Bears blow home opener.

What the hell was that? Honestly!

The Bears blow another late game lead and a team that is only a handful of plays from being 3-0 instead is 1-2 headed into a nightmare match-up with the Philadelphia Eagles.

So let’s break down this debacle from all sides:

Offense:

It was a tale of two halves.

In the first half Kyle Orton couldn’t do anything right. The offense squandered great field position and settled for field goals. And to top it off they managed to give up as many points as the defense when Orton threw on straight to Gaines Adams…. I swear sometimes I wonder if they test for color blindness in the NFL.

Then in the second half Brandon Lloyd decided to play a little football. He made several amazing catches in combining with Matt Forte to finally provide the Bears with two options as they moved down the field put up 15 points. It was by far the best the offense had looked all season.

But once again the Bears came up short on a crucial 3rd down when on a 3rd and 2 immediately after the two minute warning Orton refused to throw it on a naked bootleg and was stuffed for no gain. If you can’t convert 3rd and short in crunch time you can’t win in the NFL.

Defense:

They stuffed the run. They forced four turnovers. They did pretty much everything they wanted to for 50 minutes Sunday. But after that a few things finally caught up with the Bears, like 67 passes from Brian Griese.

First was the fatigue of trying to keep up with the Bucs hurry-up offense. Brian Griese and Co. kept them off guard by rushing to the line and creating mismatches with quick personnel changes. The Bears were regularly left with Hunter Hillenmeyer out in coverage or other equally undesirable one-on-one match ups.

Second was the fact that they couldn’t get a pass rush without blitzing. It’s one thing to blitz occasionally, especially given the quality of the Bears CBs. But Vasher and Tillman can not be left on an island all day without eventually giving up plays.

So Bob Babich was left to decide between blitzing to apply pressure or giving Griese time to pick the Bears apart. To his credit he stayed aggressive and the Bears nearly made several game ending plays, including an almost INT by Vasher. But in the end you can’t run an effective Cover-2 without getting a pass rush with four. A lot of this has to fall on Tommie Harris, Adewale Ogunleye, Alex Brown, and Mark Anderson.

Special Teams:

They survived without all-world Devin Hester. Manning was effective on kick offs and looked like he could’ve broke one all the way on several occasions. And Vasher was more than serviceable returning punts.

Overall this group performed well as usual. The only minor complaint you could make was Gould’s missed 49 yard field goal. If he hits that the Bears probably win the game, but you can’t expect your kicker to be perfect, especially at that range. I am sure well hear plenty about how much he’s paid and how he’s never hit one over 50, but Gould is the last person who should be scapegoated for this debacle.

In conclusion it’s nearly 24 hours later and I still feel sick to my stomach. On the plus side I finally have my voice back so Herman and I will be back tonight to cover two pretty gut wrenching losses.