I missed the debacle last week in Cincinnati as I was on a train from Newport News, Virginia to Washington DC at the time.  When I got to DC I found some WiFi and checked the score and just kind of stared at it.  How the hell do you lose to the Bengals by five touchdowns?  I’m actually glad I didn’t see it.

Kevin Harlan is calling the game for CBS.  You might remember that his dad was the president of the Packers for a long time and his brother, Brian, was the head of PR for the Bears, until they found out he was betting thousands of dollars on NFL games.  Whoops.

Solomon Wilcots is the analyst, and the Browns just went three and out to start the game so fast that Wilcots hasn’t said a word yet.

On fourth down, the Browns punt to Devin Hester who had a great return, only to be tackled by the punter to save a touchdown.  Hey, maybe the Bears can sign that punter (Dave Zastudil) to play free safety?

To the Bears start at the Browns 44.  They run the first play they always do, Forte off the right side for two yards.

Josh Beekman is starting at left guard instead of the awesome–I mean awful, Frank Omiyale.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that they can’t replace more of that line.

On second down, Earl Bennett clangs one off his hands and it’s almost intercepted.  On third down, Cutler drops back, can’t find anybody, then scrambled forward for four yards and gets nailed by Eric “Eazy E” Wright.  I hope he doesn’t have AIDS now.

Fourth and four from the 38 and the Bears are…punting.  Against the Browns.  Holy shit, if there’s ever a time to get aggressive it’s now.  Thanks, Lovie.  Way to simultaneously show no faith in your offense (to get four yards) and your defense (to keep the vaunted Browns offense from scoring after giving them decent field position of you don’t get the first.)

The Browns start their second possession with their only real offensive threat, Josh Cribbs, taking the snap in the Wildcat.  He does a Forte and gains two yards to the right.

Hey, a Michael Gaines sighting!  Remember when the Bears were suiting up four tight ends (it only ended like three weeks ago).  Then they cut Gaines.  Now he’s in Cleveland.  What’s worse getting cut, or getting signed by the Browns?

Third down, Al Awfulava bats down (actually up) Derek Anderson’s pass and it’s almost picked by Danieal Manning.

Zastudil’s punt almost hits a Bear, but the Browns don’t notice and just let it roll out of bounds just across midfield.

The Bears are honoring Walter Payton today on the tenth anniversary of his death.  They have painted a navy blue football with an orange 34 between the 30 and 35 yard lines at both ends.  That’s a nice touch.  I’ve always thought the Bears should honor Walter by lining the 34 instead of the 35 at each end.  Not that they ever listen to me.

Oh, and if they did they would not be wearing these hideous orange jerseys they are today.  Those are just brutal.

Third and 18, the Bears gain 12.  I hope Brad Maynard’s parents are TiVoing the game, he’s going to get a lot of work.

Did I mention the Browns just went three and out?  For the third time in three possessions?    Oh, and the Bears have had it twice and have gone three and out both times.  Awesome.

Zastudil’s punt drives Hester back and then when Devin catches the punt he sprints towards his own end zone three steps then cuts back up the field.  Daredevil or dumbass?  Dumbass, he barely gets back to the spot where he caught the punt in the first place.

So Romeo Crennel has two of those Coors Light fake press conference commercials?  If they’re going to pick bad coaches, why not break out some old Wanny footage?  Or maybe they can’t figure out what to with a lot of:

“Aaaaapp.”

“He’s got a leg.”

“I thought it was fourth down, if I knew it was third down I wouldn’t have done what we did when we thought it was fourth down.”

Or, how about Dick Jauron?

“That’s not my beer, but I drink that beer.”

Hey a first down!  On third and six, Cutler finds Forte swinging out of the backfield for a long gain up the sidelines.  That was so exciting some of the fans actually woke up.  Twenty-eight yard gain.

On the next play, Cutler is sacked and fumbles and the ball rolls towards the Browns end zone where Forte falls on it for a loss of…25  you can’t make this shit up.

Lovie is going to challenge that Jay was down before he fumbled, or even better maybe Jay’s arm was going forward and it might be an incomplete pass.

Wilcots thinks that not only wasn’t Cutler’s arm moving forward (I disagree) but that the ball went sideways and should have been a lateral…so a fumble, regardless (that I agree with.)  But the referee says it’s an incomplete pass, so instead of second and 35, it’s second and 10.

