Now that I’ve had a day to chew on, regurgitate, spew and watch the dog lick up that Bears-Lions game from Sunday, I thought I would share with you my thoughts on the final play of the day. I feel like Frank Costanza at the head of the table on Festivus.
Frank Costanza has got problems with you!
Wins are tough to come by in the NFL, we all know that. There are going to be games like this, ones you win that you shouldn’t have, and there will be games you let slip through you fingers. Sunday the Bears were fortunate. It’s no easy task to hold a team to roughly 100 yards of offense, pass for nearly 400 yourself, turn the ball over four times and still manage just 19 points and a “miracle” win.
The Bears did just that on Sunday and their fans apparently had a bigger role in the game than they might have ever imagined. No it wasn’t the raucous crowd of 62,000 on hand, it was all their bitching that caused Lovie to make some very curious moves.
Yes fans, the leader of your Chicago Bears says, in not exactly these words, that you are the reason Zach Bowman was covering Calvin Johnson one-on-one on what almost was the game winning TD for the Lions. Read:
“We play double coverage quite a bit,” Smith said. “It seems like every time we play double coverage, [people say] why do you play two deep? On that play, we had a blitz on. Why don’t you blitz more [people ask]? We had a blitz on that play, and when you blitz you can’t double cover everybody each play. [That’s] football 101. Can’t do it. On that play, we didn’t. On the next two [plays], we did.”
What the…? Since when is the coach’s job to listen to anything the fans are asking for? Hell, if that happened in Chicago Micah Hoffpauir would be our franchise 1B on the North Side, Aaron Rowand would be in CF on the South Side and Kyle Orton would be our QB. But I digress.
“Sometimes guys, it’s just a one-on-one football game and you have to be able to make a play. Sometimes you have a great player that makes a great play. Their great player did make a great play on that one. We were in good position, and the play ended up going in our favor.”
Really? So in Lovie’s mind that call was a good decision, because it ended up in his favor and because you, the bitching Bears fan got the blitz you so desperately pined for. There was one guy on the field that could beat you there, and you have Bowman on him one-on-one? My football resume is blank, but even I can tell you that’s a bad idea.
This team has enough issues on the field, and if Smith plans on this being his coaching style in 2010, things are going to be far tougher than I thought. Between not taking the go ahead points in the fourth quarter to the final controversial play, Lovie had some serious lapses in judgment on Sunday.
His post game also offered this contradiction in regards to the Johnson play:
“I’m gonna do the same things we did all of the game,” he said. “I love our game plan that we had throughout. This is what we did, defensively: we gave up 168 yards. We had three-and-outs eight times. We kept them defensively under 30 percent on third down. I like our plan, and we’ll have a good plan this week.”
Fine, but then don’t tell me your interested or affected by the fans calls for blitz’s or different coverages. Coach the way you think is right, and in the end we’ll see if your still employed by the Chicago Bears.
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