Well, bad Rex showed up last night, much to my dismay. Being a Chicago native I was pissing my pants when Hester ran back the opening kick-off for a TD, but my pissing was short lived as it seemed RG was determined to play his second worse game of the year last night.
So what now? Rex is almost universally loathed in Chicago for playing so poorly not only in the SB but for the last half of the regular season. Will he have a job next year? If so, will he be starting?
FTR I feel sorry for him. It’s got to be tough to read about/watch on TV how shitty everyone thinks you are and how you let a whole city down.
My husband is calling for a coaching change, as well, but I’ll bet that both Lovie and Rex will be back. Even with the uneven performances this year, they got all the way to the SB in Rex’s first full year. As aggravating as it is that they didn’t win, I think there’s a strong case to be made that Rexy just needs to develop a little bit & figure out how to be consistent…
How do you fire a coach for getting a team to the Super Bowl and losing? Marv Levy lost four Super Bowls IN A ROW and the city of Buffalo considers him only slightly less powerful than Jesus.
As for Sex Cannon… I say trade him to Green Bay, because he plays like he wants to be Brett Favre (and throws about as many picks.)
I guess it depends on why you think you lost. My husband thought there were bad coaching decisions throughout the game (can’t defend him on this point, since we haven’t really discussed in detail, and I don’t know enough about football to say). As much as we like Ron Turner (both Illinois alums), I think he’d probably get rid of him, too. Again, don’t know too much about the specific complaint, except that he says Turner runs the same plays too often.
Rex wasn’t the only one to play badly last night, although I don’t doubt he feels like shit, particularly after those hike-fumbles. He did make some good passes that just didn’t result in yardage gains.
That said, I couldn’t help but notice a frequent look on his face that reminded me of Dubya right after somebody has asked him a question he wasn’t expecting. A sort of “huh?” look that doesn’t give one confidence in him.
Grossman simply isn’t good enough. Bears need to win now because the defense is not going to stay together forever. That said, Indy just played a much better game. They adapted to the conditions and, for the most part, dominated the game.
Smith may go to Dallas from what talk radio has been saying. He’s a good coach but that doesn’t seem like a good move to me.
The rating doesn’t tell the whole story - for instance, it doesn’t take into account that he couldn’t handle the snap from Kreutz, which led to two Chicago turnovers. Grossman played a horrendous game last night.
Oh come on, you guys are just being swayed by the “ignorant” media. You just don’t understand Grossman and his greatness. In the big game yesterday, he uh…he…well…uh, at least he didn’t peg any cheerleaders off with a sniper rifle. Not one.
I don’t get this either. Thirty other coaches ended up just like Lovie. They lost too.
I didn’t think that they had a bad game plan. Indy just beat 'em, straight up. And Chicago only had Thomas after Benson went down with an injury. Grossman didn’t play horrendously. He was so-so, basically the usual Rex, and had a killer interception for a TD.
If not winning the big one was the metric for getting shitcanned, Dungy would’ve been out on his ass in Indy years ago (hell, probably last year - that game vs. the Steelers would have had me jumping off a tall building if I was a Colts fan. Bad coaching and play all around). Good for them for giving the guy a chance to make it happen.
Chicago had better lock up Lovie with a long-term contract, or they are going to regret letting a great coach go. Maybe he’s too wedded to Rex at QB, but it’s not like Kyle Orton is exactly an upgrade.
I think the people calling for a coaching change are doing so not becasue he lost the Super Bowl, but becasue of his stubborness in sticking with Rex. Could Brian Griese have done better? We’ll never know, but we do know that he “gambled” with Rex, and lost. He made a head coach decision that backfired badly.
Brian Griese (the #2 QB in Chicago’s depth chart) is.
I think Rex’s problems aren’t just on the field. He’s not prepared for the games (witness the week 17 loss to Green Bay), his OC doesn’t call plays that are conducive to keeping his young QB’s head in the game, and he’s allowed too much leeway to rear back and throw the ball when he should be learning to run the offense better. He seems to think he’s still playing in Spurrier’s fun-n-gun (and his coaches haven’t dissuaded him of this), and that doesn’t fly in the NFL.
Those problems are directly attributable to coaching - both the OC as playcaller and the HC as motivator and as the OC’s boss. I could see Chicago being reluctant to give Lovie Smith a big contract, especially after their experience with Dick Jauron. I think he did a passable job, but if I’m looking for an NFL head coach, Smith doesn’t make my short list (yet).
There was some ugly play all over the field. The Bears were showing that they were really missing Tommie Harris. They D really needed some rest, and they really needed to stop the counter/stunt up the middle. Bears D also should’ve exploited the rookies (well, one did exploit us for a touchdown), especially the guard (I forget his name).
When Benson went down, the Bears should’ve sent Adrian Peterson to Benson’s position. They probably never practiced like that, but they should have. The Bears didn’t run enough at all.
Rex cannot drop hikes! Fucking period. He never got into a rhythm because they were never on the field long enough. He wasn’t that bad, though, until he started forcing the issue.
Oh, and receivers must hang onto the ball (but that was the least of their worries).
(And, Colts were holding all over the place, particularly in the first half). I know…waa-aaahhh-hh–h-h-h!)
Like I said, I can’t defend my husband’s opinion, because I know basically jack about football. All I know is that he was unhappy about the play calling.
The Bears did not lose because of Rex Grossman, but he is a good part of the reason they did not win. If you look at how they played in a generally miserable first half, he was 6 for 8 (I think), but most of those were short, easy throws, not on third downs. The announcers were pointing out that he was poor on third down, but the reality is that the Bears were running on third down because they simply have no confidence in their quarterback.
Now, in the fourth quarter, Grossman showed why they have no confidence. Both interceptions were terrible passes. The first was a lollipop pass thrown off his back foot off balance, to the wrong spot (the receiver was supposed to make a run up the field, but the corner simply watched the rainbow and took the pot of gold at its end). The second was an atrocious pass downfield, for no particular reason (he wasn’t rushed, he wasn’t being sacked, he wasn’t being hurried, and the receiver was wide open when he threw it). Why they think this guy is so great is beyond me; he seems to me the archtypical major college quarterback that only excels at the college level, mostly by heaving balls downfield and taking advantage of poor defensive backs.
But if you want to know why the Bears lost, they lost because their defense never was allowed to do its job. Partly, that’s because the Colts did a good job of attacking it; partly it’s because the defensive coaching staff wouldn’t let them play aggressively. And the safeties were suspect, as they were all year.
He’s not good, but he’s really not THAT bad. He’s still young and should be given time to develop, but I don’t know if that’s likely in Chicago. He made some horrible decisions last night, but he deserves to be in the NFL (just not necessarily a starter). One lost fumble off of a snap in those conditions…I’ll give you that. But two…no way, you’ve got to be aware that could happen again (yeah, bad luck and all, but I blame the second one on him).
Finally, if the Bears let Lovie Smith go, they’re stupid. He’s an excellent coach and took a Bears team that really wasn’t great (sorry Chi fans, but it wasn’t the 85 team out there) all the way to the Super Bowl. Only way they should lose him is if Jerry Jones is crazier than we know and will pay him a ton of money plus compensation to the Bears.
Indy was just better last night. Indy would probably be better on 7 out of 10 nights. No shame in losing to a good team; doesn’t sting any less, but there’s no shame in it.