After a one yard Forte “run”, Cutler scrambles for 19 yards and a first down at the 15 yard line.

Forte actually has a hole to run through and he gains six yards, but it looked like it was going to be a touchdown.  A fast running back would have scored.

Second and four, the Bears false start.  Third down, they run an end around to Hester and he gets lit up by something named Kenyon Coleman and loses five yards.  Third and 14 at the 19.

The Browns blitz, Cutler has to throw it away and the Bears will have to settle for a Robbie Gould field goal.  As optimistic as we all were when the Bears won three in a row to go 3-1 at the bye, they’ve been pretty lousy since, at least since about haflway through the second quarter of the Atlanta game.

Robbie makes the field goal and it’s 3-0.  That might be enough.

Anderson goes up the field on first down and Danieal Manning makes a great diving interception, then hops up and returns it about 40 yards inside the Browns 20.

Let’s see what the Bears do with field position that even they shouldn’t be able to screw up.

Ugh.  Garrett Wolfe is in, and he runs for two yards.

Second down Cutler throws high to Desmond Clark who can’t hang on and the tipped pass is almost picked off.

Third down they run a screen to Wolfe, which is a terrible play, and Cutler makes a terrible throw and it’s way too low even for that dwarf.  Awesome.  This Bears scoring drive.  Three plays, two yards, and a short field goal by Gould.  6-0.  It’s a good thing they’re not playing an actual NFL team this week.

The Browns have a third and one at their own 36 and this might be time for their first first down of the game!  Oooh, the tension!

We’ll have to wait until after the break to find out because the first quarter has come to an end.

Never mind, while we were gone, the refs decided the Browns had enough yardage for a first down already.  Then, Jamal Lewis ripped off nine yards.  Then three more for another first down.

And, just when it looks like the Browns are moving, Lewis fumbles a handoff and the Bears have it back.  I’m going to go way out on a limb here and say that maybe the Browns aren’t good.

First down, Cutler hooks up with his boyfriend, Greg Olsen for a dozen yards.  They follow that with another Forte special.  Second and eight coming up.

Third and three Hester catches a pass and avoids a tackler to get a first down.

Forte off the left side, gets a nice block on the edge by Jason McKie and a good one from Orlando Pace and gets 12 yards down inside the ten.

First and goal, Forte runs (well, jogs) left tries to set up a tackler and jumps for no reason to gain about three yards. to the five.

Second and goal Forte up the middle to the two.

Third down the Bears pass, nobody blocks the right end, Cameron Wimbley and he sacks Cutler.  Time for another field goal.  Yay?

Gould makes it and it’s 9-0.  This is less than inspiring.

We have a Tommie Harris sighting.  It’s not all that good.  Third and three he rushes Anderson, and as Anderson is about to pass Tommie shoves him.  He doesn’t try to sack him, he just pushes him.  Anderson then rolls out and throws the ball away.  Tommie’s been out so long he thinks it’s two hand touch now?

On the punt, several Browns and lots of fans prove they don’t know the rules.  The punt rolls inside the 40 and is touched by a Brown but not downed.  So Nate Vasher runs in and grabs the ball, but it’s knocked away from him and Browns land on the ball.  Why isn’t that a fumble?

Because on a punt once the kicking team has touched the ball the returning team can try to advance the ball with no further risk.  The worst that can happen once the ball touches a Brown is that the Bears will get the ball there.  Say Vasher had picked it up, run around and fumbled it and the Browns grabbed it and ran it back to the end zone.  It’s not a touchdown.  It’s Bears ball where the Browns touched it to begin with.  Say Vasher had picked it up and run twenty yards before getting tackled?  The Bears get to pick where they want the ball, either where it was first touched, or where Vasher ended up.

As it turns out, the ball was dead even before Vasher touched it because when it hit the Browns player he was out of bounds, so the ball was immediately dead, just as though it had been downed.

Second down, Cutler gets hit helmet to helmet by Wimbley and roughing the passer is called.  Cutler looks like he’s not sure where he his.  Given the offensive production so far maybe he’ll think he’s in Denver and Mike Shanahan is calling plays and throw a touchdown pass or two?

First down, Forte runs for zero.  Sigh.

Ooh, on the replay we see that Cutler bit his tongue pretty good when Wimbley hit him.  That has to hurt.

