Before the Bears faced the Ravens on Sunday, a game which ended up being their fourth loss by 20 or more points, Jerry Angelo held a press conference discussing the state of the team.  All the conference really showed was how Angelo is just as frustrated with how the Bears are playing as the rest of us.  He essentially sidestepped answering the majority of the questions he received, most of which centered on the coaching staff, especially Lovie Smith.  Two things he did answer on that subject were that neither money nor the amount of available high quality head-coaching candidates would factor into the decision regarding Lovie’s job.  Yeah, right.  That may be true to some extent, but Chicago hasn’t exactly been Mr. Moneybags when it comes to spending, whether on coaching or free agents.  Furthermore, it has to be impossible to evaluate Lovie’s job without wondering if one of the several available coaches could do a better job at improving the team than he could.  No offense to Lovie, but that’s just how things are this year.  A lot of Angelo’s answers in the press conference were about evaluating the team and the coaching staff.  He also said those evaluations would be done with Lovie, but he would not confirm that Lovie would be the head coach next year.  While Lovie says he isn’t worried about his job, I would bet that he would feel a lot better if the Bears won on Sunday, or at least played a good game. 

The weird thing about this press conference wasn’t necessarily how Angelo answered the press’ questions; it was how he held the press conference before a game.  He has answered questions before in this way, especially at the end of the year.  It’s always about evaluating the staff and players and discussing those things with his head coach.  However, he never held a press conference-at least during Lovie’s tenure-to say those things.  It seems clear he was trying to send a message to the team, saying:  “You need to play well and finish the season strong or we’re going to have some changes around here.”  Conversely, it was also a message to the rest of the league, especially to the available coaching candidates, saying:  “If our team continues to play poorly, we will be looking to get someone in here who will help them win.”  This is good timing on Angelo if that is the case as there was much talk over the weekend about Mike Shanahan possibly becoming the Redskins coach and Mike Holmgren possibly becoming the football czar of the Browns.  This is also where the money quote comes in well, as it could mean Chicago will be willing to pay the price to get one of the top coaching candidates.  Things do not appear to be in Lovie’s favor, and thus he will most likely need to not only have the Bears be competitive the next two weeks against the Vikings and Lions, but also have them win, particularly due to their loss to the Ravens.       

A lot of things happen this NFL weekend to help the Ravens move closer to securing a playoff berth.  The Jags lost, the Jets lost, the Dolphins lost, the Broncos lost, and the Ravens took the Bears to the wood shed.  The Bengals even lost, which, as improbable as it sounds, keeps the division title within reach for the Ravens.  The Steelers; however, beat the Packers by the skin of their teeth, which keeps their playoff hopes alive and maybe rattles their cage a little for next Sunday’s showdown with the Ravens.  The forthcoming game with the Steelers will no doubt determine the Ravens playoff future.  I’m not overlooking a Raiders team that has played very well for the last month, but the first (and real) hurdle for the Ravens is a December trip to Heinz Field. 

Another scattered cloud on an otherwise sunny weekend for the Ravens was the season ending injury suffered by rookie standout Lardarius Webb.  Webb is thought to have torn his right ACL during a punt return block.  As the injury list grows by the week for the Ravens the area where they can least afford to lose personnel is in the defensive backfield.  Webb has been the Ravens’ primary option opposite Domonique Foxworth ever since Fabien Washington went down for the season with his own ACL tear in the week nine loss to Cincinnati.  With cornerback Samari Rolle done for the foreseeable future the Ravens turn to the rotation of Chris Carr and Frank Walker to replace Webb.  The Ravens also acquired second year DB Marcus Paschal, who appeared in three games for the Eagles last season and played sparingly against the Bears.  I don’t know about you, but those options make me very nervous, especially when I think about the talented Steeler receivers.  I shutter when I imagine Frank Walker matching up against Hines Ward or Mike Wallace in the fourth quarter with the Ravens clinging onto a three point lead. 

Chris McAlister was recently cut by the Saints and could provide some much needed depth for the Ravens, but the odds of Harbaugh welcoming CMac back to Baltimore are slim.  I don’t think that CMac is the answer as a starter, but could definitely help the Ravens in their nickel and dime packages. 

As previously stated, the return of Chris McAlister is unlikely, so the Ravens will need to do a lot of little things better to effectively defend the pass.  They’ll need to mix their coverage and their pre-snap looks in order to cause confusion.  They’ll also need to find a way to consistently pressure the QB.  After recording just two sacks in their previous four games, the Ravens sacked Jay Cutler twice on Sunday and pressured him fairly regularly throughout the game.  The Ravens’ pressured better against the Bears, but their efforts will need to continue to improve against the Steelers. Ben Roethlisberger is so good, because he extends plays and makes plays in the fourth quarter.  If the Ravens can’t pressure Roethlisberger better than they’ve pressure any other QB this season those corners could be in for a long day.  ‘

A couple open-ended, quick fire questions for you:

· Will Webb’s injury hurt the Ravens’ defense or special teams worse?

· With over 850 receptions and nearly 11,000 yards is Derrick Mason a Hall of Famer?

· Could Michael Oher surpass Jared Gaither as the left tackle of the future?

· Will the Ravens beat the Steelers?

This Ravens team has fought through a lot of adversity this season, but they find themselves in a good position…win the next two and you’re in the playoffs.  All you have to do is get into the playoffs and anything can happen. 

