Olson: Grossman, uneasiness back

Bears quarterback Rex Grossman is greeted on the sidelines by coach Lovie Smith, left, and running backs coach Tim Spencer after Grossman's fourth-quarter touchdown on Sunday. (AP

By Eric Olson, eolson@nwherald.com

We probably should have seen this coming.

Rex Grossman did.

"I always thought, you know, odds are I was going to play a little bit, and so we'll see what happens," Grossman said after he played the second half of the Bears 27-23 win against Detroit at Soldier Field on Sunday. "I never figured that I wasn't going to play at all. ... Odds are that at least two quarterbacks play some, especially here in Chicago."

Truer words were never spoken.

Naturally, just when Kyle Orton had begun to look like the quarterback of the future for the Bears, he was lost for who-knows-how-long with a vague but painful-looking ankle injury at the end of the first half.

And in the second half, everything shifted. With Orton's play of late, it seemed like good things could happen any time the Bears had the football.

With Grossman under center, the sense of looming disaster returned. So did the booing of the crowd when a pass sailed far over a receiver's head or was knocked down and/or picked off by a defender.

Those who follow the Bears seem almost conditioned to feel nervous when they see No. 8 on the quarterback's jersey.

Given Grossman's history, maybe that's justified. But he wasn't spectacular or awful on Sunday. He, like the rest of the team, was just good enough.

He had passes knocked down, including one that was intercepted. He overthrew receivers and made some throws that he probably shouldn't have.

But with Grossman in the game, the Bears also scored 14 points on the NFL's worst defense. He threw a 6-yard TD pass and ran for another in the half. It helped a lot that the Bears gave the ball to Matt Forte (15 carries for 101 yards in the second half alone) more than a few times.

Grossman's not incompetent. He's just scary to watch because it's well-known that he can uncork a bad throw at any time. With Orton, that was less of a concern, and that also was a relief.

Wide receiver Rashied Davis, who caught the touchdown pass from Grossman, talked to him on the sidelines at one point.

"It was just showing that we were confident in what he was capable of doing," Davis said. "I just told him, 'just remember '06, we went to the Super Bowl.' You know, just go out there and have fun."

In some ways, the second half felt more like 2006 than the first. Grossman's appearance aside, the Bears defense shut out the Lions in the second half after allowing 23 points to them in the second quarter. The Bears scored a couple of touchdowns, and that was enough.

Afterward, there weren't a lot of smiles and laughing around the locker room. The mood was muted. Maybe it was because of the injury to Orton. Or maybe it was the less-than-stellar win in a game against the NFL's worst team that became a down-to-the-wire affair. After all, had the Lions not missed an extra point, they easily could have forced overtime.

The Bears won't beat Tennessee, the league's last undefeated team, with the performance they turned in on Sunday.

The big question is, can they beat the Titans at all if Grossman starts at quarterback?

"Of course," Davis said. "We've got to do our job. I mean, it doesn't matter who's our QB, we still have to catch the ball, we still have to run good routes and our running back still has to run the ball, our offensive line has to block. So our offense just has to make plays."

Grossman said that he felt as though he was in rhythm with the offense about 70 percent of the time on Sunday. He thought another week of practice would help him work out the kinks in the other 30 percent of his game.

And offensive coordinator Ron Turner said that because Grossman had been with the Bears for four years now, there was no need to change the way they call plays or the game plan.

Don't you feel better now?

Yes, Grossman has his strengths. He throws the deep pass better than Orton, for one. But the drama and uncertainty that surround him largely had disappeared with Orton.

But now they're back, and so, apparently, is Grossman, for better or worse.

� Eric Olson is the Northwest Herald's sports editor. Reach him at 815-526-4554, or e-mail eolson@nwherald.com.

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Olson: Grossman, uneasiness back

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