Second down, nice pass up the seam for 21 yards to Hester.

The Bears throw a screen to Hester who slips, but still gets about six yards.

Olsen catches a quick out and picks up a first down and then comes up limping.  Looks like he twisted his right ankle.  Meanwhile two Browns knocked each other goofy trying to tackle Olsen, so there’s a break in the action.  Olsen gets his foot re-taped and Cutler stands on the sidelines with a trainer holding some gauze on his tongue.  Holy crap, do we really need a guy to hold a bandage on another guy’s tongue?

Despite the long break, the Bears call a timeout.  Because they’re morons.

First down, Forte runs for a yard.  This is just sad, really.

Second down, Hester catches a pass for about six yards at the seven and then falls out of bounds.  Given how much pressure the Browns have put on Cutler, you’d feel OK if you thought that defense was worth a shit.  But it’s not.

Forte runs for about six yards and he’s down at the one, first and goal at the two minute warning.

First play after the warning, the Bears actually run the ball for a touchdown.  It’s only Forte’s second rushing TD of the season.  And now it’s 16-0.

CBS is showing fans in the stands wearing Walter Payton jerseys.  And then they showed his mother and Connie and Brittney who is just smoking hot now.  Hello.

The kickoff to Cribbs is short, but no matter, the great Craig Steltz (he’s still on the team?) flies in and nails Cribbs inside the 20.

Second down for the Browns and Wale Ogunleye gets poked in the eye by former Bear John St. Clair.  As Wale comes off the field we can see that both of his eyes are still in his head, so that’s good.

The Bears defensive line is finally heard from again as Alex Brown and Helen Huntermeyer sack Anderson, that sets up a third and 21 and the Bears call timeout.  But when Josh Cribbs runs for nine yards the Bears don’t have another timeout to call so it’s going to be halftime.  Nobody pisses away time outs like the Chicago Bears.

How about this for a stat.  At halftime in a game Denver trails to the Broncos 6-0, Kyle Orton is 10-15 for 35 yards.  THIRTY-FIVE yards on ten completions.  Yeah, the Bears miss that.

In the first half, Derek Anderson was 2-9 for 13 yards.  Just how terrible must Brady Quinn be if they won’t go to him?  I shudder to think.

The Bears get the ball first in the second half and they decide we’ve missed the three and outs (they’d scored on their last four possessions) so they get back to it.

On the punt, the Bears are called for having an ineligible man down field.  It’s Garrett Wolfe, and just as I feared, the NFL has finally installed a “you must be this tall to participate on special teams” sign on the sidelines.

On the repunt, Maynard shanks it for TWELVE yards.  OK, time for the Maynards to turn off the TiVo.

The Browns start on the Bears 30.  First down, Jamal Lewis, with the Bears orange jerseys giving him flashbacks to his prison days, runs for 11 yards.

Next play, Lewis gets eight more.  This is normally when the Browns fumble.

Instead, Lewis rips of ten more yards and is down to the one.

So yeah, Lewis has run for 29 yards on the last three plays.

First and goal.  Lewis up the middle, stoned for no gain.
Second down, it looks like the Browns all false start, but no call, their mongoloid QB jumps up and reaches over for a touchdown.

All of the momentum is with Cleveland now.  Nothing can turn it back…

…oh, wait, the Browns get the extra point blocked.  Israel Idonije blocks it and it is 16-6.  A blocked extra point cost the Browns the Bengals game.  Have I mentioned that they are terrible?

Southwest Airlines has a whole series of those “Grab your bag.  It’s on,” commericals.  But I miss the original one, the one where Alfonso Soriano is driving that baggage cart around the airport tarmac.  They never show that anymore.

Let’s see what the Bears can do after the Browns’ TD.

Johnny Knox’s kick return goes nowhere.

But on first down Cutler finds Olsen for almost 20 yards.

And then something named Jason Trusnik sacks Cutler.  Who?  What?

It’s Trusnik’s second career sack, if that makes you feel any better.

The Bears are back up to the line, and Cutler calls a timeout.  Great?  The Bears love to waste time outs.

Second and 16, after the timeout, Cutler finds Knox at midfield for 13 yards.

Third and three, Wimbley comes free off the edge and Cutler throws it away.  Time for another punt.

