Bear Down Baffa

Knock, knock.  Who’s there?  First.  First who?  First place, bitches!  In a game we needed to win in order to save our season, the Bears stepped up like a U.S. General going after some civilian poontang.  And with GB losing to the Giants, we moved back into sole possession of first place.  We started slowly yet again, fumbling on our first play, which led to a Viking FG that gave them a 3-0 lead.  We then went 3-and-out after gaining only one yard.  But then we got medieval on they ass.  We picked up 2 turnovers, blocked a FG, played keep-away with the ball and owned the clock as we scored 25 straight points before the half.  And after some hot cocoa and a nice bedtime story, we tucked this one in and put it to bed early.

Cutler studied hypnosis during his week off and applied it to the Vike’s defense

We scored on four straight drives, and it should have been five but Minni blocked a FG at the end of the half.  On those 5 drives, we averaged 7 plays for almost 40 yards despite one of those being a 13-yard TD pass to Matt “Gotta Have” Spaeth on our first play after a Chris “Martini And Rossi Asti Spu” Conte interception.  And those long drives gave us a 15-minute advantage in time of possession, which is always a recipe for victory.

Cutler thent a dart into very little Thpaeth on thith catch, which wuth #7 on ESPN’th top 10 playth

Chicago Red Cross
Though this was a big win, it cost us a lot due to injuries as the Bears training staff put in some OT and Bears players wore out the path to the training room.  And it’s unfortunate that Obamacare hasn’t kicked in yet or it would have all been paid for by tax-payers.

This image has become all too familiar

Devin “My GPS Broke So I Can’t Find the End Zone Anymore” Hester got a concussion.  Peanut “Brittle” Tillman, Matt “Getting Hurt Every Week Is My New” Forte and Lance Briggs “And Stratton” all have ankles.  Chris “Pez Dis” Spencer and Lance “Huey” Louis “And The News” have knees.  And Brennan has a mangina.

A translator was brought in to assess Hester’s concussion because he only speaks jive

O-Line Musical Chairs
GM Phil Emery “And Ivory” read my blog last week, and apparently it lit a fire under his ass.  What most would call a clusterfuck of a line actually worked out for us on Sunday.  We benched Gabe Carimi “Green” and replaced him with newly signed, 7-year vet Jonathan “(Not So) Great” Scott.  We also benched “The Battle Of” Chilo Rachal, who subsequently left the team in a tizzy, and put Spencer (who was benched for Rachal after week 2) back in.

Scott to Spencer: “Hey man, you got Rachal’s cell number?”

Then when Spencer and Louis went down, Carimi filled in nicely at guard, which he’d never played before.  And even with Forte hurt, they lead us to as many rushing yards as Minnesota, and only allowed only 1 sack.  Jared Allen, who had 3.5 sacks the last time we faced them, was apparently on the field.  But they also kept him on lock down.

Trainer to Louis:  “Dude, you better get up or they’re gonna put Carimi back in!”

Offense
This game was won by the (gulp!) offense.  They put up 28 points, converting 2 turnovers to TD’s.  And though we didn’t gain a ton of yardage, we were 11-19 on third downs, and only punted once until the fourth quarter.  We only averaged 2.9 yards per carry, but we committed to – and stuck with – the running game, carrying it 39 times.

“Just when we thought Carimi was out, they pull him back in!”

In the first half, Cutler was a “white-hot” 15-17 (88.2%) for 117 yards, 6.9 yards per attempt, 1 TD, 0 INT’s and a 115.0 QBR.  Ponder, on the other hand, was a “white-not” 8-17 (47.1%) for 70 yards, 4.1/att, 0 TD’s, 1 INT and a 33.9 QBR.

Cutler not only played awesome, but he talked shit, even drawing an Unsportsmanlike Conduct penalty for taunting

The Butler finished 23-31 (74.2%) for 188 yards, 6.1/att, 1 TD, 1 INT and an 86.5 QBR.  If it wasn’t for the pick, his QBR would’ve been a lot higher.  And the pick was tipped, so it wasn’t his fault.  Is there anyone in Chicago still doubting his skills today?

Cutler reminds Marshall that he always goes “one in the pink, one in the stink”

Cutler also spread the ball out to 8 different receivers.  Marshall had game-highs 12 catches and 92 yards.  He had half of our receptions, and he caught almost everything in traffic.  Does anyone remember Bernard Berrian right about now?

Marshall is already over 1,000 yards and has as many catches as all last year

Defense
You can’t really ask a defense to stop a guy named “All Day,” but you can ask them to contain him.  And that’s just what the Bears did.  Peterson did run for 108 yards on 18 carries (a 6.0 average), but most of that came in garbage time.  In the first half, we held him to only 25 yards on 7 carries, and forced him to fumble at the Viking 32, which we converted to a TD.

Instead of “All Day,” Peterson should be called “Half Day”

We were also tough on the pass, allowing only 144 yards on 43 pass plays.  We only had 2 sacks, but we forced 3 turnovers, giving us 33 on the season.  We’re now averaging over 3 turnovers a game in our last 16 games.

Conte is the sixth Bear with multiple picks

Special Teams
Julius “Salt ‘N” Peppers blocked a FG, but we also had one blocked, so they kind of negate one another.  But we scored a 2-pt conversion on a fake when Adam “You Have One More Pod Than Me, So I Have One” Podlesh ran it in with the grace and ferocity of an NFL punter.

Podlesh looked like he was “podleshing” his pants on this scamper

Outlook
At 8-3, we’re now officially better than last year, which capped out at 7-3 before Cutler’s injury.  And if we can somehow write off last week’s debacle, we’re looking pretty solid.  At 5-1 at home, we host Seattle on Sunday, who’s 1-5 on the road.  Then we go to the Twin Cities for a rematch of this game before hosting GB for the sixth matchup with them since January 2011 – all five of which have been won by GB.  But even if GB catches us, we have a two-game lead on any current Wild Card team.

Carimi even commits holding penalties during TD celebrations

Quotes to Note
Lovie:  “It’s a game we had to have.  Division home game, you have to stand up for those.”  Yup, especially when the team you beat would’ve been tied with you if you had lost.

Lovie on getting bit by the injury bug:  “I normally don’t write down injuries on a sheet here, (but) there’s so many, I had to (in order) to remember them all.”

“The Hangover’s” Mr. Chow:  “Ha-ha, it’s funny because he’s fat!”

Urlacher on the fake PAT:  “I thought it was a high snap; I was kinda pissed.  I looked and then (laughter).  I saw them practicing it this week, but you never know if they’re gonna call it…It was nice to see him score, run that guy over in the end zone.”

Cutler when asked if he tied J’Marcus Webb’s shoe:  “I did.  I loosened it, tied it.  I guess my fatherly instincts are kicking in a little bit.  I was trying to keep the drive going so we wouldn’t have to burn a timeout.”

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

BEAR DOWN!

© 2012

This entry was posted on Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 2:12 pm and is filed under i) 2012 Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.