If you live in the Chicagoland area, you know that Chicago is known for having two seasons: winter and taxes. But they also have the Chicago Bears who, though more of a cult than a football franchise, play during the winter and so could probably be lumped in with the winter season which mean we’re not sure where we were going with that.
For those who don’t know, the Bears play home games in Soldier Field, so named because it is dedicated to the hard work and sacrifice of some of our heroic former Illinois leaders who in 2001 came out and said, “Oh, by the way, everyone in Cook County just paid 500 million dollars for a new stadium for some rich people but, sorry, there’s no money to fix the CTA.” Soldier Field is also the only taxpayer-funded stadium built from alien technology that can be seen from space. Because it can be launched against America’s enemies at a moment’s notice to bombard them into submission with sub-par quarterback play, the government keeps all orbital views of the stadium from the public due to national security, but we here at MojoFiction managed to get a hold of one from a secret source that we’ll only identify secretly by their secret code name: “Google Earth.” (Don’t tell anyone!)
Since we’re from Colorado, probably the best thing about living near Chicago and watching the Bears is, they are nowhere near the broadcast zone of our favorite team, the Denver Broncos, which means that instead of watching Peyton Manning destroy the Giants in the second half (because somehow the Broncos never destroy anything in the first half) we got to watch the Bears dominant run game advance to their opponent’s one-yard line and then take a break to try and throw a one-yard pass to score and, of course, oops, interception. You have Michael Bush! Didn’t you see that scene in the movie “The Dark Knight,” where Michael Bush runs headlong into a semi-truck in downtown Chicago and flips it over, end-over-end? Run that guy into the end zone!
More worrisome, Jay Cutler had to scramble a lot. The offensive line is better since they actually hired one in the off-season to take the place of the life-size cardboard cutouts of Justin Bieber they had been using last season, which were surprisingly immobile and melted when it rained. When Jay was scrambling for yards it was okay, but when he tried to make a play (such as, say, a pass) while harried, it didn’t end well.
There were a lot of mistakes in other facets of the game as well, including trying to broadcast it, but FOX gave it their all. Actually, the lack of on-screen graphics for the first half didn’t bother us as at all, but when they lost the picture entirely during the final minutes of the first half, we flipped the channel to the Broncos … oh, that’s right, we didn’t.
And finally, if you didn’t see it, there was the Minnesota punt that almost turned into a safety thanks to a miscue on the Bears special teams. Per official NFL rules, section 4, paragraph 23.5 of sub-paragraph 2 of the Treaty of Versailles:
“Any punt that careens into the end zone may be batted back into the field of play provided it has not touched the ground in the end zone and the player batting it back has leapt at least 2.4 feet into the air and hit it volleyball-style behind him. He must stick the landing. If the players on the punting team can maintain lift by jumping the aforementioned 2.4 feet, they may continue to bat the ball all the way back down the field, though that probably wouldn’t be a good idea.”
An alert Chicago player knew this rule and immediately tried to touch the ball after it was batted back. Instead, however, he kicked it forward into the end zone and the waiting arms of the Vikings. Thankfully, someone quickly redrew the end zone line, leaving the Vikings players out-of-bounds and making the play a touchback.
Somehow, against all odds, the Bears won the game to go to 2-0 for the young season. And by against all odds, we mean the against the Vikings who, against all odds, are a pretty good football team that doesn’t win. But the first team the Bears play that knows how to close out a game will cause the Bears some trouble.
So far, though, we’re not sure anyone knows how to close out a game this year.
Except those Broncos! …We think. We’ll let you know when we actually see them.
MojoFiction 
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