After sitting tied a top the NFC North with the Green Bay Packers, the Bears come out of this week with the sole lead, but it didn't come easy.
The overiding subject though is the condition of QB Kyle Orton, who went down at the end of the 1st half. Next week we play the undefeated Tennessee Titans and are going to need all their starters.
OFFENSE
Quarterbacks: Kyle Orton played well. It is a bit hard to judge him with the time he was on the field. He had the ball in short distances a few times, but he ended with 108 yards on 8 completions. He had 0 TDs and 0 INTs. He did have a rushing TD, the first of his career. But whatever, get better quickly!
Ok, we all knew the worse was in play here, but that didn't happen. In fact Grossman played an OK game. He threw for 58 yards 1 TD and 1 INT. The one INT came off a batted ball and I still think may have hit the ground. The point is he didn't make the big mistake. He looked pretty comfortable in the pocket even with pressure around, he did make a couple of big throws, but we can't get ahead of ourselves here. He was just ok, some of that can be chalked up to not having played in a meaningful game since last year and he probably was a bit rusty, but he overthrew a wide open Devin Hester for a TD. He threw a foot ahead of a few recievers.
Runningback: Forte started off slow, but finished up with a bang. His running esentially won this game for us. He totaled around 40 yards on the game winning drive. He finished with 126 for a 5.7 average. He ran hard all game and showed good vision. He had a number of 9-12 yard runs to fuel the Bears 2nd half offense and really took pressure off of Grossman.
Offensive line: Big props here. They looked like the same old lost unit in the first half, but come the second they really started to take over on some drives. On the Bears final TD drive they pulled Garza in the G Power and ran all over the Lions. It was good to seem them move the line in our favor. We don't get that often.
DEFENSE
Again hard to judge. They gave up 23 points to the Lions and let Orlovsky have his best day as a pro, but those points all came in the 2nd half. So the defense held the Lions scoreless for 3 quarters. In the start of the 4th the defense did come alive and really started to get after the Lions. Tommie Harris started to show why we paid him all that money. Dvoracek, Idonije, Briggs all had key plays. WAIT....WE HAD AN URLACHER SITING!!! I know his coverage skills have him away from the ball a lot, but he finally had a big play gettting through the line and causing a intentional grounding penatly.
Tillman did realtively well on Calvin Johnson. Johnson did get open a few times, but that is to be expected with a guy of his caliber. Tlllman had signifcantly less catches and impact in the secon half. Congrats, to Craig Steltz for getting his first INT on a big time TD saving play.
SPECIAL TEAMS
The Lions did have success on kickoffs, gaining 136 yards on 6 returns, so coverage was a bit lacking.
Hester tried to help give the Lions the game with a fumble. He also almost broke out for his first TD punt return of the season. He had the lane, but was brought down by a horse collar tackle.
Brady Maynard played well until the one time we needed a solid punt and he broke out the big 18 (it might have been a 12) yarder.
Robbie Gould was 2/2 on FGs and 3/3 on TDs.