View from the Moon: Bears still holding tryouts?

Tuesday, Oct. 5, 20108:02 PM

By John MullinCSNChicago.com

The release of Mark Anderson wasnt all that stunning, other than perhaps the timing. He was gone after this season anyway, him not being particularly happy with the one-year tender he signed last offseason and the Bears not being particularly happy with another underperforming defensive linemen. Anderson was not coming back in 2011 anyway.

What was somewhat of a surprise, however, was giving Anderson the starting defensive end job that had belonged to Alex Brown. That didnt work especially well in 2007 when the Bears tried it and why they suddenly thought it was a good idea three years later was a head-shaker.

But the personnel surprise right now remains the blizzard of changes being made at times on a play-by-play basis.

The Bears under Lovie Smith have always held players accountable and rarely blinked when they thought players were performing at less-than-NFL levels. But what is happening now has the ring of flailing.
JMarcus Webb in and out at right tackle with Kevin Shaffer. Zackary Bowman handed Charles Tillmans job, then losing it over one play vs. Green Bay, then getting it back from Tim Jennings. Desmond Clark in a key role, dropping a pass, then inactive for a player (Devin Aromashodu) who never sees the field in New York. The Tommie Harris Story.

And now Anderson, gone.

The questions now start to turn less to the players than to coaches who do not appear to have come out of the entire offseason and preseason convinced about who their best players are. They are still holding tryouts. That or they indeed are sending the messages they steadfastly deny they are sending.

Did coaches really need to see four regular-season games to determine that Anderson couldnt rush the passer?

If youve ever been in the situation where your job has been threatened, you know that there is a thin line between that being motivation to go all-out and being the cause for you to start looking over your shoulder and avoiding chances. Players afraid of making mistakes arent usually the ones who play fast, and without that, more problems loom than just Mark Anderson.

Martz reminder

I am far more of a mind that the Bears are in fact a good team that had a bad game than a bad team that somehow won three straight games. Thats why after one quarter of the season Im still more than fine with the 10-6-or-better.

And Im also more than fine with caveats I laid out about Mike Martz and his offense. Beware of breathless extrapolations in any cases but before expecting Martz to slingshot Jay Cutler and the Chicago offense to epic heights, remember:

While the Detroit passing yardage with Jon Kitna soared under Martz in 2006-2007, the Lions combined offensive yardage went from 27th to 22nd to 19th. That certainly qualifies as progress but the team also drafted Calvin Johnson in 2007, which helped a bit. More significantly, scoring increased from 15.9 points per game before Martz to 19.1 and 18.9 with him.

Kitna was never sacked more than 37 times in a season, except for the Martz years when he went down 63 and 51 times. Sacks happen, as Jay Cutler is finding painfully true.

The Prophet Olsen

Greg Olsen said after the win over Green Bay that it was often more difficult to come back from a good win than a bad loss. Well, he was right about the first part and now the Bears need to demonstrate the second.

Runaround

After the Giants piled 189 rushing yards on the Bears, any guess at what the game plan will be for Carolina with running backs DeAngelo Williams and Jonathan Stewart placing the Panthers fifth in rushing yardage?

It will not be a surprise to see Chester Taylor getting a far bigger share of the offense after a fourth straight game with Matt Forte failing to average 3.0 yards per carry. Taylor and Forte have identical averages of 2.8 yards per carry but Taylor at least has averaged three or more yards per carry in three of the four games.

Number-gaming

No team has given the ball away more than Carolinas 13 times. Then again, no team was looser with the ball before last weekend than the New York Giants

A hidden impact of the Cutler concussion on the offense is that it drove from the game the NFLs No. 2 quarterback in fourth quarters (133.4 passer rating). Given that the Bears trailed just 10-0 going into Sundays fourth quarter and 10-3 until about 4 1/2 minutes to play, the Bears were without a player whose best work has been truly at crunch time.Duly noted

If theres a touch of amusement in the Mark Anderson business, its that Alex Brown, Julius Peppers and newly signed Charles Grant were all products of the 2002 draft

From e-chater Eddie last night, can Julius Peppers play offense? Considering that he was athletic enough to play basketball at North Carolina, I wouldnt bet against Peppers making everyone forget Chuck Bednarik.

(Oh, you have forgotten Chuck Bednarik? Cmon, look it up.)

John “Moon”
Mullin is CSNChicago.com’s Bears Insider, and appears regularly on
Bears Postgame Live and Chicago Tribune Live. Follow Moon

on Twitter for up-to-the-minute Bears information.

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