The Bears are back

[b bulldog]

A win would have all but daggered their rest of the season. What a crappy performance, utterly pathetic

[BallHawk]

We could of delivered the knockout blow, but we failed to do it. :(

[vince]

Not that it matters after losing to them, but I'm convinced the Packers are the better team. That's encouraging for the rest of the season.

[BallHawk]

Not that it matters after losing to them, but I'm convinced the Packers are the better team. That's encouraging for the rest of the season.

There's no question in my mind that we're the better team, but we gave the Bears the win they needed to turn their season around.

[vince]

They have a lot of questions to answer yet, and plenty of challenges ahead of them. Their whole game rests on turnovers. If they don't get 'em, they're screwed.

[BEARMAN]

Not that it matters after losing to them, but I'm convinced the Packers are the better team. That's encouraging for the rest of the season.

A few years ago people were comvinced that the earth was flat ! :shock:

[Deputy Nutz]

The Bears could build off of that win, no doubt.

Greise did his job.

[FritzDontBlitz]

the bears were desperate and kicked, scratched and clawed their way to a win.

the packers were 4-0 and a lil overconfident, maybe. but, if you think about it the bears exploited every inexperience and weakness in a young packers team.

james jones fumbles on two consecutive catches in the first quarter because he was trying to fight for extra yardage each time, but charles tillman makes two heads up plays to prevent the game from possibly being 21-0 before chicago even had a first down. had they not knocked the ball loose, the game - and possibly their season - could have been over by the end of the first quarter. tillman turned jones' strength into a weakness. he did what he had to do to keep his team in contention and give them a chance.

daryn colledge was taken to school by tommie harris. colledge has been a farce all season, so that didnt surprise me. m3 and tt HAVE TO FIND A LEFT GUARD IMMEDIATELY because colledge is not the answer. guards have to be able to at least stalemate the defensive rusher, because if rushers or blitzers are allowed to constantly come free up the middle then your qb cannot step up into his throws and risks greater injury than he would from a rusher/blitzer coming off the edge. colledge HAS TO GO.

i cannot speak for whatever happened to the team after halftime because i wasnt able to catch most of the second half. but, i am convinced lovie outcoached m3 every step of the way, because lovie TEACHES HIS DEFENSE how to hold up ballcarriers and allow other defenders time to rip at their arm and pry the ball loose. jones is a rookie and has NEVER played in a bears game! jones should have been warned of this BEFORE they even suited up for the game, but obviously he wasnt. that's m3's fault. think about it: most of the bears turnovers arent generated by devastating hits that seperate the player from the ball, they are due to holding up a carrier that is trying to fight for extra yardage - every time a player does this he plays right into chicago's hands. m3 better teach his receivers how to catch the ball in traffic and get down before they are able to execute this move. if not, not only does he risk more turnovers he also risks injury as well, because it is not humanly possible to hold onto a football when you are immobilized and a player is ripping at your arm the way bears' players are taught to do: resisting could eventually lead to shoulder or muscle damage, and it could cause the packers to not only lose the ball but also lose the player due to injury. once again, the bears exploited inexperience to their advantage, the inexperience being m3's.

and what the fugg is going on with nick "forget the wide open receiver, i'm staring down the qb no matter what happens" collins? who the heck was he trying to cover on the deciding touchdown? hawk had the guy in the flat, collin's blunder was a classic no-no: safeties are supposed to stay deeper than the deepest, not be dumber than the dumbest. collins isnt exactly a rookie, but there needs to be a more experienced safety brought in to counteract all the blown coverages and overpusruits that keep occuring. i like him and i love bigby, but we need more experience at the position than what we have now. and trust me, this is NOT an attempt to criticise tt for letting go of manuel: at least the younger guys can blame their mistakes on inexperience. manuel was just terrible. collins and bigby still have an upside - manuel is just upsetting.

i wont go on but i will say that its better that this happened sooner than later. i saw a positive in the opening drive with deshawn wynn breaking loose for the big gain and amassing nearly 60 yards on the ground. i suspect the cramping began on the big run, because i dont think wynn is as easy to catch from behind as he was on that play. even if he is i believe he should still be the workhorse to give morency time to get into football shape and allow jackson to get a feel for the speed and ferocity of the pro game. remember: jackson was drafted as the designated 3rd down back if i'm not mistaken? i think he will still be excellent in that role, but the rash of injuries he has suffered proves to me that he is not suited to be the workhorse running back.

finally, let me remind the suicidal in the bunch that the packers are 4-1 and still 2 games up on the bears. not only that: had donald driver not mistimed his jump there may have been an overtime game - not saying the packers would have won in overtime, but i am saying that in spite of all the blunders, mistakes, outcoaching and clock mismanagent the packers were still in the game until the final seconds, and isnt that really what you expect from a good team? the bears won the game, but so what? all they gained was bragging rights. i am less than concerned about the interception record as well. brett owns every other career passing record and his longevity rivals blanda's so it shouldnt come as a shock that he would claim blanda's int record as well. ther was nothing i saw sunday night that cant be fixed. even woodson's fumble is fixable if k-rob is reinstated - that frees up woody to just concentrate on the defense and not have to endure the extra pounding and potential injuury of returning punts. woody and al have been battling injury so far, at worst the pack will be 4-2 come bye week and they will have time to get healthy and prepare a stretch run. besides, HOW MANY OF US expected green bay to be 4-2 or better come bye week? i sure as hell didnt.

