late night bearsing gone wild!!#$@

hello and welcome back to the 2006 season of i loves me some bears. i am sporadic and/or quite lazy so i can only hope that i start making better use of this facility in order to establish my football writing credentials.

anywho, in approximately 41 hours the 3-0 beloved take on the mighty seattle seahawks (how many times has that phrase been used in the grand scheme of things?) in what has been called a "statement game" and a "NFC showdown" by the national media, who by and large dismissed the bears as a 9-7 or 10-6 one and done playoff team, or even #2 in the division behind the minnesota vikings (if you trust espn's "cold pizza")

allow me to disclaim early that i am indeed a "rex guy", meaning that over the last few years whenever there was a "controversy" at QB i have always sided with rex grossman. i believe that the wonder bear has that intangible "it" factor, many call it "moxie", which gives him a pretty solidly high cieling. when the criminally stupid pined for orton to keep on starting thanks to his 10-5 record, i yearned for rex. when chicago's very own windbag mike north kept making the case for griese in the preseason, i yearned for rex. so with that in mind, i would like to continue on with my potential bias duly noted.

thus far the bears look like a very solid contender-type football team. last year's playoff loss to carolina left many a bears fan, let alone an actual bear, with a foul taste in their mouth. the vaunted defense was exposed in the secondary by the combination of jake delhomme and steve smith, who connected for something like 12+ receptions and 210+ yards and 2 TDs, the touchdowns featuring either a burned bear or a fallen bear. evidently the gameplan was centered around stopping deshaun foster, which they did and thensome, however the defense allowed 29 points to a team which had managed only about 6 in a meeting earlier in the season. even worse was the fact that the offense looked pretty solid and managed to regroup after being down 16-3 and get within a TD/2pt in the fourth quarter, ultimately marching down the field in the last few minutes and ending all hope once rex threw an interception at the carolina ~25 with approximately three minutes left.

the defense was obviously sickened by their performance, which led to its pro bowl players from bowing out of the game in a symbolic gesture after their collapse. going into this year, jerry angelo decided on acquiring defensive depth in the draft and also adding in nickelback ricky manning jr from carolina in free agency. at the time of the draft i was set on the bears getting a wideout and/or tight end, however as time wore on i managed to understand the mindset of the draft. while the offense was suitably egregious at times, the logic was that if the bears could shore up the secondary and add depth to an already good defense then you'd fortify the team's strongest area and essentially make the defense that much more of a gambit for opponents to run. while offense was clearly an area where the team needed to improve in order to make them a more legitimate contender, you figure that you had to roll the dice somewhere and see what you have in terms of unheralded players.

welp, three games into the season and i can say that a healthy rex grossman makes a world of difference with this offense. rex throws a nice tight ball that zips to the target, he can hit receivers in stride, and he also has the confidence to pick himself up after a bad play and be ready to take advantage of his next opportunity. rex has a good assortment of tools for the quarterback position, however his downsides are that he's short (approximately six feet even) and slow/veritably-immobile in the pocket. he's pretty good about being nimble and agile in terms of ducking and sidestepping pressure, though this year he's shown a weakness in that he'll make some ill advised throws under heavy pressure, the prime example being antoine winfield's TD interception return in last week's contest versus minnesota. still, rex can make all of the throws that you'd expect an NFL starting quarterback to make, he's got a nice quick release, and he seems to be somewhat intelligent in terms of adapting to the flow of the game as its going on. the other glaring deficency with rex is his lack of experience, as this is his fourth year and i believe sunday's contest will be his 11th pro start. freakish injuries are the culprit here, but with that in mind, it's still really refreshing to see a bears quarterback have success so relatively early in his career. i believe that rex has the opportunity to improve considerably with experience, so if he's able to start the full slate of games this season i believe he'll be a noticeably better QB come playoff time than he is even right now, sitting pretty as the NFC offensive player of the month for september.

oh yeah and if rex is to get hurt again (knock on wood) angelo did bring in a very competent backup in brian griese. this isn't your older brother's bears team where a QB injury meant the carousel of jonathan quinn, craig krenzel, and chad hutchinson. you've actually got a Qb that could start for a decent # of teams in the NFL, so if the horrible is to happen once again at least you don't have to erase any and all hope for the season, although i think it'd be a considerable blow with the quality of QBing that rex grossman has provided thus far.

the running game hasn't been especially effective yet, other than still providing some ability to make the playaction work. it's sounding like the 2006 chicago whitesox rallying cry of "don't worry, it'll get going soon enough" which is troublesome. thomas jones is devolving into james allen before our very eyes, noticeably shuffling behind the line once he gets the ball, then usually running into a pile of men. thus far it takes a gaping hole to get jones some seperation, even then he's usually taken down by the secondary for a 15 yard gain at most. unfortunately, that doesnt happen often. whether he's hurt or just plain ol regressing has yet to be determined, but this is where the potential of cedric benson would come in handy.