~ Pat Cary

Sunday was an all-too-familiar story for Chicago as their mistakes once again led to a win for Green Bay.  This game was too similar to the first game of the season as Chicago once again fell behind quickly, then fought back to lead the game only to later give back the lead and lose.  The Bears basically gave this one away as well with turnovers and penalties, especially in key moments of the game.   With that, here are the pros and cons of the game.

Cons

The penalties in this game really hurt the Bears, especially in the fourth quarter.  Zackary Bowman committed pass interference on Green Bay’s last touchdown drive, giving the Packers the ball at the one-yard line with four chances to score, although they only needed one.  On Green Bay’s next drive, Al Afalava was called for unnecessary roughness, which allowed the Packers to drive into Chicago territory and try for a field goal which, luckily for Chicago, Crosby missed.  Then, Chris Williams was called for face masking two plays later, a penalty which negated a first down and 16-yard gain on a pass to Matt Forte and also kept the Bears on second down, except with 22 yards to go instead of seven.  It put the Bears in a hole they couldn’t get out of on that drive.  Before their next and last drive, Corey Graham committed a holding penalty, putting the Bears at their own nine-yard line, adding to the already daunting task of having to drive down the field and score a touchdown and extra point to tie the game.  Then, on a fourth down with four to go, Olin Kreutz was called for a false start, giving the Bears five more yards they need to get in order to avoid losing the game.  Alas, they failed and the game was in the bag for Green Bay.  All in all, Chicago had 13 penalties for 109 yards.  It might not be so bad if this was a problem that just recently, but it has been going on almost throughout Lovie Smith’s tenure.  They even set a team record in penalties with 124 in Smith’s first year in 2004.  They had 112 in 2006, 111 in 2007, and are on pace for 112 this year.  That’s a problem with discipline, especially when there are four false start penalties and they are playing at home. 

Turnovers also hurt the Bears as Cutler’s two interceptions led to ten points for Green Bay.  Granted, Cutler did have a better passing game in terms of completions and turnovers and he threw one extra touchdown, but he is still having problems facing good pass defenses.  He is also still making some bad throws.  They aren’t necessarily bad decisions.  He just needs to make some better throws, especially when throwing into tight coverage. 

Defensively, the Bears had problems stopping the run again.  They gave up over 100 yards rushing for the eighth straight week.  While it probably helped them to stay in the game as they were focused more on stopping the pass, giving up 146 yards on the ground can cause quite a few problems, especially when 137 are given up to Ryan Grant on only 20 carries, a whopping 6.85 average.  Grant was a big reason the Packers won, especially when his first carry went for 62 yards and a touchdown.  This problem could especially hurt the Bears in upcoming weeks as they face a Ravens team that just ran for over 300 yards against the Lions and have rematch with the Vikings. 

The Bears wasted their timeouts again at the end of the game, this time calling timeout to see if they should challenge a play, then challenging it only to lose another timeout.  If it gets to the point where you are unsure about challenging a play and you want to call a timeout to see if you should do that, just forget about it and run another play.  If the people who have watched the replay a dozen times are unsure, then I’m pretty sure the refs are going to be just as unsure and will uphold the call based on inconclusive evidence. 

Pros

For the most part, the Bears defended the pass well.  They didn’t give up any deep passes although there were several short passes the Packers were able to turn into a long gain.  They kept Donald Driver to just 16 yards on two catches.  They also contained Greg Jennings mostly, allowing three catches for 56 yards.  Jermichael Finley caused the most problems, nabbing five catches for 70 yards.  The only problem with Finley’s numbers is that it shows that Chicago wasn’t covering him that well, which was probably due to trying to stop the deep ball.  However, it also shows that Aaron Rodgers had to get rid of the ball quickly due to the pressure he was facing.  The pass defense also recorded two fumbles, with one helping to end the first half and the other coming at the start of the second half that helped lead to the Bears’ second touchdown. 

Congratulations to Devin Aromashodu on his first career touchdown reception.  Cutler had been mentioning all year, especially in training camp, about how much he liked Aromashodu, and he finally got to include him in the game plan, connecting with him for eight receptions, 76 yards, and the touchdown.  It was a great throw by Cutler, putting the ball where only Aromashodu could get it, and a great catch by Aromashodu. 

With this loss, the Bears are officially eliminated from the playoffs and have no chance at a winning record.  While that is disappointing, it is more unacceptable that they have played so poorly against division rivals, especially the Packers.  One of Lovie Smith’s goals when he first came to the Bears was to beat Green Bay.  While he was able to reach that goal quickly, the Bears have struggled against the Packers the last two years.  It would be good to see the Bears bounce back against Green Bay and start beating them again as it would great if what happened in the 90’s didn’t happen again. 

On Sunday, Chicago will be looking to not only avenge its season-opening loss to Green Bay, but also will look to win back-to-back games for the first time since winning three straight against the Steelers, Seahawks, and Lions after that first defeat.  The Bears will also try to dampen the playoff hopes of their longtime rival.  With that, here are the keys to the game.

