisional matchups, especially against LA and San Francisco. Unless something drastically changes, there's little chance that three teams from the division will all make the NFC playoffs this winter. That puts the Seahawks under a ton of pressure to diagnose their issues and to fix them ASAP.

So what exactly went wrong for Seattle in this one? And should Seahawks fans start being worried about the team's chances of getting to the playoffs?

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These are the Seahawks most to blame for their ugly loss to the Bears on Monday Night Football.

Sam Darnold looked terrible against Chicago's defense after Jeffery Simmons addition

This version of Sam Darnold is not the same one who won a Super Bowl last season.

Darnold played poorly on Monday night, completing only 50% of his passes against a decent Chicago defense. He finished 17-of-34 for 188 passing yards with two touchdowns and an interception. Darnold was also sacked three times.

The only thing going right for Seattle's passing attack was targeting Jaxon Smith-Njigba. Seattle's superstar receiver led the team with 11 targets and turned them into six receptions for 118 yards and a touchdown. Nobody aside from JSN made a big impact on offense, be it running backs or wide receivers.

At this point, Darnold looks like an average quarterback at best over a large sample size. Kudos to him for getting hot last season and taking Seattle to the Super Bowl. But now the decision to roll with Darnold again looks pretty risky, especially with his supporting cast not being as good.

Seattle was without wide receiver Rashid Shaheed in this one. Adding just one more weapon on offense and special teams could have helped the Seahawks a lot in this game.

While Shaheed's absence needs to be factored in, it shouldn't take away from how poorly Darnold played overall.

Zach Charbonnet, Jadarian Price returns didn't fix the running game

Seattle finally got see their complete backfield in action against Chicago. The early returns are not very good.

The Seahawks gave the rookie Price lead back duties while sprinkling in Charbonnet in his return from injury. Neither running back found much running room throughout the entire game.

Price and Charbonnet combined for 16 carries for 52 rushing yards. The Bears had an easy time of slowing down the rushing attack, which put even more pressure on Darnold to drive the entire offense. This played right in Chicago's hand as they unleashed Jeffery Simmons in his debut game.

The silver lining is that newcomer Quenton Nelson looked pretty solid in his Seattle debut. Perhaps the run game will improve once Nelson gets settled in and Charbonnet gains a larger role in the backfield.

But will the Seahawks be able to survive long enough for their woeful rushing attack to get back on track?

Seattle couldn't count on their special teams unit either

Seattle's defense will not be mentioned here despite giving up 34 points to Chicago. That seems fair when looking at how poorly the offense played, paired with all of the Seahawks' special teams gaffes. The defense was essentially the only unit that played adequately in Week 8.

The Seahawks made multiple errors on special teams that kept the game from swinging in their favor.

Arguably the worst mistake came by safety Rodney Thomas. Nehemiah Pritchett did a fantastic job of downing a punt inside the five-yard line. Instead of leaving the ball alone, Thomas slid in and carried the ball with himself into the end zone. Chicago would have been pinned deep, likely starting at their own two-yard line. But Thomas' boneheaded mistake set the Bears up at their own 20-yard line instead, completely bailing them out.

Seattle also straight up left points on the field.

Kicker Jason Myers shanked an extra point attempt and had a short field goal blocked. Those two gaffes took four points directly off the board.

These missed opportunities did not determine the outcome of the game by themself. However, they contributed to the losing effort and showed just how unprepared the Seahawks were for primetime.

Ultimately, head coach Mike Macdonald deserves some blame too for not having his team ready to compete. One of Seattle's secret ingredients last season was the team's preparation and attention to detail. Without those edges, the Seahawks just don't look like the same team that won a Super Bowl last season.

Hopefully Seattle can turn things around after falling to 4-4 on the season.