For better or worse, conference supremacy is at stake
By RANDY GALLOWAY
Star-Telegram staff writer
This morning, let us mull over a couple of questions about the National Football Conference, that ugly stepchild of America's most popular sport.
Could it get any worse? Has it ever been? Is this the worst ever?
While a rush to NFL judgment in September is never wise -- actually, it's stupid -- when has that ever stopped me from taking the plunge?
The answers to the above questions are:
Yes, because the ineptness might not have reached a bottom. No, because the ineptness is at a new low. Yes, because of the previous answers.
But a team from the NFC is required, by rules, to go to the Super Bowl. By the process of elimination, the current morning line favorite would be the Cowboys, a club missing three key defensive starters and its most dependable wide receiver.
While two games into a season is a mere snapshot, the Cowboys are the best team to surface thus far in this NFC mess. That's because the Cowboys have, thus far, the best quarterback in the conference.
Tonight, however, at Soldier Field in Chicago, we will have a better read on the dog-butted NFC, and particularly on the Cowboys.
Consider the case of the Bears. Very good defense (although already down two injured starters for the season), the most dangerous return man in football (Devin Hester), and the most maligned quarterback, maybe ever, in football.
Yes, Donovan McNabb, even with your strange race-card whine last week, Rex Grossman takes a media and fan whipping like no other whipping.
To his credit, McNabb even backtracked a tad on his statement that black quarterbacks are criticized more often than white QBs.
Asked about Grossman, he answered, "I don't think anybody, especially me, was criticized that much."
Mike Ditka has spent nearly five decades as a player, coach and resident of Chicago-land, and even in a city where Bears passion has always been rampant, Da Coach uses the "never" word in describing Grossman's treatment.
"Unless I somehow missed it, I've never seen any Bears player receive as much abuse in this city as Grossman," Ditka said, and then added, "even worse, I think he hears it, which is disastrous when you play a position where thick-skin is an absolute necessity."
The irony is that Grossman -- like Tony Romo, in his fifth NFL season -- didn't start every game until last year, and his team went to the Super Bowl. It's a tough crowd in Chicago, much tougher, I guess, than we think we are here.
Last week alone, after a Bears win over Kansas City, Grossman was described as a "mental midget" in one Chicago newspaper, and even took onstage abuse from an actress at one of the city's most high-tone theaters. Sorry, what she called Grossman can't be repeated in this newspaper because it involved a certain female body part.
Since it's a night contest against the Cowboys, meaning all-day tailgating and beer consumption, just imagine what the fans might be calling Rex if he struggles again.
But if the Cowboys are to emerge from September as the best team in the NFC, they have to win this game. And as they like to say in Chicago, there is a "Good Rex" and a "Bad Rex." More than Grossman, however, which Rex surfaces tonight will probably depend on the Phillips 3-4.
While Romo against the Bears' defense is the headline matchup in this game, the flip side is just as intriguing: Grossman, with all his baggage, against a Cowboys defense still finding its way, even after coming up with five turnovers in Miami.
Word out of Chicago this week is a scrambling Bears coaching staff, while reluctant to pull the plug on Grossman, may be down to this option:
Take him out of the bus driver's seat, and turn loose Rex, for better or worse. Mentality-wise, he is considered the gunslinger type (that sounds familiar, right, Tony?) and not a guy who can play with a short chain on his neck.
Without the needed trust factor at the position, that chain has mostly been in place for Grossman. Does that change tonight?
The NFC will eventually be decided by which team is the best of a bad bunch. But the preseason favorites to win the conference -- Bears, Eagles and Saints -- have had September problems, particularly the Eagles and Saints.
Forgive me for even mentioning Super Bowl and the Cowboys in September. Winning the first playoff game in 11 years would still be the ultimate goal for the locals.
But the NFC:
Could it get any worse? Has it ever been? Is this the worst ever?
Since the Cowboys have been the NFC's best thus far, tonight provides us with an early-season moment of how good a team needs to be in an awful conference.