1. The Running Game

I know what you’re thinking: why isn’t Jay Cutler the number one key to the game?  While he did throw four interceptions in the season opener (more on that later), he also brought the Bears back to lead the game in the second half, throwing for 277 yards and a touchdown all in all.  On the other hand, Matt Forte and Garrett Wolfe accounted for only 70 yards on the ground.  For the most part, Chicago hasn’t run well at all this year, evident by it being ranked 31st in the league in yards and 25th in yards per attempt.  However, the Bears have shown much improvement in this area recently, especially last week against St. Louis.  The Bears need to improve on their rushing performance against the Rams and keep it rolling against the Packers.  They need to keep running the ball throughout the game and not stray from it.  A big reason their running game has improved is Jason McKie.  He picks up a lot of blocks that help to get Matt Forte and Kahlil Bell at least a couple of extra yards, if not more.  He has turned many of the zero and one-yard gains into gains of at least three or four.  This helps Chicago to be in more second-and-short and third-and-short situations instead of second-and-long or third-and-long.  The Bears will need a successful running game on Sunday to control the clock and get more first downs.  It will also help to open up their passing game if they can run the ball well and get the safeties to come in a little more to help stop it. 

2. Jay Cutler

Cutler needs to do two simple things this game:  control the ball and move the chains.  If he can do these two things, the Bears can win the game.  Even if the Bears running game gets going and creates more single-man coverage, Cutler needs to be careful as Charles Woodson is one of the best corners in the game and Tramon Williams is proving to be a suitable replacement for Al Harris.  Nick Collins is another big pick-off artist in the Green Bay secondary who will be looking to cause a lot of trouble.  Cutler will also need to watch out for rookie Clay Matthews.  Matthews has made an immediate impact on the Packers’ defense, registering seven sacks, one forced fumble, three fumble recoveries, and a touchdown so far this year.  Cullen Jenkins is putting pressure on the quarterback as well, which is pretty impressive for a nose tackle in a 3-4 alignment.  Chicago would be better to try a lot of short passes in this game to help lessen the pressure coming at Cutler and also to reduce the impact of Woodson.  If they run the ball well, they can then use some play-action passes to try to catch the Packers off guard as well. 

3. Defense

Defensively, if the Bears play as well as they did in their first meeting against Green Bay and Cutler controls the ball, Chicago wins the game.  Considering three of Cutler’s interceptions came in the first half of that game, Green Bay should have had it won by halftime.  Instead they only had ten points, all of which came off the turnovers.  While Lance Briggs was limited in practice on Wednesday, the Bears are hopeful he will be able to play Sunday.  If he isn’t able to go, Chicago definitely has a good replacement in Jamar Williams, who recorded 20 tackles in the victory over the Rams.  If Briggs is able to play, the Bears could see a platoon situation at the other outside linebacker spot with Williams and Nick Roach, unless Hillenmeyer is unable to play in which case Roach would most likely start at middle linebacker again, and we all know how that went.  Nevertheless, it all starts up front with the defensive line.  They need to control their gaps and create some pressure on Aaron Rodgers.  While Green Bay’s offensive line started the season poorly, it has been strong as of late, allowing only four sacks in the last three games compared to 41 sacks for the rest of the season.  The Bears should go with a similar gameplan as the one against the Rams as well.  Focus on stopping the pass and keep the run from getting big gains.  The defensive line will be imperative if Chicago plays that way as they will need to create pressure on their own often, but also plug up the running lanes quickly to hold Green Bay to short gains.  This will free up the linebackers to cover and help out the secondary more.

The Bears need to come out firing in this game.  While, yes, they do need to control the ball and defend the pass strongly, they need to score early and put the pressure on Green Bay.  They need to show the NFC North and the NFL that while they may be pretty much out of the playoffs, they are going to finish strong and come back next year with a big chip on their shoulders.  It’s time to start looking like a team that could have made the playoffs rather than a team that is struggling and can’t fix its problems.  The mistakes stop now and the losing stops now.  It’s time to play Bears football. 

While I am glad the Bears beat the Rams on Sunday, I wish they would have played a little bit better.   For the most part, they eliminated a lot of the mistakes that have been plaguing them all year long.  Nonetheless, they still looked like a team that doesn’t quite have everything clicking yet.  They do look like a team that is finally trying to fix its holes, though, and that is a good sign they can still save their season and at least finish with a winning record.  Before I get into that, let’s get into the pros and cons of the game.

Cons

Six fumbles, four of which came on offense, while the other two were muffed returns.  Thankfully the Bears were able to recover five of them, but they need to hold on to the ball better.  Part of why they haven’t won more games is due to their turnovers, and while the main discussion about that has been Cutler’s interceptions, they are also tied for seventh in the league in fumbles and fumbles lost.  While St. Louis recovered only one of Chicago’s fumbles, they could have turned the game in their favor if they were able to pick up one or two more. 

Chicago’s run defense allowed over 100 rushing yards for the seventh straight game.  In that same vein, Steven Jackson continues to show that he is one of the best runners in the game, posting his seventh 100-yard game of the season and reaching over 1200 yards for the second time in his career.  As for the Bears, what has happened to their run defense?  It used to be one of the best in the league.  Now they are having trouble stopping a team whose only success comes from the run.  Whether it’s the line or the linebackers or both, the Bears need to figure out how to stop the run again. 

While it was good that Jay Cutler didn’t throw any interceptions, he didn’t have a good game passing-wise.  Eight-of-17 for 143 yards and a touchdown isn’t going to cut it every time.  While he did ding his hand in the first half, that was also when most of his pass attempts occurred.  Part of the problem is that the receivers are having some problems with drops.  Nevertheless, it would be good to see both Cutler make some better throws and the receivers improve at catching the ball so some of these incomplete passes into completions.

