NFL Playoff Predictions: Why the Chicago Bears Will Miss out on the Postseason
Published by Soven Bery on December 22, 2012
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Chicago Bears
Right now, the Chicago Bears are sitting at 8-6 and are the odd team out in the NFC Wild Card race. Sadly, for the Windy City faithful it will stay that way.
To finish off the season, the Bears will take a road trip and do everything they can to secure a place in the playoffs. They will beat Arizona handily and then stop the Lions in Detroit.
It won’t be enough.
Chicago could hang 100 points on the Cards and it still wouldn’t be enough. That would be exceptionally cool and I would propose handing Chi-town a postseason berth just for that, though.
But the fact of the matter is that if the Giants win out, which I am projecting they do, then Jay Cutler and company will be watching January football from home.
The Bears and Big Blue would have identical records at the end of the season but New York wins the tiebreaker based on best win percentage in conference games.
But if the Giants stumble in their last two games and Chicago wins out, then the Windy City will be postseason bound with the last NFC Wild Card slot.
I just don’t predict that happening but this is the NFL and anything is possible.
But, there is still faith for Lovie Smith and his squad.
The race for the last NFC wild-card spot is a tough and confusing one but the Bears have to win out and need the Vikings and Giants to each lose at least one of their two remaining games.
Minnesota losing out seems probable and that is what I predict happening. Adrian Peterson takes his team into the heart of Texas with a matchup versus J.J Watt and Houston. The Texans have a smash mouth defense and a balanced offensive attack, resulting in too much for the Vikes to handle.
Even if they somehow get past one of the best teams in the AFC then they face one of the best teams in the NFC.
In the last week of the season, Christian Ponder welcomes division rivals the Green Bay Packers to the Twin Cities. Aaron Rodgers will initiate a beat-down.
The chance the mediocre Vikings beat two prime Super Bowl candidates in back-to-back weeks is unlikely.
But the Giants will not lose to the Ravens.
Granted, both Baltimore and New York haven’t been looking good as of late but Joe Flacco has his team on a three-game losing streak.
That won’t end this weekend.
Eli Manning has been known to step up in the clutch and he will have a huge game to ensure the Giants make the playoffs.
The younger Manning will pick apart a suspect secondary in Baltimore and leave an injured defense even weaker.
I have faith that Cutler and Marshall will be able to get by Arizona and Detriot.
That’s the easy part.
The hard part is watching and waiting on what everyone else is doing and that is what Chicago will be relegated to.
There is a solid chance that the Bears are scoring touchdowns in January but there is also a chance that those touchdowns are being scored on a Madden video game in a Chicago apartment.
Sadly, for the Bears faithful, I’m predicting the latter.
Hopefully I’m wrong.
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