In Hanie Bears trust and lose
The Bears' playoffs hopes are now hanging by a thread.
And no posture could be more appropriate after one of the worst Bears defeats of the last decade.
Even if they had won Sunday, the Bears would have had no business talking seriously about the postseason, not with a CFL quarterback leading an NFL franchise.
So for all the abuse Lovie Smith and Marion Barber will take for the Bears' third straight loss — and they deserve plenty — to look past the simplest part of this equation is to make the exercise more difficult than necessary.
This is squarely on GM Jerry Angelo, who gambled on another season without a backup quarterback.
And he has lost in a big way.
The Bears are 0-3 without Jay Cutler, losing three games by a total of 15 points, three games in which any below-average professional could have made a third-down throw to win a game.
Not several. Just one third-down completion in the right situation in each contest and it could be 3 more victories on the schedule.
Instead, with Caleb Hanie the Bears are dying a slow and painful death, and Sunday's 13-10 loss to Denver in overtime was about as agonizing as you will ever witness.
“All losses hurt,” Smith said after the Bears fell to 7-6, “but this one definitely feels like it hurt a little bit more.”
The Bears had managed a lead with little help from Hanie, who led the offense nearly two full games without a third-down conversion. Nevertheless, it was the Bears up 10-0 with 11:45 left in the game when Hanie had perhaps his worst miss of the day.
On a third-and-10 from the Bears' 21, Hanie had Barber wide open out of the backfield. But rather than stop and hit him in stride, Hanie with plenty of time kept sliding back and badly overthrew his running back, who had a good 30 yards open in front of him — maybe even a touchdown.
Just 10 yards would have pretty much put the game away for the visitors, who could have run several more minutes off the clock, and that became key in the final minutes of regulation.
“The Broncos have a good football team to hold us down offensively like that,” Smith said with a straight face. “Normally, the quarterback dictates a lot who wins the game. (Tim Tebow) definitely played a big part in that today.”
Yes, Tebow was good down the stretch and in overtime as the Bears went soft with their coverage and allowed the Broncos too much space, including one critical throw down the sideline when Tebow had precious little time and the Bears needed to keep throws in the middle of the field.
“We played our defense,” Smith said, insisting he changed nothing. “We played our defense like we did most of the game.”
And except for the last five minutes of the game and OT, the Bears' defense was outstanding. With just a little assistance from the offense they could have won this one.
Yet, as bad as Hanie was, Smith — naturally — stood behind his QB.
“He made some plays,” Smith said. “We had a chance to win at the end. Our quarterback had a lot to do with that. We saw some good things that Caleb was doing.”
Ever the optimist, even Smith could not put a happy face on the two disastrous plays by Barber, who up until the final series of regulation was having a brilliant day running the football with aggression.
His first huge mistake was bouncing a run up the middle to the outside and then through the sideline when Denver had no timeouts left and all the Bears had to do was kill the clock.
“You have to know the situation,” Smith said. “You have to be able to keep the ball in bounds on that one.”
That one play gave Tebow the extra 40 seconds he needed to march the Broncos down the field for a game-tying-field goal.
And then in overtime, with the Bears already in field-goal position, Barber looked like he may have broken one for a touchdown when linebacker Wesley Woodyard reached out and stripped Barber at the Denver 33.
Once again, and however unspectacular it may be, Tebow made the plays when it mattered most. He took the Broncos down the field for the game-winning kick and a six-game Denver winning streak.
“We did some things we normally don't do there to keep them in the game,” Smith said. “And we gave them an opportunity.”
There was some good in this game, like Barber's running and the defense until Smith backed off and went to the prevent, when Denver scored 10 points in the final 2:15 of regulation.
“With a 10-point lead late like that,” Smith lamented, “normally we're going to win the football game.”
But there was so much bad, not the least of which was Barber's big blunders, Hanie's inept handling of the offense and Devin Hester's unwillingness to catch a punt and run with it.
Hester made fair catch after fair catch in a field-position game, finally returning one in the third quarter that turned the field around for the Bears and led to their first score.
But mostly Hester was invisible at the worst possible time of the season, and now the Bears find themselves in deep trouble.
“This is one we had circled,” Smith said. “We felt like we needed to win out. Of course, not being able to do that, we just have to get ready for next week.
“But this one hurts.”
Truer words the Bears head coach has never spoken.
brozner@dailyherald.com
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