[CBFF] Bears faith in No. 8 taken to a new dimension (Arvia)

[Victor Waldron]

Bears faith in No. 8 taken to a new dimension

Monday, September 25, 2006

MINNEAPOLIS — For the Bears, it is an act of faith every time they put
the ball back in Rex Grossman's hands after he throws it someplace he
shouldn't.

For Grossman, those same throws are almost always a result of his own
sometimes-misplaced faith.

"There's going to be some passes where you've got to rush," Grossman
said Sunday. "You've got a 350-pounder in your gut and you've just got
to trust it's going to work out the way you saw it right before you
couldn't see anything."

Grossman couldn't see anything on the first play of the fourth quarter Sunday.

Feeling the sort of pressure the Vikings pass rush had been putting on
him all day long, he threw a ball to where his playbook said Thomas
Jones should have been.

"As Thomas came out in the flat, he had to help a little bit, got
knocked off, so he wasn't exactly where Rex thought he was going to
be," offensive coordinator Ron Turner said.

Instead, Antoine Winfield was there. The Vikings cornerback gathered
in a throw that Jones could only spin toward and watch, leaving him
with a great view of Winfield trotting seven yards into the end zone.

It was the second interception Grossman threw on the day, and might
have been one of four if the Vikings defenders had better hands.

Winfield's touchdown helped Minnesota to a four-point lead, and the
Vikings were still leading by that margin when Grossman got the ball
back with 3:25 left.

How confident was Bears center Olin Kreutz in his quarterback as they
huddled 63 yards from where they needed to go?

"Really confident," he said. "We believe in Rex. We've been saying
that since Bourbonnais. Obviously, it's easier to say it now."

Obviously. Grossman, for the first time in his career, got through a
third straight NFL start without requiring medical attention. More to
the point, he got a third straight win and has thrown for at least one
touchdown and more than 200 yards in all three.

This time, the deciding points in a 19-16 win came with 1:53 to play
on Grossman's pass to Rashied Davis, who never played high school ball
and hadn't caught a touchdown pass in a game that counted since
playing for the San Jose SaberCats in the Arena Football League.

If Grossman's success isn't quite that unlikely, it remains inspiring.
For a long time, Bears fans have had little more to go on with
Grossman than a college résumé and the hardly unbiased endorsements of
his bosses and teammates.

Forget wins over Green Bay and Detroit. Grossman needed to produce
under pressure, to bounce back from one of the two or three
cringe-inducing throws he is certain to author each game and to emerge
uninjured.

Bears Nation has too long had to act like Grossman does on some of his
passes — you've just got to trust it's going to work out the way you
saw it right before you couldn't see anything.

Realize, though, his teammates have always believed.

"Anytime you've got No. 8 back there for this team, we have a chance
to win a game — and he came through for us today," Brian Urlacher
said.

This has got to be the defense being nice, right?

They've spent so long carrying the team, they'd probably be thrilled
if the offense picked up a few doughnuts before practice, right?

Nope. Urlacher insisted the "D" believes the "O" has at last brought
balance to the team.

"Definitely," he said. "It's a lot of fun when they're out there,
moving the ball, throwing the ball all over the place, giving us a
chance to rest on the sideline. It's exciting to sit over there and
watch them."

Sometimes, it's too exciting to watch Grossman. Not to run that whole
gunslinger thing into the ground, but it's not the gun we mind.

It's the slinging. The back-footed, falling-away,
mechanics-gone-to-heck sidearm gaspers that flutter toward no one in
particular are things Bears fans could do without.

But maybe they should just learn to live with it.

When Grossman has his health, he has everything he needs to run this
Bears team. Yes, because he can make all the throws, but also because
he makes believers of his teammates.

"We really believe in him," Kreutz said. "We really do. We really
think he's that good.

"What is it? I can't tell you what it is. He just has it."

Muhsin Muhammad tried to define what Kreutz found indefinable, saying,
"(Grossman is) like a warrior out there. He's a courageous guy.

"When he's under pressure, you can tell how relaxed he is. ... When
you're a quarterback, you've got to be a no-nerves kind of guy."

Grossman is that. There's no other reason he can make throws that make
the fans at home wince, then, while those same fans are holding their
breath as he drops back later, casually look a safety over toward the
Bears' known deep threat and calmly whistle the game-winner to Davis.

"I don't ever worry about his mental state," Turner said. "Not one bit.

"It says all kinds of things about his character, which is really no
surprise. It's just like him coming back from two injuries. A lot of
guys wouldn't have been able to do that."

Oh, yeah, Grossman has come back from injuries. One of those happened
here, in this same godawful dome. The last time I saw Grossman leave
this building, it was holding crutches to his side while a golf cart
cruised him up a ramp toward the team bus.

This time, he walked out, and asking him about the difference never
occurred to me.

Why? I suppose, since it clearly didn't cross his mind, why should it
cross ours?