Sheesh, so it’s been a while since I’ve really done one of these huh? I don’t even know where to start. Oh wait, yeah I do.

Your 2007 Chicago Bears – The most frustrating team to watch ever

Okay maybe not ever, but the frustrating thing with this team is that we went to the Super Bowl with basically the same team. If I was watching this exact same team about 2 or 3 seasons ago, I would be thinking “Oh man, we’re so close to being a decent team.” But since we were already a Superbowl contending team, this is just unacceptable. And even though I like Lovie Smith as a person, and I certainly was a fan of his last year, one complaint I always had, even in the midst of our success last season, was that our coaching staff was completely unable to make changes to their gameplan on the fly. That inability always concerned me, even last season (and I did mention that several times on here).

Well that has really bitten us in the ass this year. We really are the poorest coached team in the NFL right now. There are so many penalties, so many inexplicable play calls, and so much frustration. For example, this past week we start off running a no huddle offense. It looks fantastic! We completely catch the Giants on their heels. So what do we do on the next possession? Back to the normal old “hasn’t worked all season” offense. What the hell? Keep the no huddle going, ram it down their throats! Nah, since we have the lead, we’ll just play “not to lose” for the rest of the game.

Though our defense has really been a mess pretty much all season, they got 4 freakin turnovers this game, and the offense didn’t put it away. That game should have been out of reach mid-way through the second quarter. Instead we went back to conservative unimaginative offense that has not worked this year. I don’t know who’s making the play calls, but they need to be fired. I’m assuming it’s Ron Turner, but if it’s Lovie, then he needs to go too. The whole team just looks unprepared with anything that happens.

– Oh my gosh they stopped kicking to Devin Hester, what do we do?

– Oh geez they kicked the ball out of bounds and we have it at the 40, what do we do?

– Oh no the running game isn’t working, what do we do? I know, we’ll put Devin Hester on the field for 4 plays a game, that way the defense knows that we’re doing something with him on those 4 plays.
– Oh no, we actually have a lead in a game, what do we do? I know, we’ll just kick field goals, because we don’t need THAT many points.

It’s so frustrating. I’m pushing for Kyle Orton to start the rest of the games this season. Our entire season hinged on that game against the Giants, and we absolutely should have won that game. But we didn’t, so now we play for next season. however, our coaching staff is not going to do that. They’re going to bull shit about how they still have a chance, and Rex is our quarterback and blah blah blah. I have nothing against Rex, and I actually think he’s done a pretty good job, but I think he’s proven that he will forever be a mediocre quarterback with flashes of greatness. We need to see what Orton can do, and if QB is something we need to address in that offseason. We already know we need an entirely new offensive line, but do we need a new guy behind that too? Probably, but we need to find out for sure.

So there’s my long overdue Bears rant.

So onto my picks (and I’ll post my records from the last few weeks too).

Week 11 Record: 12-4
Week 12 Record: 12-4
Last Week Record: 8-8 (worst record of the season, I think)
Season Record: 123-69 (not too bad, if I do say so myself)

Chicago @ Washington

Although I do feel bad for Washington with the Sean Taylor thing (and I was pretty blown away that they started the first defensive series with 10 players), they’re still a mess, maybe even more so than Chicago is. Plus the Bears have a way of not winning back to back games, nor losing back to back games (and they’ve been better on the road for some reason). And I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Washington will kick to Hester, so he can possibly break his own record. And also if the Bears win this, they can continue to live in the delusion that they could still make the playoffs, and that way we don’t check any of our “for the future” players. So yeah, good stuff. I’m not cynical or anything.

Miami @ Buffalo

Poor Miami. They lose Ronnie Brown, and they actually get desperate enough to have Ricky Williams come back. And then he’s gone for the rest of the season after 6 carries. Unreal. And Buffalo is on the verge of being a really good team. If it wasn’t for Adrian Peterson being a freak, Marshawn Lynch would totally be rookie of the year.

St. Louis @ Cincinnati

I don’t know what my win loss record is with picking Cincy, but it’s not good.

Carolina @ Jacksonville

I kept saying that I didn’t buy Jacksonville, and I still don’t for some reason. But they are a pretty good team, I’ll recognize that in any case.

Dallas @ Detroit

Boy, Detroit sure is coming back down to earth huh? I feel bad for all those Lions fans who were genuinely starting to think they had something to root for and are now telling themselves “I don’t know why I should have expected anything different.” I feel so bad for them.

Tampa Bay @ Houston

Dangit, I was so convinced that this was the year that Houston did something.

Oakland @ Green Bay

I have nothing to say about this one.

San Diego @ Tennessee

This is totally a hunch, but if Haynesworth is out, LT running all day. I don’t know, just a hunch.

NY Giants @ Philadelphia

The Giants are not a very good team.  Philly isn’t either.  So I’m just giving home field on this.

Minnesota @ San Francisco

I can hardly express how badly I want San Fran to win this game.

Arizona @ Seattle

Why not?  I figured I’d throw in a few extra upset pics this week.

Kansas City @ Denver

Two very mediocre teams.  So home field again, I guess.

Pittsburgh @ New England

Some quick New England thoughts:

– they were gifted that win against Baltimore.  A couple questionable ref calls that could really have gone either way.  An incredibly ill advised timeout.  A false start that worked in their advantage.  A touchdown that I’ve seen get called the other way before (with the Bears no less).  The game should have been over 5 different times or so.  Because of that, I don’t see how they’re going to lose for the rest of the year.

– have you ever seen a less likable really good team?  Yankees maybe?  With all the talk of “we don’t want to win, we want to kill the other team” they’re totally like the Hawks from the Mighty Ducks.  If there’s any justice at all in the world, someone will play the role of the Mighty Ducks in the Super Bowl.  Please don’t be Dallas.

– also, this team is so unlikeable because they really don’t have a personality at all.  They’re just mindless killing machines.  They don’t even have Randy Moss antics, he’s just a silent ass hole now instead.  It’s really unfortunate because I used to like the Patriots.  The Cowboys or Raiders were supposed to be this incredibly unlikeable team.

It will be interesting if there’s an undefeated, and defeated team in the same year.  Two records broken.

Cleveland @ NY Jets

I can’t tell you how fun it’s been to see Cleveland playing well.  They would be the perfect Mighty Ducks team for the playoffs.

Indianapolis @ Baltimore

Indy has been looking less than fantastic for a while now, but if anyone can turn it around it’s them.

New Orleans @ Atlanta

Yeah, whatever.

Here come the Hawks, the mighty Blackhawks!