MVN: Most Valuable Network

The Bears are a classic example of just how hard it is to stretch a dollar these days. I guess $41.3 million dollars just doesn't get you what it used to.

Think about that figure for a second. $41.3 MILLION dollars, just over 43 percent of the Bears total salary for 2008, is tied up in defensive starters Charles Tillman ($8,216,666), Adewale Ogunleye ($6,365,575), Brian Urlacher ($5,850,510), Lance Briggs ($5,471,666), Nate Vasher ($5,216,666), Mike Brown ($3,156,670), Alex Brown ($2,775,815) Tommie Harris ($1,645,470), Hunter Hillenmeyer ($1,500,000), Dusty Dvoracek ($640,345) and Kevin Payne ($414,220). Two other things to consider - thats only the starters, and there's 53 players on the active roster, which means that 21 percent of the players are eating up 43 percent of the cap space.

And what has $41.3 million gotten the Bears this year? Let's see . . . we've seen three blown fourth-quarter leads, the defense is 17th in yards allowed per game, 15th in points allowed, 18th in sacks, and an absolutely pathetic 30th in passing defense. Yeah, the run defense has been pretty good and the Bears lead the NFL in takeaways with 19, but to point out those things as some sort of justification for the performance of the defense is to ignore how cover-your-eyes-bad this defense has been when the opposing quarterback drops back to pass.

It's not like the Bears have been lit up by big-name quarterbacks either, which brings us to Kerry Collins' performance on Sunday. Collins took over for Vince Young in the season opener after Young was injured, and he has performed competently enough to keep the Titans undefeated. But Collins is not a quarterback any legitimate defense should be afraid of, not at this stage of his career. He was averaging only 165 yards per game and had thrown only four touchdowns prior to facing the Bears. But like Brian Griese, Matt Ryan and Dan Orlovsky before him, Kerry Collins magically morphed in to an All-Pro quarterback against the Bears.

Collins was barely hasseled all day, with only Ogunleye notching a sack. He completed 30 of 41 passes and finished with 289 yards and two touchdowns. The Bears looked absolutely clueless on defense whenever the Titans threw the ball, generating no pass rush and allowing the Titans' receivers to run wild through the secondary.

The Bears decided they were going to take away the run, and they did just that, holding the Titans to only 20 yards on 29 carries, a tremendous showing against an offense averaging 149 yards a game on the ground. But the Titans adjusted and started throwing the ball much more, while the Bears coaching staff sat on the sidelines twiddling their thumbs and not understanding why their faux-brilliant scheme was failing so miserably.

Thats not to take anything away from the Titans - its one thing to make adjustments to play-calling, its another to execute those play calls. The Titans definitely took it to the Bears. But the Bears shot themselves in the foot with their stubborn adhesion to a game plan that was sorely in need of adjustment.

In terms of raw talent, I still believe the Bears are one of the top defensive units in the league. The defense is not particularly old and the key starters should have several good years left in them. But something is awry with this team, and the defense has severely regressed since the end of the 2006 season. The Bears need to evolve or die, and they better get to changing their stripes quick, fast and in a hurry - they face a real, live, stud quarterback in Aaron Rodgers Sunday at Lambeau Field.