Chicago couldn’t put the game away.  They allowed the Rams to stay in the game the entire time.  If St. Louis could have passed better, they probably would have won this game.  The Bears struggled at converting third downs, which hurt their ability to control the clock and the game.  Also, what was up with the fake field goal?  Take the three points.  The fake didn’t even need to be an option.

Pros

The pass defense played better than it has for most of the season.  Yes, it was going up against Kyle Boller, but other times when the opposing team is running well, it opens up the pass game against the Bears.  It didn’t happen in this case.  Chicago seemed like it was willing to give up some yardage in the running game as long as it could stop the pass.  Hunter Hillenmeyer even intercepted the ball, finally putting the game away for the Bears.  Zackary Bowman also forced a fumble on receiver Brandon Gibson, showing that Charles Tillman isn’t the only one who can do that job.  The defensive line also deserves credit for putting plenty of pressure on Boller and sacking him three times in the process. 

On offense, the Bears finally ran the ball more than ten times.  They mixed the runs up, used Jason McKie a lot more than before, and even got Kahlil Bell into the game more than they ever got Garrett Wolfe involved.  Granted, their yards-per-carry average wasn’t too great, but the important thing is they ran the ball a lot and had 100 yards rushing for only the fourth time this year.  It’s a step in the right direction for success in the running game.

Finally, congratulations to Earl Bennett on getting the first touchdown of his career.  It took almost two years, but he finally did it.  Hopefully TD number two comes a lot sooner. 

All in all, it certainly wasn’t a very thrilling game on Sunday.  It is good to see the Bears win again.  They still need to play a complete game, but it does feel like they are getting closer now.  They will need to be even closer next Sunday as they will try to get some revenge against Green Bay.  They will also need to keep their success going in the next three weeks as they will not only face the Packers, but also Baltimore and Minnesota. 

There is only one word that can describe the Bears performance against the Vikings on Sunday:  awful.  They looked out of sync, lost, and completely out of their league.  The offense was a complete non-factor in the second half and once the Vikings offense got rolling, the defense couldn’t stop it.  To put it simply, the Bears sucked.  Still, let’s go to the pros and cons.

Pros

Pros?! What pros?!  The Bears didn’t have any pros!  So what if they held Adrian Peterson to 85 yards on 25 carries and forced two fumbles?  They allowed 392 yards passing from Brett Favre.  Who cares if they kept Minnesota from scoring in the first quarter?  They allowed 24 points in second and once again allowed the game to essentially be over by the fourth quarter. 

On the other hand, Minnesota continued to show that it is one of the most complete teams, if not the most complete team in the NFL.  Favre’s yardage on the day was ten short of his career high.  He looked and played like an MVP.  To counter a somewhat sluggish running game, the Vikings threw it 48 times to much success.  Percy Harvin, Bernard Berrian, Sidney Rice, and Chester Taylor all had six receptions and Visanthe Shiancoe added five.  While Peterson wasn’t having much success, Taylor ran four times for 33 yards and Harvin had two runs for 45 yards. 

Defensively, the Vikings dominated, especially in the second half.  They allowed only two yards in the second half.  That is ridiculous.  Chicago couldn’t get anything going. 

Cons

The Bears just played bad.  They completely abandoned the running game again, they allowed 537 yards, and they had the ball for only 19 minutes.  It was bad.  What may be good news for the Bears is they play the Rams next week.  They should be able to pull out a win unless they keep playing this way.

Chicago’s game against Minnesota this Sunday needs to be about one word: containment.  When it came to the Vikings, this used to mean simply containing Adrian Peterson, but now it also means containing Sidney Rice and Percy Harvin.  The Bears showed they can compete with an explosive team last Sunday against the Eagles.  Now they need to show they can improve on that and not only play well again, but also win the game.  The good thing about playing the Eagles is that Chicago played a team with very similar talent to Minnesota, both offensively and defensively.  The Bears can now see better as to what they need to do and fix to contain Minnesota on defense and score some points on offense.  With that, here are the keys to the game.

Containing AP

This is the most obvious key to any game against the Vikings.  Try to stop Adrian Peterson.  The only problem is, you can’t.  So what the Bears need to do is try to keep him from doing as much damage as possible.  Take away the cutback lane.  Try to keep him from going outside.  In the four games the Bears have faced AP he has gained 224, 78, 121, and 138 yards, respectively.  Even when he got 78 yards he still scored two touchdowns to lead Minnesota to victory.  The only time the Bears won against the Vikings in those four games was last year in the wild 48-41 shootout.  Adrian Peterson is the biggest offensive threat for Minnesota, and he’s an even bigger threat now that Vikings have a good passing game as well.  The Bears say they want to stop Adrian Peterson, but with the way they have been playing against the run lately and their luck at trying to stop him in previous games, I’ll be happy if they can keep him from making big plays and holding him to a lower yards-per-carry average.

