Horrible

That's a game where you want to hit the reset button. Just failures in nearly every aspect of the game. If your looking for positive takeaways, Lance Briggs seemed to play decent, special teams while not doing anything special, did not do anything horrible, and Earl Bennett had a couple nice catches. This game was hard to watch, harder to digest. Let's just move on to Week 8. Here's a little humor to get past this one. http://www.chicagonow.com/blogs/jay-cutler-superstar/2009/10/chicago-bears-as-simpsons-characters.html

Is that who we thought they were? and we let them off the hook?

The quote obviously refers to Dennis Green's famous rant after the Devin Hester induced miracle win in Arizona a few seasons ago. Is this who the Bears are, a team that can stay with the good teams, but cannot shake off mediocrity? and didn't we just let Atlanta off the hook? We can compete against the good teams, GB, Pit, Atl, but can we win consistently? Last night, was the first game all three phases shot themselves in the foot at some point. And even with all those mistakes we still had an opportunity to tie at the end. Are we a team that is mediocre and cannot take advantage of opportunities or are we a team that will punish teams like Atlanta that give us chances.

The whole night was summed up by Zach Bowman's interception. Yes, he intercepted it! Can we take advantage? No don't fumble! Did we recover? We lost 15 yards but at least we still have the ball. Wait, wouldn't that have been the same as a punt? Overall a frustrating game to watch.

• On Cutler. Cutler started out shaky with 2 interceptions, but finished strong with a line of 27 of 43 for 300 yards, 2 TDs and 2 Ints. We was more than willing to take a shot both with the ball and after he released the ball. He even tucked and ran for 30 yds, evading one defender in the process. I think he should probably do that more often.
• On receivers. Again, I think we have to say the best offensive phase of the game was the receivers. How many amazing catches did Clark, Devin, and Olsen make? I saw a few dropped passes, but nothing like what Michael Jenkins did and we've seen that before.
• On pressure. Way too much pressure on Cutler with a 4 man rush. I guess thats what happens when your QB is your top rusher with 34 yards.
• On the goalline. Why couldn't we just sneak it in on the 1? Why did we do play action followed by two fumbles to Forte. Instead of jumping around, pitching or using play action just trust Olin Kreutz and push ahead.
• On edge. Maybe this is just my feelings during the game, but I felt like I wasn't hoping for a fantastic play from the Bears, I was hoping they just wouldn't screw up. How many times did we let the ball slip through our hands? I just felt that after a while they were just hoping to make the catch and not fumble.
• On paper. the Bears won the game Total Yards 373 to 253. Rushing Yards 83 to 68. Passing Yards 290 to 185. Time of possession 33:54 to 26:06. First downs 21 to 16.

Random thoughts arounds the league.

• Vikings. Please someone beat the Vikings. 6-0? Just make the field goal.
• Patriots. Running up the score?
• Buf v. NYJ What an ugly, exciting game.
• Oak v. Phi What happened? The upset no one saw or cares about.
• KC v. Was, Stl v. Jac Are these games necessary?

Today's headline

I'll probably be late on today's post so I'll offer up today's headline for a major newspaper:

OBAMA WINS NOBEL PEACE PRIZE, NASA BOMBS THE MOON

Special Bears Team

So I'm late this week with this week's review, sorry. So the question is can special teams win a game? Probably not by itself, although in the passed with an anemic offense we just might have. But Sunday's game was a special game for special teams. There's a nice article in the Sun-Times today about Dave Toub. If you look at the box score, we were out gained 398-276, we lost time of possession 36:30 to 23:30, and we were out thrown 308-125. But if your starting field position is the Lions 46 and Lions is their own 18, well you don't need much offense. With the 1st Quarter done the Bears stand 3-1 with me hoping this team eventually find two good halves in a row.

• Again. 21-21 at halftime. Not exactly as planned. The offense and the defense seemed to alternately struggle throughout the 1st half. But the Bears once again weathered the storm and came out strong in the 2nd half. It was nice to know the outcome of the game before the closing minutes.
  
• Punt Return. Devin Hester returned 1 for 24 yards and Earl Bennett filled in nicely to return 4 for 63 yards for an average of 15.8. But Bennett benefited from some extra practice this week. From the Herald, In Bennett's case, it makes one wonder whether Toub sensed Hester would get hurt Sunday. Toub had Bennett do some return work in practice this week. The Lions had a hard time getting the return man down.
• Kick Return. Speaking of return men how bout Johnny Knox's 102 yard return TD. It seemed like that return took the wind out of the Lions sails. While the Bears are good enough to survive a sucker punch and a uneven half the Lions can't, although the showed promise. Anyway I guess the return was a counter, "It was a counter," Knox said. "Set up one way and bounce the other. Coach (Dave) Toub said this was going to be a good return for us coming in from halftime." Also, he did drop the ball before the endzone according to reviews.
• Punts. I'm often most impressed by the most easily overlooked aspect of the game and this week it was definitely Brad Maynard. Maynard, who does most of his work as people are headed to the bathroom or kitchen, hit 4 punts inside the 20 including one on 2 yard line and one on the 6 yard line. I can't even do that in Madden.
• Kicker. Well of course we have to talk about the kicker. Robbie hit 2 FGs including his career long of 52. He finally got that 50 yard barrier monkey off his back.
• Lance Briggs. Another Pro Bowl quality game for Lance with 9 tackles.
• Forte. Finally a running game, but without those 2 long runs, 10 carries for 23 yards? I know you can't "leave those out", but it would be nice to see runs of 5-9 yards more regularly.
• Cutler's hits. Officially the Lions had 2 sacks, but it seemed like Cutler got knocked around, mostly due to his own doing. His first spectacular TD as evidence. Also, Cutler seemed to be okay getting whacked while he was waiting a for a receiver to get open. Just something I'm a bit concerned about.
  
• Progress. 21-21 at halftime, a disappointment. A last minute win, a very question laced bye week. A blowout 48-24, progress.

Around the League

• Saints crash Jets flight. Well it had to happen eventually. I guess I'm just surprised it was against the Saints and without any passing TDs (Thanks Drew Brees). But maybe the Saints are for real (Wins over Det, Phi, Buf previously)
• Will someone please stop the Vikings? Will someone please stop the Vikings? Not this week with a trip to St. Louis.
• Titans? Not even going to talk about them this week. Jacksonville? Really?
  

Friday Reviews

This summer I've managed to catch a lot of shows that I normally don't watch so I thought I'd post about TV shows. Here's a list of shows I'm watching...

• Shows in regular rotation: Daily Show, Colbert Report, PTI/Around the Horn/Sportscenter (why did they move to LA?), Chicago Tribune Live, The Soup
• Shows this past summer: Weeds, Warehouse 13, Psych, Eureka, Royal Pains
• Shows to watch: Breaking Bad, Californication, US of Tara, 30 Rock, The Simpsons
• Shows that are intruging: Community, Caprica, Stargate Universe, The Next Iron Chef
• Shows I should be watching: Mad Men, The National Parks: America's Best Idea, Dexter

I'll try to review these shows in the upcoming weeks.