Posts tagged Brian Urlacher at FanHouse

In the NFC Championship game two years ago, Reggie Bush took a swing pass 88 yards to the house. The last ten or so were accompanied by Bush pointing back at the Bears defense before doing a flip into the end-zone and dancing the night away. Of course, the Saints had only cut the Bears lead to two, and didn't score another point en route to a 39-14 loss.

Several Bears were a bit peeved by this at the time. Adewale Ogunleye was in the field, and got the chance to tell Bush what he thought. "I told Reggie that was unprofessional," Ogunleye said.

"He's a rookie and he's going to be a hell of a player in this league. But for him to point back and taunt, that was no class. I swear I was a second away from punching him. I'm glad I didn't. I ran right to him and said, 'Be professional in this league.'"

Olin Kreutz -- who was fortunately on the sideline or he certainly would have punched Bush, just ask former teammates* -- didn't like the act either.

For a long time, it seemed like we couldn't go a week without hearing something having to do with Brian Urlacher but not having something to do with how he played football. Whether it was about his desire for a new contract, his acrimonious child support battle, his frisky hands or his hostile text messaging, it got far too easy to forget that Urlacher was still playing football for the Bears.

This season, though, Urlacher has faded from view. That may be a bad sign for the Bears defense, but it's a good one for Urlacher's personal sanity. I'd give thanks tomorrow, but Urlacher's luck ran out today. The mother of Urlacher's son was in court threatening to stop Urlacher from seeing his son because Urlacher has painted the boy's toenails and has him wearing pink diapers.

"He says he can do whatever he wants," (the boy's mother Tyna) Robertson said. "(Urlacher said), 'It doesn't make him feminine. It doesn't make him gay.'

"You're confusing him, if he's a boy or a girl," she said.

Whether or not he's confused about his gender, he's certainly gotten screwed in the parenting department. In case you've forgotten, Urlacher's infamous text message to Robertson accused her of "raising a little p___y, and these two have gone back and forth in the public forum for years with the little boy stuck in the middle. Hopefully Urlacher's new contract pays enough to cover therapy.

(H/T PFT)

As a Bears fan, I can tell you the defense has been frustrating this year. The offense -- as long as Kyle Orton's under center -- has been more productive, despite the fact that the team has sunk enormous resources into their vaunted defense. The production of the guys on Brian Urlacher's side of the ball has been far from their reputation, which was established in Lovie Smith's early tenure. The two biggest scapegoats for this disappointment have been defensive coordinator Bob Babich and franchise figure-head Urlacher.

On Babich, it's really a lazy theory of convenience to blame him. He took over last season for Ron Rivera, who ran the defense for '05-'06 when the unit was elite. Obviously, if the personnel is virtually the same and all of a sudden the team gets worse, it must be his fault, right? I'm not ready to blame Babich for this. First of all, last season the defense was put in all kinds of bad positions due to awful offense ... not to mention they were decimated by injuries. This year, however, the offense has been better than the defense, and the injuries have been limited (though, to be fair, most injuries have come in the secondary, and the defense isn't exactly struggling against the run ... it's all been through the air).

The stigma attached to Rex Grossman nowadays is nearly palpable. Last night in the chat, I simply typed, "Rex Grossman is not as bad as most people think." In the ensuing exchange, I was bombarded with messages telling me how much he sucks. I never even said he was good. My point was proven. He's not a good quarterback, I'll agree. He'd also presently be the best quarterback on the Niners, Chiefs, Raiders, and Lions. There could be more, but those are the obvious ones.

This stigma isn't just reserved for opposing fans. Legions of Bears fans act like he's the worst QB ever, which is saying a lot from people who have watched Jonathan "The Mighty" Quinn, Moses Moreno, and Cade McNever (among about a thousand other stiffs). It wasn't one iota surprising on Sunday when Grossman was booed. Immediately when Kyle Orton hit the turf, I texted my brother with: "Great, now a bunch of idiots are gonna boo after every incompletion." Sure enough, flocks of boos were heard in Grossman's direction in the third quarter.

It did not please Brian Urlacher.

This video has been on YouTube for a while, but with so many big college games today and some interesting late battles on Sunday, it seemed appropriate.

Meet Ben Wilson, the 10-year-old destroyer who has never met a prepubescent player he hasn't enjoyed pummeling. Honestly, this kid is 14 years my junior and scares the manhood right out of me. Why couldn't I have seen this video yesterday so I could have been Ben for Halloween? Running around the party, gingerly lighting friends and acquaintances up, people would have asked who I was exactly. Brian Urlacher? Troy Polamalu? Steve Williams?

No chance everyone, I'm Ben Wilson, the youngster that would honestly improve the Detroit Lions in about seven seconds.