Safeties

One of the reasons the Bears have had so many problems trying to stop AP has partly been because of their poor safety play.  Mike Brown was usually great in helping to stop the run, but even he had problems trying to stop Peterson last year, although part of that was Chicago bringing him up to the line of scrimmage to help stop the run when most of Peterson’s damage comes when he gets past front seven.  Nonetheless, it would be nice to have him in the secondary as he always had a nose for the ball and helped Urlacher put people in a position to make a play.  The worst safety play came from Adam Archuleta.  Part of the reason the Bears signed him was to help with stopping the run, and he couldn’t even do that, especially against AP.  Archuleta was a big reason why Peterson ran for 224 yards on the Bears in his first game against them as he came in too strong to try to stop it and allowed Peterson a wide open field to run to on the outside.  Now the Bears must rely heavily on Danieal Manning and Al Afalava to be the containment needed to keep Peterson from breaking off huge runs.  Afalava has shown he has the ability to start for the Bears in the future, but he still needs some seasoning.  While he has some good speed, he needs to avoid biting on fakes and he needs to take better angles to get to the ball.  The jury’s still out on Manning.  Right now, he still looks better playing as a nickelback than a safety.  Considering all of the one-on-one practice he has received from Lovie Smith in mini-camps and training camp, it seems like he would be making more of a difference than he has been.  These two will need to step up big time and not only help to contain Peterson, but also help keep the Vikings receivers and Brett Favre from making big plays.

Chicago’s defense vs. Minnesota’s passing game

This is where the Bears will need to play well in order to win this game, especially against deep passes.  Big plays have played a factor in all of the Bears losses, especially when those plays have come against the defense.  What have especially hurt the defense have been teams with a deep receiving corps such as Cincinnati, Arizona, and Philadelphia.  Now the Bears face another deep receiving corps in Percy Harvin, Sidney Rice, and Bernard Berrian.  Harvin has been explosive in just his first season and not just with receiving, but also with kick returns.  Rice is having a breakout third season.  Berrian is having a down year compared to his previous two seasons, but he has shown in the past that he can burn teams with his speed.  The Bears will need to put a lot of pressure on Brett Favre and play good coverage in order to keep big plays from happening in the passing game.  If the Bears defensive line can create a lot of pressure on its own, it will help the coverage a lot more as the linebackers can be used to cover more than blitz. 

Third downs

The Bears have been struggling on third downs, both offensively and defensively.  Their failure to convert on third downs on offense has been hurting them, especially in the red zone as they have had to settle for field goals too often.  Part of the problem has been that their run game is still poor and they have faced several third downs with five or more yards to go.  Part of it has also been Cutler’s decision-making with his throws.  Some of his throws on third down aren’t as smart as they could be.  However, some of that could be due to his needing to make quick decisions because of the pressure he’s facing.  The offensive line needs to give Cutler more time to throw not only on third down, but the other downs as well, especially with the Bears somewhat abandoning the run as they have recently.  This will involve trying to contain Jared Allen especially, but also Ray Edwards, Kevin Williams, and Pat Williams.  Chicago can’t let these four wreak havoc in the backfield if they are going to have a chance to win.

Defensively, the Bears need to simply just play better on third downs, especially in third-and-long situations.  There have been too many times lately where they have allowed the other team a first down on third and long.  This seemed especially true against the Eagles as they allowed Donovan McNabb to scramble and gain time for someone to get open.  Chicago needs to try to keep its coverage no matter how long a play is going.

All in all, the Bears will make this a competitive game if they can play at least as well as they did last week, but hopefully they will play better.  They need to remember to contain, not just try to stop.  They’ve tried that before against the Vikings and it hasn’t worked.  If they can improve upon how they played last week, they will put themselves in place to win the game.  They need to keep up the good play and avoid plunging back into the poor play that has plagued them throughout the season.

Chicago played hard against Philadelphia on Sunday night, but it just wasn’t enough.  Almost all facets of their game looked much better than they had in previous weeks, especially in the turnovers department.  In spite of that, there weren’t too many positives that were completely positive.  For instance, the offense looked better, but still had struggles in the red zone and on third down.  The defense forced three turnovers, but allowed 377 yards, 157 of which came from rushing.  While there weren’t many completely positive things for Chicago, there weren’t many completely negative things about the game either.  Nonetheless, I’ll start with the few pure cons and then go into the semi-pros.

Cons

The Bears had many gifts for the city of Brotherly Love with all of the holding penalties called against them in the first half.  They had three called in a six minute span in the second quarter.  They seemed to calm down in the second half and had only a couple of penalties called against them, but these penalties have been hurting them for far too long.  It especially doesn’t help when the penalties keep getting called when the Bears have a good play on offense or the defense gets a third down stop.  The odd thing was that once the Bears stopped getting penalties, the Eagles started getting called for penalties.  It was almost like they were trying to give back. 

The announcing seemed really off, which is tough to say about Al Michaels and Chris Collinsworth as Michaels is one of the best in the business and Collinsworth can usually say at least a few things to bring new insight to the game.  However, each had a mistake right at the beginning of the game.  For instance, Collinsworth said the Bears defense played good against the 49ers.  That’s true if you look at the stats of the game as the Bears held San Francisco to 216 total yards and 106 passing yards.  On the other hand, if you actually watched the game and looked at the rushing stats and time of possession, you would see that they had a hard time stopping the run, allowing 104 yards to Frank Gore, which also made them lose the time of possession battle by three minutes.  It also hurt their starting field position.  The next faux pas was said by Al Michaels, stating that Danieal Manning is on of the best in the league at returning kicks.  Danieal Manning isn’t even the best on his team in returning kicks.  Johnny Knox is returning kicks better than Manning is by an average of three-point-two yards.  That was really the only bad contribution from Michaels during the evening.  Otherwise he was his usual self for the most part.  Collinsworth, on the other hand still had a couple more gaffes in him.  After the touchdown pass to DeSean Jackson at the end of the game, NBC showed Cutler talking to Knox.  Collinsworth said Cutler was talking to Knox about running the play the Eagles just ran, except that at the time Cutler and Knox were being taped, that play hadn’t run yet and, in fact, occurred right at the end of the clip.  Worst of all, Collinsworth talked about Charles Tillman causing fumbles for FIVE GAME MINUTES, from 12:49 to go to about 7:30 to go, after Tillman forced his third fumble of the game.  Five game minutes.  That’s at least ten minutes or maybe even fifteen in real life.  Get over it, dude.  Tillman has been forcing fumbles since Lovie Smith came to the Bears.  It’s what he does.  This can’t be the first time Collinsworth has heard of it, but he was sure sounding like it.  Furthermore, Collinsworth seemed to be correcting himself more than usual.  It seemed to be a really off night for him.

