Ho Sit Down! Week 14 - Lovie Smith

While it would be easy to give Marion Barber the Ho Sit Down! treatment this week after he made a terrible mental mistake with 1:55 left in the game and then fumbled the ball in overtime, this game was lost on the sidelines. The shit that Barber did was inexcusable; but the Bears lost this game because of a philosophy that they've followed for as long as Lovie Smith has been in charge... go limp when you have the lead.

I've seen it too many times in the past to overlook the fact that it happened again versus the Broncos. When the Bears have the lead in the 4th quarter, they drop the safeties back deep and leave the middle of the field wide open for easy completions. The idea is that if you prevent the big play, it makes it harder for the other team to score. The problem with this philosophy is that even though they are forced to burn clock, the offense can easily march the entire field by dumping the ball over the middle. Then once they get in the red zone it only takes one defensive breakdown to allow an easy touchdown.

Remember last year how the Bears dominated the Eagles for three quarters and then give up 13 points in the 4th and almost lost? The Eagles couldn't do shit against the Bears all game, averaging just over 23 yards per drive through the first three quarters. Then the Eagles last three possessions go for 65, 58 and 68 yards and three scores. It's not that the Eagles suddenly remembered how to run an offense, it's that the Bears defense got the orders from The Top to bend over and expose their middle parts.

Sticking to the same old script versus the Broncos, the Bears held Denver to just under 20 yards per drive for their first 12 drives. Then when the clock starting running low in the 4th quarter, the Bears go soft on a 63 yard TD drive before a 39 yard drive that ends in a FG to force overtime.

They've been running this end-of-game defense for years, even before Rod M starting calling the plays, so it's not like he was the one that decided to pull back the defensive reins. Lovie is the only person that makes these kinds of strategic decisions.

So while Tim Jennings allowed a huge completion to let the Broncos tie the game in the 4th, and although Marion Barber coughed the ball up in OT which gave Zack Bowman a chance to do his best "Johnny Knox falling down" impression, there was a much Higher Power to blame for this big letdown... Lovie Smith calling the shots From Above.

Lovie, drink your cough syrup and sit your ho ass down!

HO SIT DOWN!
HEY!
HO SIT DOWN!
HEY!
HO SIT DOWN!

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@1stdownroywill

Ho Sit Down! Week 13 - Roy E Williams

When you give the general public an opportunity to voice their opinion, you need to be prepared to hear some pretty stupid shit. Maybe I'm just saying that because I think that most people I come in contact with on any given day are, in fact, stupid. It's not because I think I have a superior level of intelligence... it's just that I like to take a step back, apply common sense, and make rational choices in my everyday life. But after 26+ years on this Earth, I'm slowly coming to the grips that most people don't actually do this. Whether it's the oblivious MF driving 60 MPH in the left lane while you lay on your horn behind them or the grimey MF who refuses to wash his hands before spreading his dick germs all on the bathroom door handle, a lot of people just don't use the thinking part of their brains.

So what did I do?

I went straight to them for their opinions.

I decided to let the people vote for who deserves the Ho Sit Down! treatment for week 13. We polled eight NFL experts -- seven are Bears fans and one is an unbiased 49ers fan living in Chicago -- to see how they answer the following question:

"If you could pick one person who fucked it more than anyone else in the Bears loss to the Chiefs, who you got?"

After such a poor offensive display against KC, I'm not surprised at the variety of the answers. What was surprising is the fact that the only person to vote for Jerry Angelo was the only person that's not even a Bears fan. And while he's definitely right about this whole thing being JA's fault, we're not gonna talk about how Angelo failed to recruit a legitamate backup QB, in case Cutler went down.

I was (almost) shocked to learn that only two people voted for Caleb Hanie. Hanie was the first response I received, as well as my vote (had I registered to vote), so I figured he might run away with this poll. Hanie missed badly on throws to open receivers when he wasn't busy making poor decisions (like holding on to the ball too long instead of throwing it away). But since Hanie only received two countable votes this week, he'll have to try a lot harder to get the HSD! treatment next week.

