Not counting the first four minutes of the first quarter, that was the worst Bear game of the season. It’s really hard to put the blame on a single set of shoulders. For starters, let’s try the entire offensive line. Rex, who had a terrible game, had very little time to get comfortable. The porous offensive line creates a situation that is asking for say, a Cedric Benson fumble after getting drilled by a safety behind the line of scrimmage, or an even more tentative quarterback that cannot handle the snaps or find his footwork.

From there, the obvious candidate in succession is Rex. He choked. Even with the poor footing and give-and-take of the first few periods, he caved when the spotlight was on him; just like all the arm-chair QBs drew it up. The plan was to make Rex beat you by forcing him to make plays on his side of the ball, play from behind. The two INTs in the 4th quarter were huge. Before that, there was a third and long that broke-up. Grossman ran to the left side of the field and threw into double-coverage, when he should have kept the ball and slide in for what would have been a very close measure. The resulting FG kept the game close but it could have been tied.

Then we can move to the defense. The Colts are going to make plays. Fine. Blown coverages are most regrettable. Fer chrissakes, Manning was throwing off his back foot while being dragged to the ground and he got off with a touchdown. Indeed. The defense didn’t start missing tackles until later in the game, after they had been on the field for two-thirds of the game. Overall, they had the Colts were they wanted them, in terms of game-plans. Third and long allowed them to play the coverages they wanted. They just gave up the big plays. A couple of sticks in the 3rd quarter would have made all the difference.

Overall, this goes down as a huge choke. Honestly, I expected a much better showing from Lovie’s team. The plate of blame goes full circle. It’s one thing to lose, it’s another to get your ass handed to you. Which is kinda funny, because after the play where Urlacher swallowed Rhodes (I think) in the first quarter, I leaned over to a neighbor and mentioned that this could turn into an ass-whooping. Well, it did, just not from the hands I was thinking of. As for Rex, he played as bad as everybody else. There is much to learn in the off-season. First on the agenda is better pocket-presence. It works both ways. Rex is jittery when he shouldn’t be and he fails to sense pressure when he should. I still think his main issue is composure. He’s going to throw the ball around from time to time. He should not feel like he needs to in order to make big plans. I’ll be very interested to see how he comes out next season. I still think he’s a much better player than his current record.

Pitchers and catchers report in two weeks.