The Chicago Bears Experiment

Ever the forward-thinkers, the Bears are trying their hand at this new-fangled "throw the ball forward" thingy, and it's working out about like they expected. It sez so right here that they even ran a copy of Al Davis' old playbook out to head coach Lovie Smith and asked him, "Say, what's this thing that the quarterback is doing with the ball that looks like a dotted line going waaaay down the field?"

Smith, the black version of Ground Chuck Knox, shrugged. "A punt? Drop kick? I couldn't imagine you'd throw it like that...I mean, it could hit the ground or something."

G.M. Jerry Angelo piped in. "Yeah, or the other guys could, you know, catch it or something...that's bad, right?"

Still, news occasionally filtered in from the outside world that the NFL had changed, that since 1978, it had become much easier to, ah, do whatever that long, dotted thing in Al Davis' old playbook was. Word around the campfire was that there were 73 guys that had done what that horrible, mop-top Namath had done in 1967: pass the ball for 4000 yards in a season.

"My father didn't invent professional football to watch hippies throw it all over the yard," Virginia McCaskey sniffed.

Still, there were rumors. The Lions, bereft of quarterbacking excellence since the Eisenhower Administration, had actually run out a couple of 4000 yard passers in recent years, and even tried drafting one out of Georgia. The (expletive deleted) Packers had had one forever, until he quit or retired or something and now he's coaching or something in Minnesota...they wondered how that was working out for the Vikings.

"One day, we'll have to look into this "inter-the-nets" phenomenon, Mommy," said Michael McCaskey, former team president before Mommy cut his allowance and sent him to his room.

"Sounds communist to me, Ducky," said Virginia. "Telephones are bad enough, ringing all the time. I understand that I can talk to someone in Texas on the blamed thing, but what if I have nothing to say to a Texan?"

Still, Jerry Angelo and Lovie Smith persisted. The game had changed. The world had changed.

"Back when the earth was cooling, your father drew up what would become the NFL, and it worked quite well up through the Mesozoic and such...but, well, bipedal mammals are the dominant species on the planet now, apposable thumbs and all that...perhaps we should try this dotted thing after all?" Angelo offered hopefully.

Feeling her nap coming on, Mrs. McCaskey nodded. Angelo and Smith couldn't believe their luck. Not only were they about to get a 4000 yard passer, but all the Denver Broncos wanted in return were "draft picks."

Whatever those were.

Now, here they were, mired in the midst of a three-game losing streak, two games below .500 with six left to play, and that whole passing thing just didn't seem to be clicking. Never mind that their receivers couldn't catch a bullet in Beirut, or that their offensive line barely blocks the screen at the IMAX. Never mind that opposing ballcarriers run through the green, green grass of the Bears' defensive secondary like Von Trapp children about to burst into song. Never mind any of that. They went out and got themselves a guy who was supposed to pass for 4000 yards; where were all these miracle yards he was supposed to supply?

At last check, they were contemplating a call to Oakland. After all, it was Al Davis' playbook...maybe he could tell them how to read the bloomin' thing.