look for the positives even in the negatives, people. lovie, urlacher, griese and moose sure did and they drummed their mantra into the rest of the team and they came up to lambeau and took care of business. they should be commended for that, and even though we may be a bit embarrassed at the outcome the pack shouldnt be condemned.

one more thing. do not let all the bluster and bullshit from bearman and others during bear week blind you to this simple fact: no matter how much they try to act to the contrary, lovie and the bears have ALWAYS respected brett favre and know if they dont bring their a game he will hand them their asses on a chunk of cheese. they had to win the game and they did, its as simple as that. but, if the pack look at the game and pull the positives from it, they will still be a force to be reckoned with in the nfc.

peace out, ya'll. and bearman? congrats. aint no shame in losing to a worthy and hungry opponent. seeya for round two ....

[Freak Out]

The Bears D can still get the job done but the O still sucks. We gave them the game.

[Merlin]

What will really suck is when the Vikings defense stops the Bears offense and the Vikings offense actually learns that there is a middle of the field to throw the ball to. I predict the Vikings will beat the Bears and that is the ultimate slap in the face for that pathetic second half.

[RashanGary]

The sky is falling. We just lost one game.

[Merlin]

Our defense isn't all that great and we lost to a shitty team and almost lost to a less shitty team the week before. Our defense has the potential to be great and is underachieving.

I knew when the the first loss happened that all of those 3T supporters would chalk it up to youth and anyone who disagreed would be chicken little.

Unfortunately for you, this is nothing different then a lot of us have been saying long before the season started. In fact, the past 3 years. I wish I could show my true misunderstanding of the game by using a #1 draft picks name as my own. Even though he has done zero to help the team win. In fact, the one game he played in, we lost. Go figure.

[Partial]

Yes, go ahead and ignore the fact we played our conferences best team from last year. I think the team just played shitty. Has nothing to do with '3t' or MM or anything else. Just a bad game. They were bound to lose one, you know.

[Merlin]

I think the fact that we were bound to lose is the point. However, those that claimed 3T was the second coming when we are 4-0 sure aren't attributing the loss to him. 4-0 he is a genius. Lose a game in part to his philosophies, then ah, it's just youth and it's excusable. You have to take the good with the bad and he should get the criticism he deserves for the losses as much as the kudos for the wins. I heard an interview with Spitz this morning and he was claiming that moving to center isn't an issue because he plays three spots during the week anyway and he was a center coming in. Pretty confident for a guy who couldn't snap the ball when it counted or block the entire second half. But then again, that isn't on 3T because we have youth!

[Partial]

I don't think anyone was doing that. That is insane. The general manager should be an off-season topic only.

Coach Mac got his players ready to go and they won games. Has nothing to do with '3t'

Also, you realize that Spitz was only in the game for two series? He was barely in the game at all. I wouldn't blame the poor blocking on him. I'd blame it on Colledge. He gets beat play after play after play.

[Carolina_Packer]

Our defense isn't all that great and we lost to a shitty team and almost lost to a less shitty team the week before. Our defense has the potential to be great and is underachieving.

I knew when the the first loss happened that all of those 3T supporters would chalk it up to youth and anyone who disagreed would be chicken little.

Unfortunately for you, this is nothing different then a lot of us have been saying long before the season started. In fact, the past 3 years. I wish I could show my true misunderstanding of the game by using a #1 draft picks name as my own. Even though he has done zero to help the team win. In fact, the one game he played in, we lost. Go figure.

I disagree about our defense. They are not elite, but they are good. I think you have to look at the drives and what was given up.

http://www.packers.com/images/gamebooks/071007gamebook.pdf (go to page 4)

The Bears had 15 possessions, the Pack 13

They had a few decent drives, but not that many. If you dig deeper into the touchdowns, 2 of them were gifts. One from the ref when they thought Corey Williams was lined up wrong, otherwise that is a field goal attempt. The other gift was courtesy of Favre's boneheaded throw, they scored on the next play to Greg Olsen. The one TD you can truly hang on the D is the last TD. The posession started on their own 21, they went 8 plays, 79 yards for the final score. They sure picked a good time to be able to drive the ball down, but again, this was our only big drive that we gave up. Granted, it came at a critical time, but it's not like the D is a sieve.

The D was also put at some disadvantage by the turnovers, penalties and short field give-ups by MM on the kick-offs. I'd definitely say they were not the problem. You eliminate half our mistakes, including the dumb interception, and also, if the Packers don't go into a shell offensively in the second half, what would the the team then have? A victory.