Bears came out with a blitz on the first play. But beyond that, they correctly anticpated that the Vikings would try to keep it on the ground as much as possible and, though they mixed it up, they played quite a lot with eight in the box in an effort to stop the run. They played more cover two late as they anticipated that the Vikings would pass from behind.
It was pretty scary for a while in the first quarter as the Vikings literally ran over the Bears, particularly as they attacked the edges. When a team is running on you and you are stacking the box there’s the potential for real trouble. Fortunately the Bears tightened things up in the second quarter, playing with better discipline and speed, and they did a better job of stoping the running game.
50 seconds left in the first half and I was wondering if there was going to be another coverage break down to allow a big score. There wasn’t.
The Vikings were running at the edges, taking advantage of the Bears stunting their ends inside. It worked well until the Bears adjusted.
The Bears tackling was awful at times. Just awful.
The Bears also looked pretty slow and sluggish at the start of the game. I’d like to see the Bears better prepared to play mentally coming out of the locker room the last few weeks.
Kudos to Henry Melton and Corey Wooton for making big plays. These are young players that need to show that they can play. On the down side, Wooton lost contain on Joe Webb’s first ever touchdown.
Webb looked OK but its obvious why he was considered to be a receiver by the Vikings scouts. He’s quick mentally, throws sharp short passes and he’s mobile. But, though he’s got a good strong arm, based upon what I saw this game he’s not accurate deep. Though Brad Childress apparently decided to try, I’m not sure you can coach that.
Offense
The Bears also came out running and did it with some success. They didn’t do really well, however, until they stopped running inside and, like the Vikings, started running off tackle and attacking the edges )or at least until Matt Forte started finding the holes there).
The Bears offensive line had their usual problems, particularly with the Williams boys, Pat and Kevin, inside. Generally speaking they were allowing too much penetration inside. They did better away from the center and that’s where the holes were.
The pass protection wasn’t much better. There weren’t many sacks but there was a lot of pressure. It didn’t help that the Vikings anticipated the pass on third down. It looked like a jail break out there with a lot of blitzing in those situations. All of it got better as the game went on, as it usually does. The running game got going and that helped. But just once I’d like to see them come out and play well immediately.
Johnny Knox’s touchdown was an example of some poor play by safety Madieu Williams. Its nice to know that happens to safeties on other teams, too. Tough position to play in the cover two.
Wonderful game by Forte who really ran well. Maybe the best I’ve seen him all year.
As much as anything, the Bears success on the ground really set things up for success. The play action worked to perfection and the Beas got some big plays.
Jay Cutler generally looked sharp when he had time, which he frequently did once the running game got going.
Miscellaneous
Mike Tirico, Jon Gruden and Ron Jaworski did their usual great job. Both Jaworski and Gruden did a nice job of noticing things that other color men often miss or fail to point out.
The kicking game was definitely hurt by the cold weather. Neither kicker could kick off very deep. The kick coverage by the Bears was spotty and the first return was particularly long.
The Viking coverage was poor on punts, giving Devin Hester a record for returns for a touchdown. I’ve no idea why they stopped kicking the ball out of bound and started kicking to him. In any case, there was some bad Viking tackling out there and some good blocking by the Bears.
Way, way too many penalties. As usual the offensive line was largely, though not entirely, at fault. Successive penalties set the Bears back to first and thirty before the long connection to Johnny Knox for the first touchdown.
There were too many drops, possibly because of the cold. They have to do better than that no matter what the weather.
The Bears did well in the turnover department. I guess that’s no surprise with Brett Favre and a rookie at quarterback. Still, its good to see them back on track in that respect. They need to win the turnover battle if they are going to win games. Cutler threw a bad interception under pressure.
Kudos to the Bears for winning what admittedly turned out to be a weak division. Give them credit for doing it despite some obvious weaknesses. Hopefully they will continue to improve in those areas to get it together for a long playoff run.
Bears came out playing passive in the cover-2 in the first quarter. They had nickel personnel on the field on first down.
The Patriots obviously anticipated what the Bears were going to do and they responded by running the ball and they did it very well.
That wouldn’t have been so bad if it hadn’t been for the fact thay the Bears weren’t stopping them from passing either. If you can’t stop the pass with nickel personnel on the field its going to be a long day. It was.