Star-Telegram staff writer
This morning, let us mull over a couple of questions about the National Football Conference, that ugly stepchild of America's most popular sport.
Could it get any worse? Has it ever been? Is this the worst ever?
While a rush to NFL judgment in September is never wise -- actually, it's stupid -- when has that ever stopped me from taking the plunge?
The answers to the above questions are:
Yes, because the ineptness might not have reached a bottom. No, because the ineptness is at a new low. Yes, because of the previous answers.
But a team from the NFC is required, by rules, to go to the Super Bowl. By the process of elimination, the current morning line favorite would be the Cowboys, a club missing three key defensive starters and its most dependable wide receiver.
While two games into a season is a mere snapshot, the Cowboys are the best team to surface thus far in this NFC mess. That's because the Cowboys have, thus far, the best quarterback in the conference.
Tonight, however, at Soldier Field in Chicago, we will have a better read on the dog-butted NFC, and particularly on the Cowboys.
Consider the case of the Bears. Very good defense (although already down two injured starters for the season), the most dangerous return man in football (Devin Hester), and the most maligned quarterback, maybe ever, in football.
Yes, Donovan McNabb, even with your strange race-card whine last week, Rex Grossman takes a media and fan whipping like no other whipping.
To his credit, McNabb even backtracked a tad on his statement that black quarterbacks are criticized more often than white QBs.
Asked about Grossman, he answered, "I don't think anybody, especially me, was criticized that much."
Mike Ditka has spent nearly five decades as a player, coach and resident of Chicago-land, and even in a city where Bears passion has always been rampant, Da Coach uses the "never" word in describing Grossman's treatment.
"Unless I somehow missed it, I've never seen any Bears player receive as much abuse in this city as Grossman," Ditka said, and then added, "even worse, I think he hears it, which is disastrous when you play a position where thick-skin is an absolute necessity."
The irony is that Grossman -- like Tony Romo, in his fifth NFL season -- didn't start every game until last year, and his team went to the Super Bowl. It's a tough crowd in Chicago, much tougher, I guess, than we think we are here.
Last week alone, after a Bears win over Kansas City, Grossman was described as a "mental midget" in one Chicago newspaper, and even took onstage abuse from an actress at one of the city's most high-tone theaters. Sorry, what she called Grossman can't be repeated in this newspaper because it involved a certain female body part.
Since it's a night contest against the Cowboys, meaning all-day tailgating and beer consumption, just imagine what the fans might be calling Rex if he struggles again.
But if the Cowboys are to emerge from September as the best team in the NFC, they have to win this game. And as they like to say in Chicago, there is a "Good Rex" and a "Bad Rex." More than Grossman, however, which Rex surfaces tonight will probably depend on the Phillips 3-4.
While Romo against the Bears' defense is the headline matchup in this game, the flip side is just as intriguing: Grossman, with all his baggage, against a Cowboys defense still finding its way, even after coming up with five turnovers in Miami.
Word out of Chicago this week is a scrambling Bears coaching staff, while reluctant to pull the plug on Grossman, may be down to this option:
Take him out of the bus driver's seat, and turn loose Rex, for better or worse. Mentality-wise, he is considered the gunslinger type (that sounds familiar, right, Tony?) and not a guy who can play with a short chain on his neck.
Without the needed trust factor at the position, that chain has mostly been in place for Grossman. Does that change tonight?
The NFC will eventually be decided by which team is the best of a bad bunch. But the preseason favorites to win the conference -- Bears, Eagles and Saints -- have had September problems, particularly the Eagles and Saints.
Forgive me for even mentioning Super Bowl and the Cowboys in September. Winning the first playoff game in 11 years would still be the ultimate goal for the locals.
But the NFC:
Could it get any worse? Has it ever been? Is this the worst ever?
Since the Cowboys have been the NFC's best thus far, tonight provides us with an early-season moment of how good a team needs to be in an awful conference.
posted by The Gryphon at 5:27 PM
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