(Also, I'd like to preface this video with a music apology. It appears the person that cut this highlight package was abused by ears as a child and is righting the ship.)

Roy Williams has never exactly been quiet leading up to games, but he always seemed to have a few little nuggets leading up to when the Lions would face their divisional-rival Chicago Bears. The two teams square off this weekend in Chicago, but Williams has been shipped to Dallas. And Brian Urlacher is sad.

"He got us fired up every week, I'll tell you that much," Urlacher told the Detroit media via conference call. "He was fun because he always was running his mouth. But I'm sure he's not too mad to be where he's at right now."

Yeah, Brian, and I'm pretty sure the Lions don't miss Williams unnecessarily amping up the opposing defense. It's easy for people to sit behind their computers and proclaim, they are professional athletes, they don't need extra motivation! Yet here it is, right from the horse's mouth. One of the league's premier defensive players feels like there's a void this week without Williams' taunts.

So, without this extra little push, the Bears will only win by, what? 20?

Damn, I miss Roy, too.

I was actually surprised that this many Bears fans thought their team was going to win Sunday night in Indy. There isn't much optimism emanating from the Windy City these days when the topic of conversation is their beloved Halas Hall residents. So I looked around to see if anyone without bias thought the Bears could win.

No one at sportsline even thinks they can cover.

ESPN, while not ballsy enough to pick against the spread, doesn't have a Bears pick.

Peter King, while obviously putting a ton of time into his analysis, has the Colts -- and check out the side poll. Over 95 percent of the voters have the Colts winning.

FanHouse's own Will Brinson has the Colts in blowout fashion.

And so it goes, on and on and on ... no matter where you look. There are a few people who think the Bears can cover, but I didn't find a single entry where the Bears were the predicted winner.

It makes sense. To illustrate why, let's first go over what the Colts have to do to win.

Being a Bears fan, I figured I was in for at least a little bit of torture last night. The game was at home against the lowly Niners on Fox -- meaning Troy Aikman would contribute to the torture. Going into the game, one would reasonably expect the Bears offense to provide said torture, while the defense, Devin Hester, and Robbie Gould offered a reprieve.

Then the game started ... and we entered a whole new universe. Good was bad, up was down, day was night ...

For example:

- Kyle Orton was great. Sure the touch pass in the end-zone was too low and shallow, but he seems to have developed great game-relationships with Greg Olsen and Rashied Davis. Orton ended with quality numbers, but they should have been better. There were several dropped passes, including one by Davis that would have been his third TD.

- The offensive line provided solid protection for Orton, which was a huge bounce-back from the embarrassment in Seattle. They also opened up good enough holes for Matt Forte and Kevin Jones to combine for 74 yards on 14 carries. Forte ran very hard and shed several would-be tacklers.

- Dusty Dvoracek and Mike Brown appeared healthy and full-speed.

- Danieal Manning was stellar in the return game ... coming away with a 60-yarder and a 75-yarder that set up 10 first quarter points for the offense.

On the other hand ...

Training camps are underway, the NFL season is a month off, and to get you ready for 2008, FanHouse previews all 32 teams, "heat index" style. We'll rate each club in 10 categories on a scale of 1 to 10, high score wins.

Quarterback: It's an open competition between Rex Grossman and Kyle Orton. Cue the laugh track. I'll try to be positive. In 2006, Grossman led the team to a 13-3 record and an NFC Championship to boot. He led the NFL in 100+ QB rating games (yes, I know he led in games below 40 and also had a zero rating once ... remember I was being positive), and threw for over 3000 yards with 23 TD passes for a running-and-defense team. Orton went 10-5 as a starter in the previous season with atrocious numbers (seriously, he didn't even throw for 2,000 yards or ten TDs in 15 games). Look for Grossman to start, unless the Bears want to completely take away the threat of Devin Hester. And they can't do that. Heat Index: 2

Isn't this the best part of every training camp ... also the pre-season in basketball, baseball, and hockey? A veteran star feels like he's in the proverbial "best shape of his career." How many times have we heard it? It's so cliche, but according to Dan Pompei of the Chicago Tribune, this is exactly the case with the face of the Monsters of the Midway.

Apparently Brian Urlacher is using a training regimen called Egoscue that aging vets Junior Seau and John Lynch had used in the past to try and keep up the younger players of the league. It involves a bunch of stretching and self-resistance, among other things:

"It's a lot of core work, holding a pose for a minute or two," Urlacher says. "Some weird stuff. It's hard. Muscles you didn't even know you had start burning. But it makes you more flexible and functional. When I get done I feel great."

Remember, Urlacher was playing with pain last season -- just like Tommie Harris was -- as he dealt with a pinched nerve in his neck and assorted other back issues.
And now?