Eventually the Bears started putting in the standard front seven more often and bringing an eigtth guy into the box in running situations. They haven’t had to do that for most of the year but they did here. This did help stop the run but Patriots quarterback Tom Brady passed at will.
Color man Phil Simms almost immediately pointed out the significant fact that the Patriots offensive line was expected to block the Bears pass rush without help. The fact that they did was a huge key to their victory. The pass rush wasn’t getting to Brady quick enough under the circumstances.
The Patriots run the play action really well. Of course it starts by running successfully which they did until the Bears gave in and started to scheme to stop it, giving the pass.
The Patriots executed the passing game to perfection finding the holes in the cover-2 defense all day, especially by throwing over the middle. The gaps were huge particularly when the linebackers got sucked toward the line of scrimmage by the play action fake.
The Bears just weren’t playing fast enough or tight enough to stop a balanced Patriot offense that was executing well. The footing had a devastating effect.
The last play of the first half was a disaster. Charles Tillman let Branch release to the outside. He got no help over the top. Absolute disaster.
Terrible game for Tillman.
Give the Bear defense credit. They continued to give good effort in the second half and really laid some good hits.
Offense
The Bears came out running and it looked like the right thing to do. They were getting yardage and the Patriots seemed perfectly happy to give it to them by staying in their standard 3-4. But the Bears didn’t execute well enough, consistently enough to do what they had to on the ground. This was true particularly when they tried to run up the middle.
On a related note, the Bears offensive line was particularly bad today. The Patriots defensive linemen got penetration and generated negative plays all day.
I don’t know what it was with quarterbacks not sliding today but after watching Aaron Rogers get a concussion I grimaced when Bears quarterback Jay Cutler took off with the ball. He’s got to start sliding.
The protection was really bad for Cutler and the Patriots got good pressure up the middle. Once it got to be about 24-0, the Patriots just started rushing all out, knowing the the Bears had to throw the ball. In fairness to the line they did improve in the second half (as usual). But it was way too little, way too late.
Cutler did throw the ball pretty well today. He’s got the arm to compete in this kind of weather if he has time to throw. I know he was intercepted twice but he was simply trying to make something happen under trying circumstances.
For a team that dominated the game the way they did, the Patriots didn’t tackle very well.
Miscellaneous
Jim Nantz and Phil Simms did a very good job. It’s tough when the game is so uncompetitive. I really appreciated the occasional wide shot that CBS gave the television viewers. It allowed us to get a glimpse of the formation before the camera zoomed in more closely.
The special teams were both good and bad. Good with the returns as Danieal Manning had some good ones. Bad with the kick coverage as the Patriots had some good returns as well. The ball was dead which made kicking difficult.
The Bears deferred on the coin toss giving the ball to the Patriots first. I was mildly surprised because one of the keys is to keep Brady and that offense off the field. No harm done.
The turnovers were, of course, killers. The Patriots converted them into points and things really snowballed in the first half because of it. The Bears, on the other hand, missed repeated opportunities to get turnovers of their own – opportunities which they usually take advantage of. Not a good game.
The Patriots didn’t drop many balls in the first half. They let down and dropped quite a number of them in the second half. The Bears had maybe a few more than usual but relatively speaking it wasn’t a serious problem.
The Bears, again, had far too many penalties. As usual, the offensive line was the main culprit.
The Bears seemed to have a lot more trouble with the footing than the Patriots did. It wasn’t really the slipping around that was so obvious but they looked tentative on their feet and it limited their mobility. The Patriots looked like they were much quicker and more sure footed.
Thank goodness the Packers lost to the Lions today.
The Tweet of the game comes from Brad Biggs of the Chicago Tribune: “In his team speech last night, @ZachZaidman reports Lovie Smith was so emotional, some players teared up. Anyone cry at halftime?”
The Bears didn’t play well and they didn’t handle the footing very well, either. But those things can be corrected. Their biggest problem today was that this was an awful, awful match up for them. The Patriots look and play like they were almost designed to compete against cover two defenses like the Bears. The loss was disappointing and I’m as frustrated as anyone. But, unlike some fans, I’m also not going to be calling this a team full of frauds, either. Circumstances and their offensive line just conspired against them today. Here’s hoping they learn from it and are better able to handle them later. There’s still hope that over the next month that offensive line will solidify and come together to make a playoff run. But they’d better hurry.