Ugly Bears Victory Does Little Beyond End Losing Streak
Published by Gene Chamberlain on December 6, 2009
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Chicago Bears
CHICAGO — To find truth in the Chicago Bears‘ locker room, one must go to defensive players, and particularly, the defensive ends.
Alex Brown has the right team-oriented attitude, but usually will not look through the same rose-colored or Lovie-tinted glasses that everyone else does. He didn’t Sunday.
“We can’t play the way we played today and expect to beat a Minnesota. But it is good to get a win,” Brown said. “It’s great to get a win. I can’t express how good it feels just to win.
“We’ve lost so much this year.”
Obviously winning is more fun, and the Bears hadn’t done it in a month until they registered an uninspiring 17-9 victory at Soldier Field over the moribund St. Louis Rams.
But Brown shed the proper light on the win with his first sentence. You can’t beat Minnesota with a game like that.
In fact, you can’t beat a lot of teams like that.
When they beat the Cleveland Browns at home on Nov. 1—in a manner nearly as unimpressive—the Bears acted indignant over negative media and fan reaction.
That was a game in which their offense collected red zone possessions like Bernie Madoff collected retirement accounts, but then treated the goal line like a force field.
So hearing one player acknowledge a win by a touchdown and two-point conversion, over Steven Jackson and a bunch of department store dummies wearing millennium blue and new century gold, was unimpressive seemed a step in the right direction.
Because nothing could be truer than to point out that even in victory Sunday, the Bears found plenty of ways to remind everyone of their inadequacies.
For one, the offense, which only managed only two second-half yards against Minnesota the previous week, put up 131 passing yards in the first quarter. And, oh by the way, they threw for 12 more yards over the next three quarters.
“I dinged my hand a little bit the first half,” said quarterback Jay Cutler, who wouldn’t explain what exactly “dinged” meant. “Part of (the passing failure) was with the way our defense was playing we didn’t feel like we had to make some big plays or throw the ball down the field.”
Apparently this Bears offense is so good it can pick and choose when to score.
Another problem the Bears had was the running game—again. Eventually they got Matt Forte heading toward 91 yards, his longest effort since they beat Detroit on Oct. 4.
Their 120 team rushing yards doesn’t sound bad until you realize six straight opponents had run for more yards against the Rams’ defense.
“My performance today was decent,” Forte said. “There are a lot of things I can do better. The first drive I gave the ball up. As a running back you can’t ever do that.
“I think there were a few runs where maybe if I make somebody miss, I could have some more yards.”
Wasn’t that exactly what Brian Urlacher said which irritated Forte last week?
Smith was his usual vague self when asked about the success the defense had with Kevin Payne playing strong safety, Al Afalava moving from strong to free safety, and Danieal Manning moving from free safety to nickel back.
“We’ll go back and evaluate it,” Smith said. “We thought it would be this type of football game (with the Rams running a lot).
“Kevin down at the strong position and putting Al back, that combination gave us our best chance to be successful today.”
It was Payne who gave up the game-winning TD pass to Green Bay in the season-opener, and he was immediately banished to the bench.
The problem is, Payne actually looked better defending the pass Sunday than most Bears defensive players. He knocked down two passes, including a touchdown-saving diving deflection in the fourth quarter.
Perhaps it’s a case of the coaching staff misidentifying the talent they had, and Payne can actually play better than he initially got credit for—like that’s never happened (Cedric Benson, Justin Gage, Chris Harris, John Gilmore, etc.).
The Bears’ special teams looked surprisingly poor with three returns for minus-three yards and a couple muffs by Earl Bennett and Johnny Knox, who had to replace Devin Hester due to an injured calf muscle.
The Bears even had a trick special teams play explode in their faces when tight end Greg Olsen got caught from behind on a shovel pass out of field goal formation.
“At the time I thought our defense was playing pretty good, so if we didn’t get anything we at least had them down at their end of the field,” Smith offered.
Those three points the Bears passed on in favor of a failed gamble would have made for an awfully easy feeling by the late fourth quarter. Instead, the Bears had to get a Hunter Hillenmeyer interception and a fourth-down incompletion on St. Louis’ final two drives to reach the end of their four-game losing streak.
“It’s been a while since we talked about our win, but the guys did what they needed to do,” Smith said.
The Bears did what they needed to do to get a win over a team staggering around in a three-year slump, but not what they needed to do to instill any confidence that something good might come out of their home field rematch with Green Bay next Sunday.
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