CHICAGO — You don't try to figure out these Chicago Bears. You certainly don't try to get inside their heads and poke around, lest you get stuck there and start talking in the third person about bandwagon-jumping or a lack of respect.On paper, the Bears weren't supposed to be able to stay with the Eagles on Sunday night, and they weren't supposed to be a whole lot better on an actual field.

So, no, you don't dare try to understand how they played so well at times against Philadelphia or how a team can be so up and down from week to week, let alone moment to moment. Try, and you're liable to get motion sickness.

Bears, 24-20. Take it and keep walking, folks.

You can look at Sunday night's performance as incriminating—why didn't the Bears dig this deep in those two earlier losses? — but we're forward-looking people, aren't we? A 2-2 record, a new world beckons and, well, you never know. You Never Know—how's that for a Bears slogan?

As long as Kyle Orton does a fairly realistic imitation of a healthy Tom Brady—OK, of an average Jake Delhomme, then—anything would seem possible from now on.

Anything would seem possible as long as the Bears make big plays like the one defensive end Alex Brown made late in the game on Philadelphia's Correll Buckhalter on fourth-and-goal from the Chicago 1-yard line.

"Six inches," Brown corrected.

To have a chance, the Bears needed a good performance from Mr. Orton. Would three touchdown passes in the first half qualify? No, that's not a trick question. It actually happened.

So did a brutal interception in the end zone early in the second half, but nobody's perfect, especially a Bears quarterback.

"Kyle was good; we won," said receiver Rashied Davis, winning being everything and the only thing for a quarterback.

All night Kyle saw a hurricane of Eagles rushers. When he had time to throw, he was good. When he didn't, he was puree. The only question was whether his transportation after the game would be sedan or ambulance.

As expected, the Eagles concentrated on Bears running back Matt Forte and dared Orton to beat them through the air. A three-step drop is the obvious answer to a feral rush, but it doesn't necessarily mean instant success.

The Bears' very first offensive play was telling. With only two wide receivers on the field, the Bears showed run, but Orton instead fired a pass to Davis over the middle for a 34-yard gain. And then Orton, operating without a huddle, dropped a beautiful pass onto the fingertips of tight end Greg Olsen for a 19-yard score.

One nice series. It could happen to anyone. But the Bears didn't stop there. Taking advantage of a muffed punt by the Eagles' DeSean Jackson, Orton hit Marty Booker with a 23-yard touchdown pass.

Offensive coordinator Ron Turner was starting to think that the townsmen with the torches and pitchforks who normally knock on his door at night would pass by this time.

And imagine general manager Jerry Angelo's state of mind when Devin Hester reeled in a 20-yard touchdown pass — pay no attention to his push-off on an Eagles defender — just like a real receiver.

A quarterback, receivers who catch the ball and plays that work. The Bears seemed to be on to something. There were good vibes as they made their way to the locker room with a 21-14 halftime lead.

But the Bears and second-half leads aren't what would be called "friends." In the losses to Carolina and Tampa Bay they blew leads of 14 and 10 points. So when Orton lost a fumble in the third quarter, there was every reason to think the end of the world was just around the corner. But it resulted in a field goal; the end would have to wait.

And when a bad exchange between Orton and Kevin Jones led to a fumble that Philadelphia recovered near the end of the third quarter, you could hear the ominous sound of fans at Soldier Field saying, "Uh-oh."

The Bears had no first downs in the third quarter. But it mattered not, or at least it mattered not at the end of the game.

The question is whether the Bears can build on this victory.

When Orton was allowed to imitate a quarterback, when he wasn't busy getting run over or coughing up the football, he looked good. Those are some pretty hefty qualifiers, but when you've watched poor quarterback play for as long as Chicago has, you take what you get, even if it's a hint of something.

"We didn't play perfect, and we were still able to overcome mistakes and beat a good team," Olsen said.

Was this the start of something? You'll get a headache if you try to figure it out.