So Nobody Can Ever Be Fired?
David Haugh makes the argument that the Bears will fire neither Lovie Smith or Jerry Angelo because of the time left on their respective contracts.  Here’s a question: why are contracts for coaches and management guaranteed in the NFL while player contracts are not?  Why doesn’t someone write an expose on this fundamentally unfair practice by the league?

“Still Believe We Can Pull It Out”   
Ted Phillips thinks the Bears’ season is not dead.  Let’s call this one of several things that Ted and I disagree about.  The Bears needed their team president to come out on Monday morning and show respect for the organization by denigrating, with authority, the performance of his coaching staff.  Right now, defensively, this team is far closer to a league doormat than a world champion.

Singletary
If you want to know why Mike Singletary never became a coach for the Bears, here it is.  It broke my heart to read it then and it breaks my heart to read it now.  How could this organization let a non-entity like Dick Jauron keep 50 from putting his colors back on?

Tommie Harris: I Hate Him More Every Day
I read Brad Biggs’ piece on Tommie Harris and I would have blown it off if not for Tommie’s claiming that Cardinals’ offensive lineman Deuce Lutui did “some unnecessary stuff during the game”.  The game was three plays for you, Tommie.  Three total plays.  I’m now fully convinced that you’re an emotionally unstable moron.

The Bears defense is a wretched, flaming mess.  They’ve got a defensive tackle with a host of seemingly incurable mental disorders.  They’ve got Alex Brown trying to generate a pass rush on his own, excepting Adewale Ogunelye’s twice-yearly dominance against Detroit.  They’ve got second-stringers starting at linebacker, third-stringers starting at cornerback and Vivian Stringer starting at safety.  They do all the little things right as long as tackling, gap discipline, communication and coverage are not considered “little things”.  The head coach took over the play-calling and instead of instilling a sense of urgency, instilled a sense of complacency.  An argument could (and should) be made that this is the worst defensive output in over a decade.

And still they’re 4-4.  They’ve won as many games as they’ve lost.  They beat the Pittsburgh Steelers.  It just doesn’t make sense.  I looked at the standings this morning and the Bears are only chasing Atlanta (5-3), Philadelphia (5-3) and the Giants (5-4) in the wildcard race.  Maybe that says more about the mediocrity of the conference than anything else, but it also says that the Bears will have an opportunity to make something of the 2009 season. 

Will they?  There’s no way a realistic football fan can look at this team and answer “yes”.  Can they?  Is it worth being a fan of the team if you don’t wanna believe so?  Hypothetical.  The Bears win Thursday night in San Francisco.  5-4.  The Eagles lose a game they’ll be favored to lose in San Diego.  5-4.  Giants are 5-4.  The Bears – your shitty 2009 Chicago Bears – will be tied for the final wildcard spot nine weeks into the season.

So I’m leading the Lower Your Expectations Campaign and carrying the “Just Get In!” banner.  We don’t have a first round pick.  We’ve got nothing to lose for.  It’s time for the Bears to play violent and angry on Sundays and if they’re going to lose, lose in a rage.  Leave everything on the field.  The Bears don’t need the league to crumble to make the postseason.  They need to win football games.  And they need to start Thursday night.

• The Chicago Bears can no longer employ Tommie Harris.  Today
  was Tank Johnson’s gun house and Cedric Benson’s boat ride.  I don’t
  care if he goes to another organization and leads the universe in sacks
  and tackles-for-loss.  I don’t want him anymore and I think if you
  polled fans, over 90% would agree with me.
• Al Afalava can not start.  The guy is lost on blitzes and a terrible tackler.
• Lovie
  Smith must be put on notice publicly by the organization.  Either Jerry
  Angelo or Ted Phillips must come out and state to gathered media that
  Smith is not maximizing talent and hasn’t out-coached an opponent since
  the 2006 NFC Championship Game.
• Chris Williams should start at
  left tackle Thursday night.  If Williams is really the future at the
  position, the Bears can ill-afford to waste eight weeks of
  development.  It’s best now for both he and Cutler to get the
  experience.
• Gaines Adams should be worked regularly into the
  rotation.  Adewale Ogunleye should be worked out.  The frugal Bears
  should play politics and keep Ogunleye from building the stat sheet in
  meaningless minutes.  Put him on the sideline and maybe they can get
  him to stay for a few less nickels in March.

I’ve never written a post-game report in the third quarter before but today I’m going to do just that.  Because for the next quarter and a half, I’m doing other things.  Life is too short to waste on this kind of effort.

At 2:43 pm EST, I report that the 2009 season is dead.  Deceased.  Over.  The Bears may still win a few games here and there.  They may find a way to enter December with a puncher’s chance at a wildcard spot.  They may provide a few memories down the stretch.  But this is the worst defense the Bears have fielded since before Dick Jauron took over.  These are the consistently worst coaching efforts since Wanny left town as well.  (As I typed that, Zack Bowman was beaten in man coverage by Larry Fitzgerald.  Bowman.  Man. Fitzgerald.) 

