Chicago Bears Upset San Francisco 49ers: A Mostly Unbiased View
Sep 14, 2014; Santa Clara, CA, USA; Chicago Bears wide receiver Brandon Marshall (15) catches a touchdown pass against the San Francisco 49ers during the second quarter at Levi
It can be hard being a fan of an NFL team. The roller coaster ride from week to week is exhausting. One game your team looks like they could take on anybody, but just a week later they could be taken apart by a team that you don’t think they should have any trouble defeating. It’s never as good or as bad as it seems, and certain problems will persist throughout a season while others can be worked through. That’s why we here at BGO have decided to bring you “Bear and Balanced: A Mostly Unbiased View of Your Chicago Bears”. I can find the silver lining to any cloud, but also find areas of concern in the most convincing victory. Each week I’ll try to bring you the facts of the game from an unbiased standpoint to help you, the fans, get a better feel for where the season is going.
Spirits are high this week, and rightfully so, after the Bears overcame a 17-0 deficit to upset the 49ers on the road 28-20. The Bears’ resilience in this one gives me hope for the rest of the season, but their performance was far from perfect. Even in the second half, there were a handful of items that had me concerned. The Monsters of the Midway have a long way to go if they are going to see the post season this year, and here’s why:
The defense isn’t fixed yet. Better, yes. Good enough? No. The rush defense is already better and I think their improving, but they are far from good enough. I thought they did a better job against Buffalo on the ground in week 1 than the stats would indicate, but a handful of big plays made it look ugly. The Bears looked decent against the run for most of the 49ers game, but a few bad plays made the stat sheet look mediocre and we might be singing a different tune if Frank Gore’s 54 yard run in the second quarter wasn’t negated by a holding call. Injuries piling up in what was already a shaky secondary are troublesome as well. While Kyle Fuller played a fantastic game in relief of an injured Charles Tillman and deserves every accolade he has received, he’s still a rookie and I expect there will be some bad mixed in with the good moving forward. The injury to Chris Conte is also cause for concern. Despite catching a lot of flack for being stiff armed by Fred Jackson in the opener, he was catching a lot of footballs too and I thought he was having a nice start to the season. Who replaces him? Brock Vereen? I’m not sure how I feel about two rookies starting on the back end.
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