The Bears were awful on third downs, especially on offense where they went three of 16.  They won’t win many games if they keep failing to convert third downs.  The defense also had a few troubles on third downs, especially when Philadelphia had a third and long situation.  Chicago never seemed to be able to put the Eagles away and get the ball back.  While they may have eventually stopped the Eagles, the earlier conversions allowed Philly to put the Bears in worse field position than they could have before.  Chicago’s defense has to work harder to keep teams from converting third downs and keep them from doing damage on third-and-long situations.

The last thing for the Bears that was especially was their use of timeouts at the end of the game.  They called two timeouts and then let Philadelphia get a first down.  They called the first one after allowing a run for four yards.  I would have liked to have seen less yards allowed before calling a timeout there.  Something that showed they were definitely going to stop the Eagles on these first three downs.  The second was called after Philadelphia got their first down after a measurement.  That one just feels like a waste.  The Bears called have used the timeouts better.  They still had three-and-a-half minutes left when they used the first timeout.  I know Philly was running down the clock, but they were able to do it anyway.  It just felt like they could have waited and used them better.

Semi-Pros

First off, I got to hand it to Philadelphia’s offense for playing well throughout the game and for playing good when it mattered most.  They even looked like they could have run away with the game a few times.  Turnovers hurt them big time as they could have made the game further apart than it was.  Also, Philly’s defense constantly put pressure on Cutler and forced him to make a lot of throws before he wanted to.  However, they would have allowed a few more points if Cutler threw better downfield.  Nonetheless, part of Cutler’s poor throws downfield occurred because of the blitzes and pressure created by the defense.

Speaking of Cutler, he had a decent game for the most part.  He made smarter throws than he had been making in recent weeks and protected the ball better overall.  Even so, he still has a lot of work to do.  On one red zone possession, he threw into double coverage.  That was probably the worst throw he made all night coverage-wise.  He also missed Olsen and Hester on back-to-back plays when each was wide open for a touchdown.  He threw another pass a little too far ahead of Johnny Knox when Knox had a step or two on the defender.  He needs to make better throws when this happens.  A big reason the Bears traded for Cutler was because he had stronger arm than Kyle Orton and he could make more accurate passes downfield.  Furthermore, there were a few times where Cutler wasn’t throwing to the open receiver, or at least a more open receiver.  It felt like he was still forcing some throws instead of going through his progressions.

The Bears seemed to run the ball better in this game, too.  While Matt Forte had only 34 yards on 14 carries, Kahlil Bell started off his NFL career nicely with a 72-yard run.   For the most part Bell seemed to hit the hole strong in three of his four carries, the fourth being an outside run.  The run also looked much better when Jason McKie was in the game, as he made a good block that helped to break open the running lane for Bell.  He was also used on a fake handoff play that also worked for a few yards.  He also appeared to help the Bears get more yards running up the middle when he was in the game than when he was out of the game.  The Bears also ran a couple of decent draw plays, gaining about 13 yards on three draws they ran out of the shotgun.  They even ran outside a couple of times. 

Overall, the Bears play-calling on offense was better.  They mixed up the plays they ran in the running game, and it helped them to get over 100 yards rushing as a team for the first time since they played Cleveland.  They even ran a couple bootlegs.  However, they abandoned the run too early and fell into a bad habit of running on first down and passing on second and third down in the second half.  They are also still calling wide receiver screens, which work great if they are run the way Philadelphia ran it on the touchdown to Jason Avant, but usually they aren’t and they’re stopped pretty quickly.  They still need to call some more play-action passes as well.

The Bears defense played well for the most part.  First, big props go to Charles Tillman of course for forcing three fumbles, two of which were recovered by the Bears.  Honorable mention goes to Zachary Bowman for intercepting McNabb in the second quarter and starting the turnover game for Chicago.  The defensive line also put some pressure on McNabb and forced him to move around a lot in the pocket.  Conversely, they allowed some plays that showed how much of a difference Urlacher and Mike Brown made on the team.  For instance, on a couple of plays, Al Afalava bit on the play-action and caught himself out of position.  Lucky for him, he has the speed to be able to make up for his mistakes.  One example occurred on the Eagles first drive.  Afalava lost coverage on Brent Celek in the end zone, but had the speed and burst to catch up and force McNabb to make a throw just beyond Celek’s reach.  Afalava also lost coverage on the touchdown pass to DeSean Jackson.  He was also able to catch up to the ball and have a chance to make a play on the ball, but he didn’t take the right angle to give himself that option either.  There were a few plays as well where the linebackers didn’t play the ball right and were out of position, leading to a good play for the Eagles. 

