Monday, December 15, 2003

Charles Tillman for Rookie of the Year

The Bears won despite being outgained 393 yards to 232. The game ended with Charles "Peanut" Tillman stealing a game winning touchdown from Randy Moss. Tillman simply took the ball right out of Moss' hands. I think Saddam fought harder coming out of his spider hole.

You can get the Minnesota point of view over at Sethspeaks. Although Moss had 9 catches for 93 yards, he short armed a couple of passes, and should have caught the game winner. So while his numbers may look good, he didn’t have a great day. That’s probably why he didn’t talk to reporters after the game.

The Vikings failed to take advantage of their gaudy running numbers. Like week 2, the Bears played a cover two, taking away the deep pass and daring the Vikes to run. And boy did they run (178 yards). But it seemed once the Vikings got in Bears territory they got pass happy. No I know its harder to run on a cover two as you get closer to the goal line and the safeties are closer to the line of scrimmage. But when you’re picking up 7 and 8 yard gains with the run I think you have stick with it.

The Vikings probably should have taken a couple of shots down the field even with the cover two, as Moss often beats double coverage. But I still think the Vikes would have been better off running even more. Anyway, you have to give some credit to the Bears coaching staff for a good defensive game plane.

The offense didn’t play that well. That might be expected as Rex Grossman was making his NFL debut. He didn’t get any help from the running game which was non-existent. The passing game never really got on track and Grossman was a bit inaccurate. But in all it was a good debut for Grossman. While it was nice to see him take chances downfield, I was most surprised by how mature he was. He didn’t turn the ball over and didn’t take any careless chances. If he can improve his completion percentage, which I believe he will, and continues show the football smarts he displayed, he’s going to have a long career with the Bears.