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Dan Peters
Sports Editor
Suburban
Journals of Chicago
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December 31, 2006
Maybe the Bears
will retire the "All Blue" uniforms. They never have had success
wearing this combination.
©
Suburban Journals of Chicago photo by Joe Paolella
Bears
lose finale to Packers 26-7, many questions yet to be answered heading
into playoffs.
by Dan Peters
The Bears, having nothing to play
for Sunday night, having
clinched home-field advantage throughout the playoffs two
weeks ago. left many questions un-answered
as they head into the NFC Playoffs in two
weeks. The Packers, eliminated from post-season contention
earlier Sunday, played for pride in what may have been Brett Favre’s
last NFL game.
Looking nothing like a serious
Super Bowl threat, the Chicago
Bears delivered their worst first-half
performance of the season in Sunday night’s regular season finale
against the Packers.
In his poorest outing in an up-and-down season, Rex
“Blutarsky” Grossman had two of three interceptions
returned for touchdowns, lost a
fumble and compiled a 0.0 passer
rating as the Packers crushed the Monsters of the Midway
26-7.
“I’m trying to figure that out myself.
Everything that could go wrong went wrong,
whether it was a tipped pass or my reads."
Smith noted. “Everything just didn’t seem right tonight and I’ve
got to go back to the drawing board a little bit and have a sense
of urgency about us heading into the playoffs. The plan was to
play Rex into the third quarter,” Smith said. “(But) after
you’re having a game like that, I didn’t see there was any need to put
him back in after an effort like that from not just Rex (but)
offensively. You can’t turn the ball over like that, and we did.”
When asked if anything that occurred in Sunday night’s season
finale would alter the Bears’ depth chart at quarterback, Smith
said: “There are no changes on our team. Where do
you start? We didn’t play well. We’ll evaluate
film like we do each week
and go from there.”
Brian Griese does his best to imitate Mr. Blutarsky, oops
Grossman. Brian Griese didn’t fair much better after relieving
Grossman, completing 5 of 15 passes for 124 yards with 2
interceptions, Both quarterbacks combined
on just 7 of 27 passes for
157 yards with 1 TD and 5 interceptions. Hardly what
a team needs heading into the playoffs.
Griese’s only highlight was a 75-yard TD pass to Mark Bradley,
bringing the Bears to within 23-7 with :34 left in
the third quarter. This was the closest the Bears would come.
Brett Favre, meanwhile, may want to re-think about retiring. The future
Hall of Famer passed for 209 of his 285 yards in the first half
including a 9-yard touchdown to Donald Driver to lead the
Packers (8-8) to their fourth straight win. Imagine if you
will, if the Pack had started to peak a few games earlier…we
could have been facing them again in the playoffs.
Brett Favre
looked in vintage form tonight, Maybe he should stay for a
few more years
©
Suburban Journals of Chicago photo by Joe Paolella
Favre’s touchdown pass to Donald Driver on the game’s opening
possession capped an 11-play, 75-yard drive and gave the Packers a 7-0
lead. Green Bay was on the move again later in the
first quarter when Nathan Vasher intercepted a Favre pass
intended for receiver Ruvell Martin and returned it 7 yards to the
Chicago 35.
But Grossman then looked toward Desmond Clark in
the left flat and safety Nick Collins slipped in front of the Bears
tight end, picking off the pass and returning it 55 yards for a TD.
Dave Rayner clanged the extra point attempt off the left upright, but
the Packers still led 13-0 with :50 left in the first quarter. The only
bright spot offensively for the Bears was the performance of Cedric
Benson.
The first 100-yard performance of Benson’s career came Sunday night in
his 24th NFL game. His previous high was 79 yards on 14 carries last
season in a road win over the New Orleans Saints.
“It’s pretty exciting,” said Benson, who led Texas to a 25-0 record
when he topped 100 yards in four seasons with the Longhorns. “It took a
long time to get here. I’ve dreamed about it from time to time. I knew
it would present itself when it was ready. It was fun.”
“There’s not a whole lot for me to say about tonight,” said Coach Lovie
Smith. “I was pleased with how Cedric Benson ran the football. We’d
kind of seen flashes of that from him for a while. Besides that, we
didn’t get a lot done as a football team. Coaching-wise we didn’t get
them ready to play. The players
didn’t play as well as they need to. We win as a team. Tonight, it was
definitely a team loss.” “Cedric ran really well and Cedric’s been
running well,” said offensive coordinator Ron Turner.
Not All the
fans at soldier field were dissapointed On New Years Eve
©
Suburban Journals of Chicago photo by Joe Paolella
“Cedric is playing with a lot of confidence
right now. He’s running hard. Cedric’s a good football player and the
last several weeks he’s been showing that.”
The fourth overall pick in the 2005 NFL Draft credited the Bears
offensive line with blasting open holes. The line benefited from the
return of left tackle John Tait who was back in the starting lineup
after missing the previous two games with an ankle injury.
“It was the guys up front,” Benson said. “They were coming off the ball
every snap. You can’t say enough about those guys. I love them. When I
come in, they’re my spark; I’m their spark too. They were coming off
the ball hard and made it really easy for me.”
