Bears After the Bye - What to Expect in the Second "Half" of the Season

It's odd how things work out sometimes.  Four weeks ago, the Illini were undefeated, and it looked to me as if the Bears were on the fast track to mediocrity after a Monday night loss to Detroit dropped them to 2-3.  But since then, the Illini have lost three straight games, crushing any hope of New Year's Day football, while the Bears have a two-game winning streak and renewed playoff hopes.  When the Illini were up the Bears were down.  Now, the Bears are up, and the Illini are down.  You know who I am?  Even Steven!

With the Bears are coming out of the bye week at 4-3 (the same record they had at the bye week in 2010), the next two games will most likely determine which way the 2011 season breaks.  A win over the Eagles on Monday night would give the Bears the tiebreaker edge over three of their potential competitors (Eagles, Falcons, Bucs) for wild card spots.  While a loss at Philadelphia wouldn't be fatal to a Bears' playoff run, the next game, at home against the Lions (another potential wild card competitor), is the real key to the team's postseason chances.  If the Bears are swept by Detroit there's no way the Bears will catch the Lions, and the Bears would have no way to make the playoffs other than as the NFC's #6 seed.  But a Bears victory would go a long way toward helping them finish ahead of the Lions, especially since Detroit still has to play Green Bay twice.

With the almost-second half of the schedule about to get underway (it would be much cleaner if the bye week fell at the exact midpoint of the season, but what can you do about that?), I figure this is a good time to try to guess if the Bears will return to the postseason.  I originally had the Bears finishing at 8-8, but there's been a slight change in my forecast.  I'm assuming the Bears will follow last year's formula, in which after the bye week, Mike Martz "chose" to go with more conservative, run-oriented game plans instead of the pass-happy, let's-get-Jay-Cutler-killed game plans he prefers.  Based on that assumption, here's how I see things unfolding the rest of the way, game by game:

Playoff Preview - Bears vs. Seahawks

If you've found your way to this blog, then you probably know what's at stake for the Bears and Seahawks when they meet this Sunday at noon at the Spaceship. But let's take a moment to focus on what's at stake for me on Sunday. With the Illini basketball team bumbling around and the Cubs stuck in neutral, this may be my last realistic chance to see one of my teams win a championship for a while. So I'm hoping the Bears will consider my needs when they take the field, and now - on to the preview.

The Bears will win if...

They follow George Costanza's strategy and do the opposite of everything they did in their Week 6 loss to Seattle. This would include: giving Matt Forte more than 8 carries; successfully converting a third down at some point; and blocking Seattle's defensive backs when they blitz. It would also help matters if our big money defensive end would get his name called in a sentence that doesn't sound like "Russell Okung has completely taken Julius Peppers out of this game."

The Seahawks will win if...

You may have heard something about this game being Jay Cutler's first playoff appearance. Sometimes when he throws an early interception, it leads to others, and the Seahawks would be greatly helped if they are facing the turnover machine that the Redskins saw in Week 7. Also, if it's a close game that boils down to a battle of wits between the coaches, the Bears may be in trouble. Pete Carroll may be a slimebag - while at USC, he was the John Calipari of college football - but he's a good coach. Just getting this Seahawks team to the playoffs, even via a watered-down NFC West, is evidence of that. Lovie Smith, on the other hand, is noteworthy for his baffling use of timeouts and replay challenges. Let's hope the Bears play well enough to take this factor out of the equation.

Prediction

Two years ago, the Arizona Cardinals were the champions of a weak NFC West and the #4 seed in the NFC. Some experts called them the worst team ever to make the playoffs. After they won their Wild Card Weekend game, they advanced to face the #2 seed Carolina Panthers in Charlotte, where they were a double-digit underdog. But Jake Delhomme threw five picks, Kurt Warner and Larry Fitzgerald put on an offensive clinic, and the Cardinals advanced to the NFC Championship Game.

There are quite a few parallels between that game and this Sunday's game. For example, I could certainly see Cutler playing the part of Delhomme. But the 2010 Seahawks are truly the worst team to ever make the playoffs (the 2008 Cardinals outscored their opponents by one point on the season; this year's Seahawks were outscored by 97 points), Matt Hasselbeck isn't Warner, and Mike Williams isn't Fitzgerald (his performance against the Bears in Week 6 notwithstanding). As long as the Bears follow the formula that allowed them to win seven of their nine post-bye-week games (balanced offense, opportunistic defense, big returns on special teams to help win the field position battle), they should be able to dispose of the Seahawks. If not, it's going to be a long winter.

Bears 30

Seahawks 13