Riddle me this. How is a Bears football game like a teenager’s haircut? You know it is going to be bad, you just don’t know how bad until you actually see it.
On the gruesome meter, this one was midrange, somewhere between hideous and silly, worth both a scowl and a smirk.
On the scowl side would be three points from the offense. Make that the No-ffense. Just 13 points in the last three games. Hermits are more likely to score than the Bears.
Coach Dave Wannstedt grumbled about turnovers and punt returns and field position and had to be reminded that if all of that had not happened, the Bears would still have had to win the game 3-0.
“We had play-action things in the game plan, some spring things,” Wannstedt said. “We just aren’t executing very well.”
To borrow from another coach who was once asked about his offense’s execution, he said he would be for it.
“The only play we make on our scoring drive is roughing the punter,” Wannstedt said.
Likewise, the confusing and capricious flopping of the quarterbacks earns a frown, this time Erik Kramer for Rick Mirer, though Kramer was being asked to come back from 21 points down whereas Mirer took the job just nine points behind.
Kramer’s confidence, apparently, does not need as much of a running start as Mirer’s.
“Of course I would like to play,” Kramer said. “But I’m not going to politic for it. For the morale of the team, we need to do what is best for the team and not for individuals.”
Wannstedt insists he will have to look at the films to see which one will start next week against the woeful Saints of Mike Ditka. Start Wally Weebil for all it matters.
Talk about going back to Square One. This is last February’s square.
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“There is too much unnecessary energy spent worrying about who is going to be the quarterback,” Raymont Harris said.
And who doesn’t agree that every bit of energy the Bears have is necessary?
On the smirk side would be Wannstedt blaming his punter, Todd Sauerbrun, for Deion Sanders scoring a touchdown.
“Fifty-seven yards, 4.21 seconds hang time,” Wannstedt said, giving the specifics, and incorrectly, for the punt that Sanders styled almost the entire 83 yards into the end zone.
The punt was, in fact, only 50 yards, and it wasn’t the 4.21 seconds it took the ball to get there that was the problem. It was the 10.7 seconds that Sanders took to bring it the other way.
“It was a blessing the punter outpunted his coverage,” Sanders said, agreeing with Wannstedt.
Here is a suggestion. Get a different punter, one of those 39-yard up-there-forever kickers, or adjust to Sauerbrun’s leg. The lamest excuse for being 0-5 is that your punter’s leg is too strong.
Wannstedt had no problem sending Sauerbrun’s leg into the game with 6 seconds to play in the first half to punt the ball as the clock ran out, this after wasting nearly 2 minutes trying not to score.
“We wanted to go in at the half 7-3,” Wannstedt said.
That’s 7-3 behind, not 7-3 ahead. Playing to trail by four points at the half is what passes for achievement these days.
“My high school coach once told me something,” Bryan Cox said. “Effort without results doesn’t mean anything.”
In that case, I will not mention that the defense was not half bad (the first half), especially the two cornerbacks, Tom Carter and Walt Harris, man-to-man all game on Michael Irvin and Anthony Miller; that Barry Minter resembled the impact player the Bears are missing; that the rush on Troy Aikman was as menacing as the Bears have looked under Wannstedt.
Nor will I commend the Bears for, as an 0-5 team, continuing to hold firm in their common misery. Whatever good that will ever come out of this has to be shared, not reproached or resented.
“We just have to go out there on Sundays and do for four quarters what we do in practice,” said Carl Reeves.
So that’s the answer. The Bears need to play the Bears.