Jimmy Clausen's No. 1 goal: Take care of the football
After another week of dysfunction at Halas Hall, the Bears hope their Week 16 game against the Detroit Lions provides a return to normalcy, although a victory would probably be asking too much.
The 10-4 Lions can clinch a playoff spot with a fourth straight victory in the series. The 5-9 Bears are hoping the benching of quarterback Jay Cutler and the switch to Jimmy Clausen provides an offensive spark that has been missing during 3 straight losses.
It has been nearly four years since Clausen started a game in the NFL, back on Jan. 2, 2011 as a rookie. Clausen went 1-9 in 10 starts for the 2-14 Carolina Panthers that season. The assignment of taking over for Cutler came out of the blue, according to Clausen.
"I didn't see it coming at all," he said. "It was quite a surprise to me that they wanted to go with me this week. But it's a great opportunity for me and the team to go out there on Sunday and put our best effort out there and hopefully get a 'W.' "
Clausen is confident that even a disappointing Bears team possesses better talent than his original team.
"Just to have the supporting cast around me like we do here is going to help," he said. "The biggest thing for us is to just take care of the football, move the chains and get down in the red zone and put points on the board."
That's much easier said than done against a Lions defense that is No. 1 in the league in points allowed. Surprisingly, the Bears' red-zone offense is tied for third in the league, having converted 67.4 percent of its opportunities (29-for-43) into touchdowns. The Lions' defense is 11th in the red zone, allowing opponents to score touchdowns 51.2 percent of the time (22 of 43).
"The biggest challenge is playing the No. 1 defense in the NFL and having (just) two days to prepare for them," said Clausen who, along with the rest of the team, did not practice Wednesday because of last Monday night's game vs. the Saints. "(It's) just watching tape as much as I can, getting help from Jay and (No. 3 quarterback) David (Fales) and the coaching staff."
In their 34-17 Thanksgiving Day loss to the Lions in Detroit, the Bears made no effort to run the ball against the NFL's No. 1 run defense, netting 13 yards on 8 rushes. The Bears had 256 air yards, a meager total considering it took 48 passes, and Cutler was sacked three times and picked off twice.
The strength of the Lions' defense, which has allowed 17 points or less in 10 of 14 games, is a deep and talented front. The ringleader is Pro Bowl tackle Ndamukong Suh, who already has a career-best 18 tackles for loss this season, including 6 sacks. Left end Ezekiel "Ziggy" Ansah leads the Lions with 7½ sacks.
"(It's) their front four," Clausen said. "You start up there. They're great; a great eight guys is what they have. They rotate eight guys through. They definitely get to the quarterback (and) stop the run. They have great linebackers and secondary, just get around the ball, fly around, make tackles and make plays."
Clausen was signed by the Bears on June 5 as a free agent, 10 months after he was waived/injured by the Panthers following a 2013 preseason right shoulder injury that he spent the year rehabbing.
Clausen had the benefit of a full off-season in the Bears' program, but he's thrown just 9 passes in mop-up duty at the end of 3 blowout losses. He says he plans to stick to the script, something that Cutler often has failed to do this season with dire consequences. Following the gameplan worked wonders for Josh McCown last year, as he posted a career-best passer rating of 109.0 playing extensively when Cutler was injured.
"The biggest thing is just going through the reads and the progressions that are within the offense," Clausen said. "I've heard from Jay and (Cavanaugh) and (Trestman) that Josh did a good job of just sticking to the paper and going through his reads and progressions. And that's what I'm going to do, go through my reads, whatever I see coverage-wise, just go through it, 1 to 2 to 3, check the ball down and move on to the next play."
Sounds like a plan.
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