It all went our way, and we STILL blew it

With a 31-24 loss at the hand of the Houston Texans, the Bears put the cap on a 9-7 season, and really didn't look like a playoff team out there. Most of the miracle to get the Bears into the playoffs had already happened, with the following happening in Week 16:

• Dallas losing to Baltimore 33-24, becoming 9-6
  
• Tampa Bay losing to San Diego 41-24, becoming 9-6
• Minnesota losing to Atlanta 24-17, becoming 9-6
• The Bears winning the Monday Night Football finale against the Packers, becoming (you guessed it!) 9-6
  

I'll give you that the Ravens might be a better team than the Cowboys, but the Bolts (currently 7-8) over the Bucs IN Tampa Bay?! And the Vikes couldn't even protect their own Dome against a Falcons team that had already locked up a playoff spot.

So going into Week 17, all the Bears needed was a win and:

• A loss by Minnesota (to NYG) for the NFC North
• Losses by Tampa (to Oak) and Dallas (to Phi) for a Wild Card spot

OK, so the Vikings DID win against the Giants, but in ANOTHER game in Tampa, the Bucs lay an egg and lose to the 5-11 RAIDERS 31-24. The path was set! The door was open!! All the Bears had to do was go into a Reliant Stadium that was actually heavily speckled with Bears fans and beat the 7-8 Texans. Could they do it? NO. And what do they do? Give up 31 goddamn points. So much for a vaunted defense.

And since this was written before the Dallas-Philly game, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say Philly wins, which would have given the Bears the 6th wild card spot.

Oh well...I guess Illini Basketball is on the upswing. They should get into the Top 25 after that win against Mizzou.

Now my devotion is all Bears and Illini Football

With the Cubs getting swept by the Dodgers, I have decided to put all sports enthusiasm towards the football teams of the Chicago Bears and the Illinois Fighting Illini. For an offense that lead the NL in runs scored, doubles, total bases, OBP and slugging, I was thoroughly disappointed.

Other pitiful and otherwise disappointing stats of the series:
5-for-28 (.179) with runners in scoring position
9 XBH (12 for LAD)
5.87 starters ERA (1.42 LAD)
14 BB given out by the Cubs pitching staff
The Big 3 (Soriano, Lee, Ramirez) went a combined 9-for-37 (.243)

Our starting pitching (Dempster, Zambrano, and Harden respectively) dug us deep into holes early in the games and the heart of our order was not clutch to say the least. And after pretty much blowing away hitters for months, I was not expecting this out of our staff. Six runs scored over three games isn't gonna win a series 100 times out of 100 in this day and age, and so much more was expected after leading the NL in runs scored.

Saying "Wait 'til next year" sounds especially sour after such a successful 97-64 Division-winning regular season, but it still has to be said. Jim Edmonds was a great (and cheap) pickup, batting .256, 19 HR, and 49 RBI over 85 games as a Cub. Kosuke Fukudome, whom I thought at the beginning of the year had rookie of the year written all over him, seemed to be baffled by MLB pitching, especially on left-handers, during the entire second half.

So much was expected of this team. It was supposed to be THE year, with 7 All-Star selections, the highest payroll ever, and the most wins since 1935.

It gonna be a long winter, but now it's time to turn attention to football.