Well, the NFL season is one week old, and already the refs have given the bears a game and stolen a game from the Packers (see separate post).
We’ll look at these plays/calls in order:
1. A blatant illegal motion penalty was not called on the bears’ first TD drive. The penalty might or might not have been accepted, but the fact that it wasn’t called was ridiculous.
2. Down 7-0, Anderson committed blatant interference on the Cincinnati receiver, having his arm draped around him for a long time. Instead of a first down, the Bengals had to punt and committed a facemask penalty on the punt.
3. On second-and-goal from the bear 2, Tillman interfered with the receiver in the endzone, but it wasn’t called. The Bengals did score a TD.
4. The Bengals single covered Marshall on third and long, allowing him to catch a first-down pass. This happened a number of times, and is terrible coaching.
5. Green dropped a pass at the bear 17 or 18, giving away an almost-sure score (TD or FG), and the pass was intercepted off the deflection.
6. Cincinnati had a second-and-14 from their 8 with 0:59 left in the half, and the bears with only 1 timeout. The smart thing to do at that point was to run the clock down to almost zero and go into halftime with a 14-7 lead. The Bengals threw short on second down, and the incomplete pass stopped the clock, which gave the bears enough time to kick a 58-yard FG. This was coaching idiocy.
7. On the punt in Point 6, the Bengals were called for a personal foul, and that gave the bears 15 yards, which allowed them to try the field goal. On the play, Weems of the bears clearly pushed the Bengal player in the back, which is why the player retaliated and which should have been a penalty. Had they called the penalties properly, the bears don’t get the 15 yards and don’t get the field goal, which was the difference in the game. It also gave the bears some momentum going into halftime.
8. The Bengals fumbled in the 4th quarter at the bear 17, when up 21-17. This was the second time they fumbled in the game, and the player didn’t protect the ball. It’s been obvious to everyone in the NFL for years that the bears try to strip the ball and coaches have to stress protecting it all week, but twice in this game, the Bengals did not protect it. This cost them the game. This fumble not only prevented a Bengal score, but led to the “winning” touchdown by Marshall, who again was single covered. I talked about the single coverage on Marshall throughout the game, and on this “winning” touchdown, here is what Marshall said after the game: “I didn’t understand it. Fourth quarter, put a safety on me one-on-one. You can only dream about that.” I said this during the game, but the Bengals couldn’t figure this out?
9. In addition to single covering Marshall on third downs, they put the defensive back in press coverage on him on a third-down play, which of course meant the DB couldn’t react, and Marshall got another important first down and big gain.
10. The Bengals used all of their second-half timeouts with 8:06 left, the last two due to having 10 men on the field and 12 men on the field. The failure to save these timeouts cost them at the end of the game. I’ve always said it’s usually better to take the penalty than to waste a timeout, unless the situation is important. This was another of a long line of gifts the Bengals gave the bears all game. Even without the timeouts, the Bengals stopped the bears with 1:06 left and would have had the ball, but a stupid unnecessary roughness penalty on Cincinnati on the third-down play that failed to get the first down gave the bears a first down and the win. Gift after gift after gift.
This “win” now gives the bears some momentum and confidence to start the season, and a properly reffed game could have changed the outcome. To quote a Bengals writer, Geoff Hobson: Frustration boiled over in the aftermath of the Bengals’ 24-21 Opening Day loss that had head coach Marvin Lewis seething over his team’s lack of composure and the way some of the calls came down… “We had a lot of guys lose their composure today. We can’t do that. Their guy is blocking them after the whistle. You think it would be offsetting fouls. But today we didn’t get any offsets,” Lewis said.
On the play at the end of the half, Hobson continues: “He hit our guy out of bounds late on our sideline,” Lewis said. “We can’t retaliate. That’s not what our team does. Unfortunately today we let them get under our skin. We did it twice today. We can’t do that.”
Hobson later goes on to quote linebacker Vontaze Burfict: “We’re at their home, they get that. I feel like the refs were with them the whole game…They were talking a whole lot. They’re at their home and some guys just didn’t ignore it. The second guy always gets caught.”
In addition to the bad calls that impacted the outcome of the game, and the terrible plays mentioned above, the Bengals tried to run the ball even though the bears showed no ability to stop the pass, and were 21 for 63, a 3-yard/carry average. Their featured back was 14 for 25, which is less than 1.8 yards/carry. These were wasted plays, especially since Green and the tight ends were open and catching passes.