http://boards.chicagobears.com/forums/thread/1891578.aspx

I found this on a Bears' forum, and I thought it was an interesting read.

It's funny how time changes perspectives. A little over three years ago the Chicago Bears were undefeated and destroying every opponent in site. A Monday night showcase game against the lowly Arizona Cardinals was being hyped up as a David vs Goliath on steroids. No one thought the Cardinals even had a chance. But then, something unexpected happened, the Bears turned out to be who (Dennis Green) thought they were.

Before the game, the Bears were the talk of the league. For a few years running the Bears had a great young defense and special teams units that were leading the Bears to victories while the offense sputtered along. It was that defense and special teams that were expected to win the games, while the offense did its best not to screw it up. But this year, this year was different. The Bears finally had their young starting Quarterback, Rex Grossman, on the field and healthy. Grossman and the offense were so effective that he was even being hyped as an early season MVP front-runner.

During the ESPN Monday night pregame show,  commentator Joe Theisman, predicted that the Bears would go undefeated en route to a Superbowl victory. Even though there had only been one team in the history of the NFL to accomplish that feat, amazingly, this prediction wasn't met with much criticism at all at. It seemed that the Bears had convinced everyone that they were unbeatable.

When the game started the Cardinals came out with a full head of steam. Their young offense led by rookie Quarterback Matt Leinart torched the Bears and their tampa 2 defense by throwing quick slant routes underneath the Bears safety's and behind their Linebackers. This negated the Bears fearsome pass rush by not allowing time to get to the quarterback with their front four, a key component in the tampa 2 scheme.

On the other side of the ball, Quarterback Rex Grossman was being harassed up the middle by the Cardinals defense and by the end of the game he had committed 6 turn overs, 2 lost fumbles and 4 interceptions. By half time, the Cardinals were on top of the Bears 20-0.

In the second half, the Bears led a furious comeback, in part because of mistakes the Cardinals made, and because the Bears overall talent level far exceeded that of the Cardinals. The Bears were able to squeeze out a 24-23 victory thanks to a missed field goal by Cardinals kicker Neil Racker's at the end of the game. The Bears had remained undefeated.

The post game press conference given by Cardinals head coach Dennis Green is still famous today, during the conference he famously screamed "The Bears are who we thought they were!". Furious over the loss and  and a poor 2-4 start by the Cardinals, Green truly flew off the handle. I remember watching the conference laughing hysterically at what Green was saying. At the time I just figured that the Bears had played a terrible game and were so good, that they still couldn't lose. I almost looked at it as a sign that the Bears were destined to go undefeated and become a power house for the foreseeable future. Like I said, Its funny how time changes perspectives.

What really happened that game was the beginning of a war, a war the Bears would eventually lose. The battle that night against the Cardinals, even though it was a defeat for the opposition, became the blue print on how to beat the Bears. Dennis Green and the Cardinals had exploited the Bears version of the Tampa 2 defense. With the blue print in place, teams began to apply maximum pressure to Quarterback Rex Grossman and it soon became clear that Grossman wasn't a new found star in the NFL, but a player taking advantage of the surprise of the Bears deep passing game. Under pressure Grossman was famously nick named "good Rex, bad Rex" for his massive inconsistencies the rest of the year. Grossman who started the season  with 10 touchdown passes vs just 3 interceptions would finish the year at 23 touchdown passes and 20 interceptions.

But it wasn't just Grossman that was exposed that night, the Defense, who had finished number 2 in overall defense the year before and were looking as dominate as ever in the first half of the 2006 season finished the last 6 games  giving up over 360 yards of offense per game. En route to what would turn out to be a 13-3 campaign finishing in a Superbowl loss to Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts.

That night in Arizona, David took on this new super Goliath and hit him square between the eyes with a rock. Although they didn't defeat Goliath, they showed not only that it could be done, but how to do it.

Since then, the mighty Bears have been merely average, 20-19 in the regular season, a game above .500 and haven't been back to the playoffs since. Injuries and age has contributed to the decline of the defense, but it was that night that started their decline, the night we found out, The bears were who they thought they were.

Thoughts?