Overall, the Bears played better against the Eagles than of late.  They looked a lot more like the team that went 3-1 than the team that lost four of its five games leading into this one.  They can certainly get something out of the season if they continue to play at least as well as they played in this game, if not better.  If they can keep playing this way and improving, they can at least be a .500 team.  A big test for them to see if they can at least reach that plateau lies next week when they face the Vikings for this first time this season.

The Bears face the Eagles on Sunday night.  The way the Bears have been playing in prime time, especially Jay Cutler (see Packers, Falcons, and 49ers), this game already looks to be in the bag for Philadelphia.  On the other hand, if the Bears can protect the ball for once and play good defense, they will have a good chance to win this game, which brings me to the keys of the game.

Turnovers

The Bears need to protect the ball, especially Cutler.  His 17 interceptions are the worst in the league.  The worst part is that several of those interceptions have come in the red zone, killing any chance of getting points.  It wouldn’t be so bad if the interceptions simply happened because the other team made a great play, but that has rarely been the case with Cutler.  He’s throwing into double and triple coverages and is forcing the ball way too much.  He needs to relax and start throwing the ball to the open man.  Several times he has thrown an interception and on the other side of the field is an open receiver.  He needs to go through his progressions better and make smarter throws. 

On the other side of the ball, the Bears defense needs to be able to force turnovers as well.  Chicago has had much more success when they get turnovers.  The problem they have had is being able to make good offenses, especially good pass offenses, turn the ball over a lot.  Against the Bengals and Cardinals, the Bears forced only one turnover.  They will need to do a lot more than that to halt the Eagles.  However, that is only one problem the defense faces.

Pass Defense

Chicago has been terrible against teams that air it out.  One major reason for this is that once teams can pass at will on the Bears, the run defense goes to pieces.  This was especially true for the Cardinals and Bengals, but it even held true somewhat when they faced the 49ers.  San Francisco passed quite a bit on its first series, and although Alex Smith didn’t pass for a lot of yards, that first series opened up the running game and allowed the 49ers to control the clock the entire game.  Philadelphia is ninth in the league in pass yards, so a similar situation looks to play out, especially since the Eagles are only 23rd in rush yards.  The Bears are going to need to create a lot of pressure on McNabb and play some tight coverage if they intend to stop the Eagles.

Offensive Line

The offensive line is still not playing well.  While they finally avoided allowing a sack last week against the 49ers, they aren’t blocking well in the run game.  They are also facing a tougher test this week against a Philadelphia defense that has 29 sacks, led by Juqua Thomas with five and Trent Cole with seven-and-a-half.  To complicate matters further, the Eagles are also ninth in the league in rushing yards allowed.  However, the line isn’t completely to blame for the Bears rushing woes.

Play-calling

Chicago’s play-calling has been awful on offense.  Every run goes right up the middle.  The only times Matt Forte even gets a big gain is when he can cut to the outside.  The Bears need to call more outside runs to mix up what they use in the running game.  They should maybe even work fullback Jason McKie back into the running game a little bit more as they have used a singleback formation much more this year than in previous years.  McKie could be worked in more not only to help block for Forte, but also to take a few handoffs himself and maybe throw off the defense a little bit.  Furthermore, the Bears need to call some more play-action passes.  There has been too many times where they followed a run that went for no gain with a shotgun formation.  They could at least try to make it look like they might run again.  At any rate they could try a draw or two when they do that. They should also try at least one or two play-action plays on first down, since they almost always run on that down.   

The Bears can salvage their season with a win on Sunday.  However, they will be facing an Eagles team looking to strengthen its playoff hopes.  Chicago will need to play strong on both sides of the ball in order to win.  They can’t play like they have been in recent weeks or they will get blown out of the water. It would be nice to say they will play better with being at home, but the last time they played at home they got smoked by the Cardinals.  The Bears need to win, plain and simple.  If they win, their hopes of making the playoffs come alive again.  If they lose, though, they will have a tough road to have a winning season, let alone make the playoffs.

Last Thursday I saw quite possibly one of the worst NFL games ever played.  I mean what an awful game to start the slate of Thursday night games on NFL Network.  It almost seemed like neither team wanted to actually win.  It especially seemed like Cutler didn’t as he practically gift-wrapped the victory for the 49ers by throwing five interceptions.  Everything was bad about this game except for the defenses.  The defenses did a good job, but even they had their problems.  Even the special teams were bad.  So I’m going to go through the game’s bad parts (of which there were many) and then finish up with its good parts (of which there were very few). 

First off, the offenses of both teams were very poor, but Chicago’s was worst.  First off, there are Cutler’s five interceptions.  At best, two of them you could blame on the receiver.  In one case Devin Hester fell down coming back for the ball and on another tight end Kellen Davis didn’t keep going on the play and let Mark Roman come in to get the pick.  However, on the latter play, Cutler didn’t throw that great of a pass to begin with.  He thought Roman should have been called for pass interference.  There was no way the refs could have called that because Roman played the ball perfectly.  Heck, Roman didn’t even touch Davis until he was catching the ball.  The other three interceptions were horrible decisions by Cutler.  He threw into double or triple coverage on every single one of those picks. 

Worst of all, on two of those plays, the coverage was right in front of who he was throwing it to as well.  How can someone do that?  Is he not seeing the red jerseys of the 49ers?  Do they somehow blend in with the field like Boise State?  The worst part was seeing the replay after already knowing he made a terrible decision because it made it ten times worse.  Three 49ers are less than five or ten yards from him and he throws it right at them.  I think if you had an extreme close-up of San Francisco’s defenders you would see dollar signs in their eyes.  The last play was even worse.  Cutler threw the ball right at Michael Lewis.  I mean right at him. 