Benson’s 30-yard run provided just a temporary spark. Grossman then
fumbled the exchange from Pro Bowl center Olin Kreutz and defensive
tackle Ryan Pickett recovered at the Green Bay 39.
Grossman then turned the ball over on the third straight possession
when his pass intended for Rasheed Davis was intercepted by cornerback
Charles Woodson. Grossman wanted to return in the third quarter but had
to watch from the sideline, contemplating how he will rebound in two
weeks when the Bears attempt to win their first playoff game since Jan.
1, 1995 when they upset the Vikings in Minnesota.
“I would have loved to have played and gotten out of that funk a little
bit and had that drive to feel good leaving the game,” Grossman said.
“Now I’m just going to go back to square one. I’ve been in this
position before and hopefully I never come back. I hate this. I hate it
right now, but I’m really excited about where we’re at right now; all
of the opportunities that are in front of us, and that’s all I’m going
to concentrate and think about.”
The best quarterback on the field tonight was Bears punter Brad
Maynard. You can always count on Lovie Smith to use a few “trick
plays”, even if they fail. The Bears caught the Packers off guard when
Maynard completed an impressive 34 yard fake punt for a first down to
Adrian Peterson. The silent crowd roared to life, even if it was short
lived. Maynard’s quarterback rating surpassed all three regular
starters at 118.8. Let’s hope Lovie has a few of these trick plays up
his sleeve in the playoffs, the Bears just may need them to advance in
the playoffs.
Welcome
back Tank.
Defensive tackle Terry “Tank” Johnson played in his first game
since Dec. 11 against the St. Louis Rams. The third-year pro was
deactivated versus the Buccaneers before serving a one-game suspension
last Sunday against the Lions for conduct detrimental to the team.
Johnson played predominantly in passing situations, making his first
appearance on the game’s fourth play from scrimmage. The 6-3,
300-pounder made two tackles and pressured Brett Favre into an
incompletion on Green Bay’s first possession.
“It was good to get him back in the flow, which
will help the next time we play in our playoff game,” Smith said. “It
was good to get him back for that. Right off the top of my head, I
don’t know
exactly how he played. But again, it was good to get him back into the
regular routine.”
Sigh
of relief.
Pro Bowl rookie return specialist Devin Hester exited Sunday’s game in
the second half with a calf strain, but Coach Smith described the
injury as “nothing serious.”
“Our plan was we wanted to play the players into the third quarter, so
we got him a few more plays and just took him out from there,” Smith
said. “If there is a bright thing that happened from this game, it’s
that we didn’t get any major injuries.”
Hester averaged 19.8 yards on four kickoff returns but mustered just
one yard on one punt return while muffing a second midway through the
third quarter. Fortunately for the Bears, Worrell recovered the loose
ball at the Chicago 32. The Bears, who rested several of their starters
in the second half of Sunday night's loss, will have next week off
before hosting either Seattle, Dallas or the New York Giants in a
divisional playoff game Jan. 13 or 14 at Soldier Field. The
sixth-seeded Giants would advance to face the Bears with a win at
third-seeded Philadelphia. Otherwise, Chicago will host the winner
of the game between the fifth-seeded Cowboys and fourth-seeded Seahawks.
“We’re not concerned about anything,” said
corner back Ricky Manning, Jr. “We have home-field advantage, we’re
13-3 and we’re going to work on some tings. We’re going to start
preparing this week for our playoff game in two weeks. We’ll see who we
face
and that’s about it.
Luckily for the Bears, the teams they may face in the first round of
the playoffs look to have issues and problems as well. None of them
show a serious threat to the Bears, providing they play better than
they did against the Packers. “We’re not keeping our heads down.
Our heads are not down. We just need to work on some things. It’s going
to be a whole different atmosphere when it counts.”
The Bears only
had one thing on the agenda tonight, but it was not meant
to be.
©
Suburban Journals of Chicago photo by Joe Paolella
Brad Maynard threw only one pass
tonight.
and had the best quarterback
rating at Soldier Field... 118.8
©
Suburban Journals of Chicago photo by Joe Paolella
There’s
no crying in football…
After the game. Brett Favre was asked why he was shaking the hands of
his team mates after the victory. Favre was visibly choked up and
fought back tears as he was being interviewed by a local TV station
after posing for a team photo. One would think that this is a sure sign
of retirement? Hardly. “I wouldn’t put too much into that,” said backup
quarterback Aaron Rogers. By the time Favre reached the locker
room, he was back to his jovial self. “There wasn’t really any tears in
the locker room,” Rogers said. “A lot of laughs, actually, a lot of
story telling and stuff like we always do after games. It was a good
time. Everybody was on cloud nine.”
Donald Driver responded by saying “ You never know what he’s going to
do, but I’m hoping he can play until I’m done,” Driver attempted to
carry Favre off the field when Packer coach Mike McCarthy took him out
with less than two minutes to play in the game.
“It’s tough,” Favre said. I’m going to miss these guys and miss the
game. Just wanted to let them know that. I’ve always felt like I could
still play at a high level,” Favre said. “Today just kind of reassures
me, as well as other people, that I still can play. Now what that
means, if I’m going to play, I’d like to play at a high level. Today I
did.” Whatever Brett chooses, nobody will ever forget him.
© Oak Park Journal photo
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