Some thoughts on last nights game while wondering if the Bears will ever give up on Benson…

• Three words.  Ho.  Lee.  Crap.
• I’m shocked.  I haven’t been this shocked about a Bears win since the Bears won up in Green Bay the day after Payton died on the blocked field goal attempt.
• The Bears were clearly the inferior team BY FAR the first half.  The only reason they were even ‘in’ the game was due to Tillman’s efforts in stripping the ball twice.  If not for Tillman, this game is probably the blowout a lot of people - including myself - expected it to be.
• The offense was simply horrible in the first half.  On both turnovers, they couldn’t even get a first down.  Granted, they were helpful from keeping the Packers from scoring more points, but to not even get a first down on both those fumble recovories was just sad.
• Why do we keep giving Benson the ball?  He had one nice drive, where he got the touchdown, but that’s it.
• Now, I will say that because they kept giving Benson the ball, even though he was doing very little with it, the play-action pass to Clark for the winning touchdown was open.  But that had more to do with giving the running back position the ball than Benson.
• I remain convinced the Benson was the worst draft pick the Bears have made since I started paying attention to them.
• Griese did a much better job last night.  It seemed that last week was definitely a case of rust rather than just being bad.  That’s not to say he won’t have his weeks where you realize why this is his fourth team, but play like last night - at least in the second half - will keep the Bears in a lot of games.
• The offensive line, while still not great, was better last night.  Griese didn’t seem to be quite as much under attack as last week.
• Hey - the Bears actually realized they have Tight Ends!!!  Now if they can just remember that.
• Nice to see Olsen get his first TD.  Not sure if he would have come in bounds if he wasn’t pushed at all, but I’ll take it.  And just a great play by Clark on the winning TD.
• Lovie Smith is now 4-0 in Green Bay.  Whatever else you want to say about him, that’s awfully impressive, because Lambeau - whether the Packers are good or not - is a damn tough place to play.
• The WRs weren’t really heard from much last night.  Which is good - means they weren’t dropping passes.  Berrian being out w/ some sort of toe injury probably helped that somewhat.
• The Defense was all sorts of bad in the first half.  But they were as good in the second as they were bad in the first.  Or, maybe Green Bay just played that badly in the second half.   Probably a little of both.
• Still, none of that probably would have mattered if Brett didn’t have a ‘Farve’ moment (ESPNs words, not mine) and thrown the ball right to Urlacher.  Not a good decision on his part.
• Once again, great job by Tillman in the first half creating two fumbles.  He was the only good player for the defense in the first half.
• And outstanding job by Maynard following the play on his punt and recovering the fumble - and doing all of it in bounds.
• Hester obviously didn’t have a lot going on last night, as the Packers were clearly kicking away from (or over) him.  But the one punt return late in the game was still impressive.  Inside the 10, and 4 guys coming unblocked towards him - and he still manages to get through that line and up to the 20.  It wasn’t a huge return, but there are very few people in the league - if there even is anyone else - that can do that.
• And even when Hester doesn’t get kicked to, he still puts them in good field position.  If teams want to give the Bears the ball outside the 30 every time just to avoid kicking to Hester, I’m perfectly OK with that.
• Please hurry back, Vahser.  Manning is clearly lost at CB.
• Outstanding job by McGowan on the last play of the game.  Driver was right there for the ball, but McGowan just went up and took that ball for himself.  Can’t believe it was that close, but they/he got it done.
• Special teams had problems on kick and punt coverage again, but other than that were solid.  I was disappointed we couldn’t get a kick blocked for the fifth week in a row, although Urlacher was damn close.
• Ron Turner gets a lot of crap from, well, everyone over his play calling, and deservedly so (at least in my opinion).  But the two plays he called for the last two touchdowns - going for the jugular right away on the pass to Olsen after the Urlacher INT and the play-action to Clark - were some of the best play calls I’ve seen out of him in a long time.
• Finally, regardless of the fact the Bears won last night, I’m not convinced that they’ve turned some sort of corner.  I think Griese will be OK now that he has a couple weeks behind him now (or, at least, he can’t use rust as an excuse), but Benson is still awful, the offensive line play has been mixed at best, and even the defense hasn’t seemed quite as good as they did the first few weeks.  I think the Packers lost the game last night more than the Bears won it, but a win is still a win.  I do think the Bears should be able to beat the Vikings this week, but at this point, I still don’t see them getting to 8 wins for the year.  I hope I’m as wrong about that as I was in predicting the game last night.

Still, since they won last night, GO BEARS!!!!