What’s worse is you can clearly see Greg Olsen starting to run to the left right as Cutler threw it.  On that play you don’t hope your receiver comes back to fight for the ball unless you know he will get it.  You throw it to the open man.  Cutler could have even tried to run it for a little bit as long as he either scored or got down and quickly called a timeout.  He didn’t need to force it like he did.  There were eight seconds to go when that play ran.  He had time to do something besides try to force the ball. 

Cutler also threw the ball 52 times.  That is ridiculous in such a low-scoring game.  When asked why the Bears threw so much, Larry Meyer, writer for the Bears on their official website, said it was because “they had little success running the ball against the 49ers.”  Of course they did.  They still haven’t learned that Matt Forte runs really well when he runs to the outside.  Forte had a nice 16-yard run in the game which was due to his bouncing the run to the outside.  On the other 20 runs, he gained only 25 yards because EVERY SINGLE ONE was an inside run.  San Francisco’s linebackers must have been licking their chops at what an easy job they had.  If the Bears ran, all they had to do was pick a spot between the guards and charge and one of them would get a tackle.  Of course, if the offensive line blocked like Stanford did against USC on Saturday, this could be an entirely different story.  However, the Bears still need to run outside a lot more than they have been. 

San Francisco’s offense didn’t do the best job either, but you blame the Bears defense for that more than the offense.  The 49ers had several long drives, but they would end up with a punt because the Bears defense would finally stop them.  They only had four three and outs in the game.  One area that would help the 49ers is some longer passes.  Alex Smith went 16-of-23 for 118 yards and an interception.  He had a good completion percentage, but he had a lot of short completions and quite a few quick throws.  If he could have had some longer passes, he could have stretched the defense a little better and really opened up the offense more.  He could have also taken advantage of the Bears’ inexperienced safeties.  San Francisco probably would have ended up with more than ten points too and not just have points due to turnovers.

On the other side of the ball, the Bears defense had trouble stopping the 49ers offense at times.  They showed once again that they can’t keep a team backed up toward its own end zone, instead letting that team get a first down or three before forcing them to punt.  This especially hurt at the end of the game when stopping the 49ers would mean the Bears would get the ball with plenty of time on the clock or could even be able to get the ball twice.  The 49ers last drive of the game went almost six-and-a-half minutes before the defense finally stopped them on the 34 yard line.  On another drive, San Francisco was backed up to its three yard line on a second and 18 and came away with three first downs before Smith threw his lone interception.  The defense needs to play better when they have the other team right in its clutches.

This was an ugly game special teams-wise as well.  The Bears averaged 14 yards on its three kickoff returns.  They have had a few bright spots on returns this year, but this unit does not seem to be having as much success as when Devin Hester was returning the ball.  I think they need to put Hester back at returning kicks because he was a big threat doing that and he might function better this year at returning kicks than he was last year.  A big problem for him last year was he was thinking too much on returns.  Part of that was he was learning the entire offense instead of just a few plays.  Now that he knows the offense a lot better, he has been returning the ball on punts better with few exceptions.  I think that will turn into better kick returns, too.

Now for some good news.  Let’s start with the 49ers defense.  This unit played perfectly.  Five interceptions.  That is quite a stat.  The secondary put themselves in good positions to make plays on the ball and played tight on the receivers all game.  The front seven stuffed the run on all but one play.  Aubrayo Franklin played a great game inside and out as he not only blocked the holes set up for Forte but he also got an interception.  The linebackers were quick to take advantage of Franklin’s play as well and got into the holes on every run.  San Francisco will have a shot at the playoffs if this unit keeps playing like it did Thursday night.

As for the 49ers offense, it ran the ball extremely well.  Frank Gore ran for 104 yards and kept a lot of long drives going.  The Bears had a hard time stopping him, especially at the end of the game.  San Francisco’s first drive was its best passing-wise.  Smith threw several quick passes and led the team downfield.  It was too bad they didn’t get points out of the drive as Nedney’s kick went wide right, but it showed a lot of promise.  I think if they would have kept up with that game plan they could have scored some more points than they did, especially if they would have been able to work in some deeper passes.

The Bears defense played well in that it didn’t allow a lot of points and kept the team in the game when they should have been out of it.  It was also good to see Tommie Harris and Marcus Harrison causing some pressure as each one recorded a sack in the game.  The defense was also getting enough pressure and covering well enough to hold the Smith to only 118 passing yards. However, it would have been nice to see them playing the run as good as they played the pass.

Of the few bright spots on the Bears offense, one was that they did a good job with screen passes to Forte.  Forte was able to rack up 150 yards on eight receptions and a big part of that was due to the use of the screen.  Kudos also goes to the offensive lineman for blocking well enough on the screens to let Forte break free.  On the other hand, the wide receiver screen is still one of the worst plays in football.  The Bears need to stop running this play because it is not working for them.

The biggest reason the Bears lost this game is due to the turnovers.  It would have been a much different game if they didn’t have those.  They might have even scored a touchdown or two.  Nonetheless, they have a lot of things they need to fix and quick.  Hopefully the coaches, especially Ron Turner, start to actually fix some of these problems for more than a week instead of fixing it only to have it go wrong again.  It would be nice to see some better execution and better play from the Bears.  Hopefully things will go better when they play the Eagles next…Sunday…night.  Oh crap.