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INDIANAPOLIS -- The Colts didn't pay $717 million for this.
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| Not a good night for Peyton Manning, who finishes with a lower passer rating than Bears QB Kyle Orton. (US Presswire) |
Which makes Lucas Oil Stadium -- with its beautiful brick façade and its retractable roof and its 80-foot window view of downtown Indianapolis -- the biggest waste of money since the New York Yankees.
The Colts, unbeatable in their old home, lost their first game in their new home Sunday night, and they lost it horrifically to a team that could yet prove to be horrible. I'm not sure what to make of the 2008 Chicago Bears, but I'm sure of this: They're not good enough to beat the Indianapolis Colts 29-13. Not in Chicago, and definitely not in Indianapolis. Not at brand new Lucas Oil Stadium or the forsaken RCA Dome or the even skanky patch of urban blight located between the two domes.
The Chicago Bears have a quarterback who won't win games and can only hope not to lose them, as Kyle Orton did Sunday night. He didn't win the game. He just managed to avoid losing it.
The Bears have receivers who, um, ahem. Can I be honest? I'm still not sure who their receivers are. I watched the whole game, I promise, but for the life of me I couldn't tell you who plays receiver for the Bears. Maybe Devin Hester, though the only thing he did that caught my eye was field a kickoff seven yards deep in the end zone, count slowly to 10, and then run it out, making it all the way to the 3. His own 3. Nice move, Devin.
The Bears do seem to have a nice defense, and they definitely have a future star at running back in Matt Forte, who was one of the steals of the 2008 NFL Draft and, if you play Fantasy Sports here at CBSSports.com, was someone's steal of your draft. Forte put up huge numbers at Tulane, including a 2,000-yard rushing season as a senior, but he slipped to the second round of the draft because, well, you'd have to ask all those geniuses running NFL teams. No way should a running back that big, that fast and that clever -- not to mention that productive -- slip to the second round.
But strange things happen in the NFL, and Exhibit A is: Bears 29, Colts 13. Or if you want to go chronologically, that would be Exhibit B, which would allow Exhibit A to be the moment before the game when the Colts christened their nearly $1 billion home by having Johnny Mathis sing the national anthem. I mean, Johnny Mathis? He was born in Texas, raised in California and irrelevant by the time Joseph Addai was born. But otherwise, a nice choice by the Indianapolis Colts.
For the Colts, this whole game was a disaster, from the choice of Johnny Mathis to the play of their receivers and their offensive line and secondary. The numbers will show Reggie Wayne with 10 catches for 86 yards and a touchdown, and Marvin Harrison with eight catches for 76 yards. That puts both players on pace to catch more than 100 passes this season totaling more than 1,200 yards each. Which means the numbers are bold-faced liars.
Wayne and Harrison were bad. Wayne dropped a touchdown pass and failed to drag his feet -- or even try to drag his feet -- on what would have been a 35-yard play deep into Chicago territory with the game within reach early in the fourth quarter. Harrison dropped a long pass on that same drive, but he made his biggest (skid) mark on this game in the third quarter when he was good enough to hang onto a pass ... until he fumbled it. That let Bears linebacker Lance Briggs return the fumble 21 yards for a touchdown, proving that good things do in fact happen to bad people.
Lots of Colts were bad. Cornerback Kelvin Hayden dropped an interception a few plays before the Bears kicked a field goal in the second quarter. Whoever was supposed to be blocking Bears defensive end Adewale Ogunleye, presumably right tackle Ryan Diem, will be humiliated after watching this game film. Safety Antoine Bethea was juked out of his jock on Forte's 50-yard scoring run. Quarterback Peyton Manning did his happy-feet-in-the-pocket thing, which is fine when he's throwing for 400 yards, but irritating when his passer rating is below Kyle Orton's. And on and on.
"We played terrible," said Colts safety Marlin Jackson. "Simple as that."
The night wasn't supposed to end like this for the Colts, who had the NFL-watching nation's undivided attention after a day of games that saw two of their biggest rivals in the AFC, the Patriots and Titans, suffer injuries at quarterback. With Tom Brady possibly gone for the season in New England and Vince Young also hurting in Tennessee, the Colts went into kickoff Sunday night in the AFC's catbird seat.
And then they vomited up this 29-13 fur-ball on their new $717 million rug.