i agree with the both of u! They would have been on FIRE over those missed tackles and dropped passes, and INT's...but it would have been great, cos we still won, and we would have the damn "W" to hang our hat's on!



"DICK JAURON!"[/b]

Very sloppy, but I can forgive it if it's an isolated incident. As for Rex, Jurko is right: he giveth and he taketh away. All in all, he's still a massive upgrade for the offense, however. He has got to stop making those dumb throws, because his good ones have been very good.

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I respectfully disagree. Today made me more nervous. Rex probably could have had 4 or 5 interceptions if the Vikings wouldn't have dropped the ball. This was the best team we have faced and they are not a great team. It was a squeaker and are lucky we won it. Thankfully he did okay (not great) under pressure. He needs to put the ball in the end zone in the red zone. That's been a consistent problem in the first 3 weeks.

No QB is perfect, all I want in a QB is a winner. Someone who may not show it in the stat line (see: Tom Brady, Ben Rothlselslslgberger) but they ind a way to win. Sure Grossman made a few bad decisions today, but he made the one play when he had to and it lifted the Bears over a tough division foe. This offense is growing up and the more Grossman gets seasoned as a starting QB the more and more we'll be suprised by his composure and ability to make the play when he has to and win the Bears a game.

Hub made a good point today during the post game show: Seattle will most likely play a more straight up defense as opposed to what GB, Detroit and Minny have done (stacking the box), so I'm hoping that Jones stops with his someone's-shooting-at-my-feet dance routine and just plows through any open hole that's available. Seattle's gonna be tough as shit, seeing as how they just bludgeoned Eli and the Giants today. Let's hope for a more balanced offensive attack and that Desmond Clark will be ok.

1)If I were Seattle's defensive coordinator, I would be calling a lot of blitzes against the Bears. As Spaulding said, Rex could have very easily thrown 4-5 interceptions because added pressure caused him to make some egregious decisions. The offensive line and Thomas Jones proved equally inept at handling the blitz.

2)Olin Kreutz is not having a good season. He almost got Rex killed yesterday by ignoring Pat Williams' rush and instead needlessly double teaming another defender. After the game, Kreutz seemed to explain this mystifying mental error by blaming it on crowd noise. But he did the same thing in the season opener at Green Bay. So every time the Bears play a road game this year, is he going to give defensive tackles an unimpeded path to the QB? His "illegal snap" penalties are also brutal.

3)The defensive line had a disappointing game yesterday. Carolina just destroyed the Vikings offensive line while the Bears, except for Tommie Harris, looked very ordinary against them. Even the excellent pass rusher Alex Brown had a rough game. And Ogunleye didn't fare much better even though he was matched up against a human turnstile. We need better edge rushing.

4)Thomas Jones is brutal. Granted, the offensive line hasn't been as good this year as last, but he is also failing to see holes, too. And his blocking has sucked. If Benson is worse than Jones, then he's a horrible draft pick.

5)The Bears defense made the Vikings look better than they actually are. Brown, Urlacher--try to wrap somebody up, will ya?

6)I like Rex's mental toughness. He had a crappy game, but still came through when the team needed him most. That's a very good sign for the future--if he can correct his bad decision-making.

7)Someone please tell Devin Hester that he needs to go upfield, not sideways. I think the guy is confused.

How did Robbie Gould become good all of a sudden?

9)Even when they're not playing up to their potential, the Bears defense still delivers some unbelievable hits. Last week Furrey started getting alligator arms in the 2nd half. This week Troy Williamson and Steve Hutchinson got totally wiped out.

10)Despite apparently weighing about 110 lbs., Bernard Berrian continues to impress. I hope that sliver-legged man can stay healthy for the whole season. What's happened to Mark Bradley, by the way?

100% agree on Kreutz.

Gould is a pro-bowler - he needs to keep up his torrid pace of touchbacks from week 2.

Thomas, stop dancing.
Hester, stop running backwards.

Is Bradley 100%? If so it looks like Davis has beat him out for #3 reciever.

Glad to see you and I watched the same game, Midge.

One thing that puzzled me too was Rex's constant backpedaling and subsequent throws off of his back foot when pressured. While he is no Michael Vick, he certainly has better escapability than what he displayed yesterday, and that is often times when he makes his best throws - rolling out. Could that have been a post-injury mental block about running around on the Metrodome turf, or is the Vikings' pass rush really that ferocious that he had nowhere else to go?

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And to think I was going to come on here and ask you if watched A. Brown yesterday. I (and Lawrence Holmes for whatever that's worth) thought he had an excellent game. I think he was only credited with three tackles ( not including the horse collaring BS and the incorrect offsides penalty in which he caused a fumble). However, he and the rest of the line were getting pressure without the need of blitzing LB/DBs. They played the run very well.

If you think three tackles, no sacks, and two penalties is an "excellent game", then you and I don't agree on the definition of "excellent".

Carolina absolutely destroyed the Vikings offensive line. They had 5 or 6 sacks and were hitting Johnson on almsot every passing play in the 2nd half. The Bears mounted nothing like that pressure. They looked very ordinary.