The 2009 season can go in two directions.  (1) The dreaded “look for improvement”, also known as the Houston Texans.  This will lead to a couple surprising victories in December and unmet expectations at the start of the next season.  (2) The coveted “hot seat”.  How many more performances like this from Lovie’s defense will it take to get him fired?  (Cue David Haugh’s weekly column wherein he lists the coach’s won-loss record.)

And now Fox has turned the game off.  And I don’t care.  I’ve hit my low point as a Chicago Bears fan.  And I need a few hours off.

If you’re bored and in the New York area in the next two weeks, come see a reading of a new musical.

Without further adieu, and with hope on the line…

Born to Run
You want to know what’s dogging the Bears offense?  Brad Biggs breaks it down quite effectively in his Sun-Times column: 

They are tied for 25th in the NFL in red-zone efficiency at 44.4 percent (12-for-27).

Here’s the kicker: Entering Monday, only six teams had more
opportunities inside the 20-yard line. If the Bears were 50 percent
better on their missed chances, they would be regarded as an offensive
juggernaut.

Red zone efficiency more often than not comes down to play-calling and here’s a fact: on every first down in the red zone, the Bears called a run.  (Not withstanding a first-and-two with five minutes left.)  These are the same Bears who can’t run the ball and whom Lovie Smith called “a running football team” in Monday’s presser.  I often make the argument that we give athletes and coaches the benefit of the intelligence doubt but you know what?  These guys aren’t smart.  They’re jocks.  And they really like proving it.

It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City

David Haugh offers ten ways to fix the Bears offense
and he gets it right from the start.  The best player on this offense
is the quarterback and the offense will produce nothing until the team
utilizes his very special abilities.  What we overlooked for the past
few years is how a limited quarterback may have covered up scheme and
play-calling flaws in the name of “a conservative approach”.  You wanna
score like the Saints or the Pats or the Colts?  You have to trust the
guy throwing the ball.  You wanna score like the Bears?  You trust Ron
Turner.

Nothing Man

When did the expectations for Tommie Harris get so low?  Vaughn McClure’s Trib piece
has Alex Brown calling him “amazing” and Lovie Smith calling him
“disruptive”.  I don’t know what word I would use to describe his
performance against the Browns but I’d start with “pretty
good…against the Browns.”

It was important for the defense to perform how they performed Sunday, opponent aside.  If it only served to get the taste of the Cincinnati Bungle out of their collective minds, it was well worth it.  The Browns stink – nobody disputes that – but the defense didn’t mail in the effort and dominated the ballgame.

Sunday provides a real test for the unit at the season’s crossroad. When the Arizona Cardinals are at their best, even without Anquan Boldin, they can dominate defenses through the air.  Kurt Warner is one of the best pure throwers in the game and there’s not a receiver out there that Larry Fitzgerald takes a backseat to.  If their o-line holds, the Bears will be staring their first home loss directly in the eyes.

That can’t happen.  Not if the Bears have any pride.  Not if the Bears have any hopes of paying a ballgame in the postseason.  Ten wins will be needed to accomplish anything in 2009.  That means they must enter their Sunday night game at Soldier Field against the Philadelphia Eagles at 6-3.  Must.  And with the offensive line in total disarray and offensive coordinator on the brink of a meltdown, the defense will have to carry the water bucket to the top of the hill. 

It feels like every week or so, another game presents itself as a “must win”.  This is what happens when you lose games you’re not supposed to.  As a fan, I couldn’t get into Sunday’s game against Cleveland.  No upside.  The Soldier Field crowd on Sunday should act like the season is on the line.  Like hope is on the line.  Because it is.        

Shocking that in today’s NFL that a team can win 30-6 and display so many flaws but the Bears did just that.  There were positivies from yesterday’s game but not enough to warrant Monday morning attention.  If the Bears plan on making a run for a division title or a place in the postseason, they’re going to need to be better.  A lot better.  I’m focusing on the offense because we can’t learn anything defensively from playing the Browns. 

#1. Stop calling runs up the middle on first down.  I’ve been writing this for two years and I’m frankly getting tired of it.  But how many drives have to be second-and-nine or third-and-long before Ron Turner starts a drive in shotgun and lets our best offensive player make plays.

#2. Block someone.  Anyone.  Is there a solution on the current roster?  I have no idea.  But the solution was not lined up against the Browns.

#3. Get Matt Forte involved in the passing game.  Forte displays the explosiveness we all expect from him when he’s catching the ball out of the backfield.  Not on last-thought dumpoffs but on designed screens.  

#4. Never ever ever run the wildcat again.  Was that serious?  The wildcat?  Why did we give up so much for a quarterback and then take him off the field on pivotal downs?  The Bears won 30-6 and I can make an argument this was the worst game Ron Turner ever called.

#5. Install the no huddle.  The offense’s pace is wretched, leaving me wondering who is going to jump before the start of each play.  The coaching staff must do something to rectify this and the no huddle is an option.