via www.chicagotribune.com

There has been a lot of talk in the past about Bear weather and how if Ditka blesses us with freezing temps and wind and snow that it's an automatic win.  Well Ladies and Gents these aren't your Daddy's or even your Grandpa's Bears. 

We all saw what happens when these Bears are forced to come out into the cold, they decide to go into early hibernation.  The only silver lining from yesterday was the Lions defeat of the Packers.  Most of us didn't think that we had a chance in this game anyway and the Pats made sure that they were right.  We all had hope that the Bears would fight to the bitter end but that didn't happen, these Bears laid down after they got kicked in the teeth and didn't get up.  What I hope happens is that they take this game and build on it instead of letting it destroy the season.  It's only one game, that's what I keep telling myself and I hope you all will to.  We still can go 12-4 and take the North and in that scenario if the Falcons maintain current place gives us #2 seed and a first round bye.  Not many of us ever thought we'd be in the playoffs let alone the 2 seed. 

Things I learned from the game or that we're reaffirmed to me, in no particular order

-Tillman is a liability in coverage, he got burnt like toast again, watching Branch streak down the sideline brought that all familiar Berrian image into my brain.

-The next person who tells me Greg Olsen can block I'm going to slap them.  I watched him early on completely blow his blocking assignment thus leading to a tackle in the backfield and our drive stalling out, or being in 3rd in long once again.

-They can not play in poor conditions, this offense is based on precision and timing, I saw too many balls behind the receivers I don't know if that's the weather or poor execution.  Bottom line it needs to be fixed. 

-Turnovers are crippling, just when we think we can get some momentum boom turnover.  You can't expect to compete if you are going to turn the ball over, especially against the Pats.

-In bad weather you need to run the ball, well we you are down 14 then 21 that pretty much makes  you one demensional and we all know what happens when Martz has to dial up the gunslinger. 

-The defense got smacked around like Wanda on gameday and didn't look much like the #3 defense in the league. Hardly any pressure from the front four means we aren't going to win many games.  The only question is after the half did our D get better or did the Pats take pity on us. 

-Our special teams coverage was poor this week, consistently we've been at the top for special teams but barring that penalty they'd had looked even worse.  The return game, minus Rashied was solid. 

-Tom Brady almost had 3 interceptions because of deflections, if Harris gets that first deflection the game may have looked much different.

Overall I took away from this game that there is a lot of worked left to do, and if the Bears don't learn from this and in turn take it all out on the Vikings next Monday I'm going to be very disappointed.  How do they respond?  Do they get up and dust themseleves off, or do they just stay down and quit? 

Still 1st place in the North, still able to be 12-4.  Packers lost to the Lions and play the Pats next week maybe without Rogers.  Lost of positives still abound my friends, so Bear Down and lets go out and smash the Vikes! 

As always your thoughts and comments are greatly appreciated.