This one’s a little better.  Maynard’s kick gets a nice bounce inside the five, and Corey Graham is able to keep it out of the end zone and the Bears down it inside the two.  We know the Browns can drive 30 yards for a touchdown.  Let’s see them go 99.

The Browns are starting to move the ball on the ground though.  Harrison gets ten yards on first down, then three more on the next play.  Second and seven the Browns run quick pass to their fullback but he drops it.

Third and seven, Wale and Helen hit Anderson as he throws and it falls incomplete.  Zastudil will be standing at the one to take the snap for this punt.

Hester fields it inside the Bears 40 and does one of those returns where he runs parallel to the goal line for a long time and gains no yards, and Corey Graham gets called for an illegal block.  So the Bears are going to end up at about the 30 to start this drive.  So much for turning the field position.

Good news for the Bears, though.  Josh Cribbs leaves the field holding a shoulder.  One of his own.  He’s probably the only real threat to them losing this game with 6:30 left int the third quarter, either by breaking a return or doing some Wildcat nonsense.

First down, Forte runs for three yards.

Second down, Foret special.  Third and five coming up.

Wilcots says, “The Bears are basically averaging what they did per rush last year, so what’s the problem?”

The problem is that their offense sucked last year, too.  So being that good will have them home watching the playoffs again.

Third and five, one yard pass to Johnny.  Time for another punt.

Cribbs couldn’t have been that hurt.  He’s back in to field Maynard’s punt.  But Maynard doesn’t get much of it and it bounces out at the Cleveland 40.

If you had 2:14 pm in the “When will CBS show some Sid Luckman stats?” pool, you are a winner!  Hey, it’s the Bears own fault.  Most other franchises didn’t spend 50 years not bothering to find a real quarterback.

On third and five, Anderson finds Steve Heiden for a first down, but while Helen was tackling him, Danieal pulls the ball out and returns it about five yards.  That’s the third Bears forced turnover today.

So the Bears take over at their own 49, and on first down, Cutler finds Hester in the middle of the field.  Devin almost makes a great catch, but can’t hang on.

Second down, Forte runs for eight yards.  Harlan wonders if the Browns defense has ‘worn down.’  This is what it’s come to.  When the Bears gain eight yards, you immediately assume that the defense must be exhausted.

First down, Cutler makes a terrific throw (while being hit) and slips it to Johnny between two defensive backs for a long gain down the far sidelines near the 10.  Cutler got hammered by Shawn Rodgers but still made a great throw for that long gain.

(Yardage update.  In Baltimore, Kyle Orton has now completed 14 passes for 73 yards.  He’s heating up.  Almost five yards a completion!)

First down at the 11, and Forte runs left, cuts back to the right and easily beats everybody to the pylon for a touchdown.  He got a great block on the edge by Des Clark that gave him the corner.  Robbie Gould makes the extra point and it’s 23-6.

Speaking of 73 yards, that’s how many yards Forte has on 19 carries and he’s got two touchdowns.  All you dopes who took him in the first round of your fantasy draft finally are getting at least a few points out of him.

Josh Cribbs finally gets some room during his return, but Wolfe makes a very nice open field tackle to drop him at the 30.  If Wolfe doesn’t make that tackle, I’m not sure anybody would have been able to catch Cribbs.

The Browns get a first down when the immortal Chansi Stuckey catches a short pass and Zach Bowman makes a terrible tackle attempt, letting him get six extra yards.

Another first down for Cleveland as Anderson starts to scramble then throws across his body and across the field to Cribbs for about 20 yards.

The Browns are running the Wildcat with Cribbs again.  First down, Lewis breaks a nice run up the middle.  Second down, Cribbs is hit and fumbles, but the Browns get on it.  third and two.

anderson is stopped by Briggs and Helen short of a first.  Fourth and one at the Bears 28.

The Browns throw to thier tight end, but Awfulava is there to break up the play.  The ball goes back to the Bears.

On second down, Cutler’s pass for Knox is batted into the air and apparently intercepted by Brodney Pool.  It looked like the ball hit the ground while Brodney (what kind of f’ed up name is that?) was trying to make the catch.  Lovie thinks so too and throws his little red hanky.

Because Bears-Browns is about the fifth best game on CBS today, there aren’t a whole lot of camera angles to choose from.  There isn’t one that proves that Brodney didn’t catch it and the ruling stands.

Never fear, it’s the Browns!  First play, Anderson finds Mohammed Massoquoi and Nick Roach immediately pokes the ball free and the Bears hop right on it.