The runner up in this week's poll was Mike Martz. Although he only came one vote shy of defending his HSD! belt, he just couldn't do enough to come out with this week's award. But with the incredible perseverance that we know him for, we can all expect Martz to be in the running again next week and beyond.

That brings us to this week's scapegoat (and first time recipient of the HSD! honors)... Roy E Williams.

Williams struggled throughout the game to get off the line of scrimmage while being jammed. He lost his footing a few times and was a general non-factor. It wasn't until the most crucial drive of the game that Roy E made his presence felt, dropping a potentially game-tying TD with 4:01 left on the clock. Not only did he not catch the big brown thing flying at this head, he decided it would be smart to play popcorn with it in a sea of KC defenders, allowing the ball to be legally up-for-grabs. When the Chiefs came down with the interception, that pretty much wrapped it up.

Personally, I think Hanie fucked it way worse than anybody else with his poor play, but since my vote doesn't count this week (and only this week), I'll bring it full circle with the most important theme of the 2011-2012 Bears season... Roy Will did not have one MF first down celebration for the second straight week. Now, it's kinda hard to celebrate a first down when you don't have any catches and it's hard to catch the ball when it's only thrown in your direction one time all game, Caleb Hanie. But this is the NFL, and we can't blame anybody but Roy E Williams for a ho-ass-zero-FDC performance against the Chiefs. So Roy E, this one's for you...

HO SIT DOWN!
HEY!
HO SIT DOWN!
HEY!
HO SIT DOWN!

@1stdownroywill

Ho Sit Down! Week 12 - Mike Martz

If you're going to be anywhere near Greensboro, NC this winter you need to check out a basketball game at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Although I've never seen a game at NC A&T personally, it was brought to my attention a couple years ago that this is officially the Crunkest Gym In America. You see, when a player on the opposing team fouls out, the Dawg Pound goes HAM Newton on them and emphatically helps them off the floor with Maceo's "Go Sit Down" as the soundtrack. While the song might not be anything special on it's own, I love the fact that the Aggies fans have adopted this tradition when somebody fouls out against them. So much so, that I decided to bring you a new weekly feature to Bear Down Chicago Bears called Ho Sit Down. Each week we will highlight one person that fucked up so bad that they deserve the Ho Sit Down treatment.

And what better person to get this thing rolling than Mike Martz?

I think it's pretty safe to assume that Martz reads BDCB because after we gassed him up last week for his play calling against the Chargers, his head returned to its normal, over-inflated levels and his creative juices squirted all over the place.

We could single out the fact that he didn't tone down his play calling for Caleb Hanie, who was making his first career start. We could focus on the Bears RB's only getting 22 rushing attempts when they averaged over 5.5 yards per carry. We could bury him for calling a trick play on 2nd and 1 at the OAK 7 yard line.

But what made me want to tell that ho to sit down more than anything on Sunday, was that when the Bears needed to march the entire field at the end of the game, Devin Hester was on the sidelines. From what I noticed, he didn't get a single snap on offense the entire game, which is stupid in its own right; but it really pissed me off that they didn't have him out there on the final drive of the game.

The Bears got the ball back with 56 seconds left in the game and down by five points. With the drive starting at their own 4 yard line, the Bears needed to go 96 yards without any timeouts. So instead of putting their best homerun threat on the field (or second best, if you're one of those Johnny Knox D-riders), they put slow ass Sam Hurd out there.

Now, I like Sam Hurd and I think he needs more offensive snaps. Even though he's not fastest WR or the best route runner, he's a big target that catches the ball when it's thrown his way. But in this scenario, his lack of speed warrants keeping him on the sidelines since you're going up against the clock and don't have time to change personnel between plays.

Obviously, Hester has his own shortcomings as a receiver and has struggled with drops this season, but he is still capable of reaching the end zone from anywhere on the field. He could slip one tackle and take it to the house on any play.

So for the simple fact that the Bears had to race down the field but chose not to line up their fastest player, we are telling Mike Martz' ho ass to sit down!

HO SIT DOWN!
HEY!
HO SIT DOWN!
HEY!
HO SIT DOWN!





@1stdownroywill