By Carl Mohrbacher
Size Matters
Utilizing such exotic tools as human eyes and tape measures, Bears offensive coordinator Aaron Kromer discovered what he believed to be an edge during a late Saturday night film session, with a big assist from the Internet.
“Wait a minute,” muttered Kromer to himself as he watched a video titled ‘Inside The Film Room With Coach Zimmer’ on the website ‘vikings.com.’
The video that caught Kromer’s attention detailed the match-up problems that Brandon Marshall and Alshon Jeffery present to opposing defense.
“We have two very tall men playing wide receiver . . . we have tall men . . . playing wide receiver!!!!”
Kromer quickly dialed head coach Marc Trestman.
“You dumb sons of bitches,” said Trestman as he answered.
“Coach, I’m sorry. Did I catch you at a bad time?”
“Oh, crap. Sorry about that, Aaron. I was just looking at something about Walmart that was stupid on a couple of levels . . . nevermind. What’s up?”
“Coach,” said Kromer. “I know it’s late in the week, but I’ve got an idea that needs your sign off.”
“Friggin’ morons,” muttered Trestman. “Sorry Aaron, not you. Go ahead.”
“Listen. I just noticed that we have a few tall guys on our team. And I can’t prove it yet, but word on the street is that the Vikings have some not so tall guys on their defense.”
“Huh. That’s weird. And pretty gross . . . wait, you’re saying they have small guys in Minnesota, and they’re going to bring them to town for the game tomorrow?” Trestman slowly put down his iPad as the pieces began fitting together.
“That’s right, coach.” Kromer now spoke deliberately to make sure his point hit the Marc [giggle]. “I propose we have our massive, speedy, sure-handed receivers run deep routes and. when necessary, jump balls or back-shoulder lobs in short-yardage situations.” The assistant coach took a breath. “Because I think it will be very difficult for a man of average height to jump as high as either Marshall or Jeffery. Do you want me to get [defensive coordinator] Mel [Tucker] on the line?”
“No time, man!” Trestman’s voice rose to commanding force. “He’s not going to have a job here in a couple weeks anyway. To the Bearmobile!”
Long pause.
“You mean the Dodge Aerostar?” said Kromer.
“Hey, you drive whatever the hell you want to, man,” said Trestman, sidestepping the old Simpsons joke. “The first thing I did when I got my paper was to buy a decent ride.”
The Start Of Something Good?
Well, you probably know by now how that one ended.
And if you didn’t know that the Bears won last Sunday, what the hell are you doing in the granular corner of the Internet provided to me by The Beachwood Reporter?
So Ma Mohrbacher, if this is your first time here, do like The Lord Humungus says and just walk away, just walk away . . . and there will be an end to the horror.
The Bears bolstering their victory total in fine fashion (in the sense that it was, meh, “fine”), taking care of business against the no-name-besides-Greg-Jennings-that-I-recognize-oh-wait-a-minute-is-Teddy-Pendergrass-the-name-of-the-Minnesota-QB?-dammit-no-it’s-not-that-would-have-been-awesome Vikings.
It’s been a rough season.
Stunningly one-sided losses, frustrating lack of defense . . . and lack of offense . . . and other than one utterly meaningless kickoff return, special teams play that has led to no fewer than five fist-shaped holes in my den’s drywall.
So what’s the secret sauce?
What can the Bears do going forward to ensure a repeat of both the quality of effort and successful results?
As per usual, I have a few suggestions.
- Remove Barry Manilow’s Greatest Hits as pre-game warm up soundtrack, replace with Slayer’s Hell Awaits.
- Hire intern to hold big cardboard arrow pointing towards appropriate end zone to subtly remind offense which way to go
- Losing weight had a very positive impact on Detroit quarterback Matt Stafford’s level of play. Prevent Bears players from eating until February.
- If drinking a glass of wine with dinner is good for your heart, it stands to reason that all players should chug a bottle of Bacardi 15 minutes before kickoff.
Name Of The Game
Sunday pits the Bears against another Ghost Of Seasons Past, former head coach Lovie Smith, who is now the head coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
As a coach with one of the longer stints in franchise history, Chicago fans had ample time to levee a litany of criticisms against the Lovie regime.
