This game was like the practice game before the big game, when the A-team plays the B-team. This scrimmage always turns out badly for the B-team, and it serves as a good dress rehersal and a confidence boost for the A-team. But this was the actual big game, and the A-team Bears rebounded from back to back losses to beat the B-team Rams like they’ve been getting worse each week, and it was December, 2012.
It was a complete domination, moreso than even the lopsided score (27-3) reflects. The Bears scored the first 21 points on their first 5 drives, and were up 24-3 at the half. But because STL probably wouldn’t contend for the title in the NCAA, there really is no call for chest pumping. I mean, the Rams are really bad, like so bad you almost feel sorry for them. But it sure was nice to get a double-ya for the first time in 21 days. We’ve now won 5 of 8, and are tied for first place on Turkey Day. God bless us, everyone!
If you are considering voluneteering for a good cause over the holidays, you may want to consider helping the St. Louis Rams. They’re about as far from being good as the KKK. They went through 3 QB’s, as if that would make a difference. They could have put all 3 on the field at once, with 3 balls, and it wouldn’t have mattered. Between the 4 tackles for no gain, 8 tackles for loss, 5 sacks and 4 INT’s, you’d have thought the Bears were playing with extra guys.
The Worst Show on Turf gained a total of 14 yards on 19 carries, and if you count the yards they lost on sacks as rushing yards lost, they actually lost 29 yards on the ground. They weren’t even into positive yardage until their fifth drive, when the game was already out of reach. And their 5 offensive penalties didn’t help, giving them 8 more pentalties than the Bears, totalling 71 more lost yards. So basically half the time they had the ball, they were either commiting a penalty, gaining no yards, losing yards, getting sacked, throwing an incomplete pass or throwing an interception.
But even though you need to beat whoever they put in front of you, this is not what our players are paid to do. They are paid to beat good teams, and to play consistently on both sides of the ball for four quarters. The Bears are not doing these things consistently right now. But the one thing that does seem to be going well is our running game. Though Matt Forte fumbled for the first time in his 11-game career, he ran for a career-best 132 yards on 20 carries – that’s a 6.6 yard average! And 2 carries after his fumble, he broke a 47-yarder, scoring his 9th TD. He’s now rushed for over 900 yards, and is averaging 4.0 yds per carry and over 110 all purpose yds per game. Not only is he making a claim for Rookie of the Year, this kid might be the first Bear RB to keep his job for more than two seasons since Neal Anderson.
Reportin and Retortin on Orton
Orton threw for just 139 yards (18 of 29) but he didn’t throw an INT for the sixth game in a row, giving him a team-record 185 passes without a pick. One could argue that if he’s not throwing INT’s, he’s not throwing enough or not taking any chances. But in that span, he’s 113 of 185 (61%) with 6 TD’s. That’s 8% better than the rest of his career when he’s thrown 17 TD’s against 19 INT’s. So maybe he is getting better.
A win means we didn’t lose (which is good), but it’s not like we “did” anything Sunday. But because we won, we now have the chance to do something big. Green Bay was so exhausted from packing all that fudge last week that they got blown out by New Orleans. So we are now tied for first place with one team – the team we play on Sunday night. The Bears will be approaching this game like it is their season, so it will be. A loss puts us in a tie for second with GB, who beat us. So it is about as must-win as games get in November. It’s put up or shut up, now or never, do or die. And if we can’t beat the team tied with us that we’ve already beaten, we don’t deserve to advance to the post season.
We don’t call many games, but our staff has crunched the numbers, analyzed the data and out-sourced probabilities calculations to NASA. And our prediction for Sunday night is this: Bears win 24-22. But we do fear it is wishful thinking, as half of NASA’s staff are Super Fans.
Super Bowl, Super Let’s Win Sunday Night Then We’ll Talk Super Bears!
© 2008
Bear Down Baffa 
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