First down, quick pass to Earl for 17 yards.  Harlan inexplicably calls him “Williams.”

On the replay we see why.  He had Chris Williams on the brain.  On that quick pass, the pride of Vandy wheeled out and threw a nice block in front…uh…further pride of Vandy, in Earl to spring him.

Cutler scrambles left and a flag flies (turns out to be defensive holding) and Jay runs up the sidelines showing no desire to just go out of bounds and gets hammered pretty good after an 11 yard gain.  Go out of bounds, Jay.  You’re one hit away from the Caleb Hanie era.

If you had 2:45 in the “When will CBS run the list of QBs since Luckman” graphic, you win!

Third and three and Jay sees a corner blitz coming and nobody to pick it up.  So he calls timeout.

After yet another “Two and a Half Men” promo, Jay finds Devin for a first down.

First down at the 35.  Forte for nothing.

Swing pass to Devin who makes two unbelievable moves to get into the open field, and he thinks he’s going to score, but he is caught at the one .  Thirty-four yards and just a great effort by Devin, who may have hurt his foot on that tackle.

First and goal as Devin limps to the sidelines.  Cutler can’t find Olsen over the middle and throws it away.

Second down, Forte runs for no yards.

Third down.  Forte for maybe a yard to the one.

A field goal won’t matter, so the Bears are going to go for it.  Ostensibly to show that they can run it.  Instead they run play-action and Cutler’s pass is thrown away.  What was the sense of that?

After the play, Rob Ryan and Cutler start yelling at each other and we get a nice shot of Ryan yelling, “Fuck you!”

The Bears appear to stop Harrison in the end zone, but the refs (incorrectly) rule that he got the ball over the line before he was down.

On second down, Lewis flirts with a safety.  Third and ten from inside the one yard line.

Anderson is hit as he throws, and Peanut Tillman makes a diving pick, gets up makes a couple of nice moves and picks up a few blocks inside the ten and scores from 20 yards out.  30-6.  That’s the fifth Browns turnover in the game.

With 3:14 to go, Brady Quinn is warming up on the sidelines, and Solomon asks what we’re all thinking. “Why even bother to make the change now?”

Cribbs breaks two tackles on a long return before he is hammered by Darrell McClover.  There was a flag which calls most of the 55 yard return back, as the Browns were caught cheating.

Sure enough, Brady Quinn is in to play quarterback.  Get ready for a 24 point rally here in the last 3:02?

Quinn finds Massaquoi for nine yards, and as Peanut shoves him out of bounds, Mohammed gets mad and shoves back.  Too little, too late, Mo.

Second down, Quinn throws the out, Massaquoi runs the out and up and Peanut almost has another interception.

Quinn finds his tight end for a first down, and he drops the ball.  Time for a punt.

Devin’s obviously OK as he takes the punt at his 30, breaks a tackle, gives a little dead leg on the sidelines then breaks it all the way to the end zone.  It doesn’t count, because Rashied Davis is called for holding.

On the replay, they show Rashied’s block and it didn’t look like it should have been called.

Garrett Wolfe is in to run out the clock (we hope.)  He gets about five on first down and the clock runs to the two minute warning.

Second down, Wolfe gets five more, a first down and Cleveland calls time out?  What?

First down, Wolfe for five more.  Hey, this Garrett Wolfe is awesome!  As he runs left, makes a guy miss and runs for 35 down to the 13.  Can you tell the Browns have quit?

And now with a minute to go, Cutler takes a knee and it’s all over.

So what did we see today?  We know we saw one awful, awful team, and we’re not quite sure what we saw playing against them.  On one hand, the Bears did what you expect a good team to do to Cleveland.  They completely shut down their offense, allowing points only when a terrible punt gave the Browns the ball at the Bears 30.  They forced five turnovers.  They completely shut down one of the best return men in football.

But, they did allow more than 100 rushing yards, even when Cleveland had almost no threat in the passing game.  And on offense they didn’t run the ball very well, at least not consistently.  You hate to keep going back to this, but if you can’t run the ball (and the Bears really can’t) you have no chance of being a playoff team, and right now, they don’t.

The best part?  They just finished what we thought was going to be the “easy” part of their schedule, and in the next four they get Arizona, the Niners, the Eagles and the Vikings.

Gulp.