As an aside, this coaching administration is not to be confused with the funk band “Lovie Regime,” who is best known for their semi-militant 1979 offering “Whitey Moves Stiff (Cracker Shuffle).”
Furthermore, “the Lovie regime” has nothing to do with the soft core porn* star “Lovey Regime,” who appeared in such films as Aaron Spelling Presents: Topless Models Inc., Busty Mountain Hop and Sensual Tax Prep. As fans of her work will no doubt already be aware, Ms. Regime’s filmography also included a lone hardcore entry, How I Met, And Then Tag-Teamed Your Mother.
I tend to have a more charitable view of Smith’s tenure.
Given the length of his resume, the coach has a rather large attack surface for critics to fire at.
He didn’t display emotion; he was terrible at challenging plays; he couldn’t select a decent offensive coordinator; he was the only Bears coach in history to lose a Super Bowl; the brand of skim milk he endorsed was loaded with MSG, pasteurized in a Taiwanese sweatshop and procured from some carnivorous species of bovine that ate at least nine child laborers . . . as a Bears fan you’ve already heard all of the typical complaints.
But while we’re all basking in the glow of a rare home victory, let’s keep the good vibes going and examine some of the positives and lesser known facts about the former Bears coach.
- Implemented a systemic commitment to forcing turnovers that lead to some of the most exciting and successful defensive units in Bears history, a philosophy that was largely derived from watching his three Dobermans devour the last pork chop after he accidentally dropped it on the kitchen floor.
- As a black guy who doesn’t drink or eat fatty foods, scientists believe that Smith technically doesn’t age. At 94, he is the oldest coach in the league by four months over Steelers defensive coordinator/Magnito’s dad Dick LeBeau.
- Conversely, at 18.9-years-old, the team Smith currently coaches has the youngest average age of any squad in the league, though to be fair the curve is significantly impacted by Bucs backup kicker Jake Moore.
- Thanks to his firing after guiding the Bears to a 10-6 record in 2012, Lovie single-handedly proved to America once and for all that you can’t trust whitey.
- Responsible for introducing the phrase “Rex Is Our Quarterback” into the popular lexicon, thusly ensuring that couples everywhere have a safe word at their disposal that immediately douses the dangerously rampant sexual desires of an out-of-control partner.
Kool Aid (2 of 5 – Aforementioned Bacardi Rum, No Chaser)
I’m still not convinced that I should be busting out regionally relevant craft beer recommendations again quite yet. The stakes just aren’t high enough.
For those of you who have been to Florida recently, you’ll note two things.
One: there are an inordinate amount of feral cats roaming the Orlando area.
I’m not kidding. That town has a serious problem. I had to shoo cats off of the hood of my car after being gone just long enough to drop off my luggage.
Also, I’m not the friggin’ Highlander and this wasn’t 15 years before they broke ground on Disney World, it was literally last week.
Two: they have no good local beer. Unless, you count drinking enough seawater to hallucinate – which I’m not entirely ruling it out.
Granted, the Bears have twice as many wins as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, so that alone is reason to believe that they can notch a second two-game winning streak within the last 11 games.
But the Bucs have a pretty decent wide-receiving tandem of their own, and if watching the last four consecutive Bears games has taught me anything, it’s that, like the Viking secondary, the Bears defensive backs are not particularly good at stopping guys from catching passes.
Sometimes I wonder if they’re even on the field of play, because they are not on camera when I am watching an opposing wide receiver waltz untouched past the one-yard line, though to their collective credit they’re marginally more present than some NFL players.
So while I’m not super excited about this match-up, I did notch up the Kool-Aid rating a point because I’m starting to warm up to this seawater idea.
Glug, glug, glug.
Woah.
That was salty.
That’s what she said.
She also said “Bears win at home against an inferior opponent.”
Bears 28, Buccaneers 17
* Cinemax – pandering to those too lazy to go downstairs and masturbate to the Internet since 2001.
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Carl Mohrbacher is our man on the Kool-Aid. He welcomes your comments.
Posted on November 20, 2014