Would someone tell me why the Bears didn't just rush up to the line and spike the ball before the first half ended? That would have provided more than enough time to get the FG crew out and kick the damn thing. Am I missing something?

Other than that, I think everything else has been covered in this thread...

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The penalties were questionable at best. One would have resulted in a sack/strip. The other would have resulted in him running down an RB from behind to stop him from picking up a first down. I and others thought he had a good game. You and others did not.

The line was good but not dominant. Definitely not ordinary. They put pressure on the QB without help and did a nice job stopping the run. Johnson, unlike Grossman was unflappable in the face of pressure, save for one play that I remember. That is the next step I would like to see in Grossman's progress.

The Viking D was getting pressure but not sacking Rex. Would you say the Viking pressure had an impact on the game? I'm not from the Blache school of pass rushing but pressure has an unquantifiable impact on games. You only give weight to pure statistics so things like containment on the run and pressure on the pass have no weight in your world. They do in the game as it is played.

I don't even care to argue this point with you. I assume you get as fatigued by it as I do.

The ref's didn't even have time to set the ball before the gun sounded.

one QB Sack?!?!?! that's not good enough.
the extra 3-4 yards running with the ball carrier while trying to strip it move....and this isn't one Bear. Multiple times I saw a Viking surrounded by Bears D players, all taking swats at the ball, and nobody actually tackling the ball carrier.
Rex is lucky the Vikes DB's seem to catch 1 out 3 balls that hit their hands....For the first 3 quarters, he threw off his back foot frequently.
Running game, at times, looked o.k. a few runs here and there....nothing special.
Devin Hester....please run straight upfield. quit trying to make 5 cuts in as many yards.
Mushin and Robbie are studs.

an ugly win, but a win nonetheless.

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@audioidkid

It is ugly whenever you play in Minny. I can appreciate fans wanting to look like Vikings on game day but what do you do the other 355 days out of the year?

The stadium is always loud and they do seem to play well there.

It's funny that you complain about arguments even as you're starting one. Physician, heal thy self.

I can see why you say I exaggerate the importance of quantifiable statistics to support my points, especially since you have none to forward your view of Alex Brown. The stats are a bit of an "inconvenient truth" for you, eh?

I do not think you exaggerate them, you rely on them exclusively. The convenient truth is that he is regarded well enough to be considered a Pro Bowl alternate without dominating numbers. He must have one hell of a personality.

So you're saying you don't think sack totals indicate how well defensive linemen rush the passer? You don't believe the sack numbers suggest a larger pattern beyond the specific plays to which they refer? So it's possible a 6-sack guy is a better pass rusher than an 18-sack guy?

Stats and brother-in-laws sometimes lie. Brown had a "good" game. He got called for a penalty when he absolutely timed the snap perfectly and caused a fumble. Didn't count cuz they flagged him but that's not his fault. He had decent pressure and played the run nice.

In todays NFL sacks are tougher to come by. Everybody running the West Coast offense and the QB's are doing the 3 step drops and release on alot of plays. Not enough time to get a sack but you can disrupt him and that means more sometimes if you force a pick. Brown is a good pass rusher and good against the run.

Apparently they are harder to come by for some than they are for others. Here's a partial list of guys who sacked the QB more frequently than Alex Brown did last year:

1 Derrick Burgess OAK 16
2 Osi Umenyiora NYG 14.5
3 Simeon Rice TB 14
4 Kyle Vanden Bosch TEN 12.5
5 Aaron Schobel BUF 12
6 Jason Taylor MIA 12
7 Robert Mathis IND 11.5
8 Michael Strahan NYG 11.5
9 Dwight Freeney IND 11
10 Jared Allen KC 11 55
11 John Abraham NYJ 10.5
12 Joey Porter PIT 10.5
13 Rod Coleman ATL 10.5
14 Julius Peppers CAR 10.5
15 Shawne Merriman SD 10
16 Adewale Ogunleye CHI 10
17 Leonard Little STL 9.5
18 Adalius Thomas BAL 9
19 Clark Haggans PIT 9
20 Bryce Fisher SEA 9
21 Reggie Hayward JAC 8.5
22 Rocky Bernard SEA 8.5
23 Will Smith NO 8.5
24 Terrell Suggs BAL 8
25 Greg Ellis DAL 8
26 DeMarcus Ware DAL 8
27 Phillip Daniels WAS 8
28 Adrian Wilson ARI 8
29 Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila GB 8
30 Bryant Young SF 8

can you look up his pressure's and see where he ranks. Is there a stat that ranks how many times a running back wizzed past these ends because they over pursued out of their lust to get a sack. I'm just point out other factors that you are dismissing. Alot of those guys on that list don't play the run well and cost their teams big plays.

So are you saying that Alex Brown is a better pass rusher than Jason Taylor or Dwight Freeney? If so, then you are wrong. If not, then apparently the stats aren't as misleading as you suggest.

No

I'm not saying Berns steals from the board, but I have heard him say things on air that were written here the night before. Probably just a coincidence though.

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