Week 13: NY Giants at Chicago

For fans of a team that has generally been more good than bad, Giants fans live in a strange state of fear much of the time. Some of this is a result of living in the New York media market – still your best bet if you want to hear guys with Long Island accents screaming at you 24/7 – but a friend of ours who’s currently watching Giants games online in Germany, and thus residing far outside of Mike and the Mad Dog’s orbit, wrote us an email a few weeks back worrying about the fact that QB Eli Manning “always looks like he’s lost his puppy.” And that was before Eli’s horrendous, four-interception day against Minnesota in Week 12. We haven’t heard from our Germany-based friend in the wake of that performance, and frankly we’re a little worried as to whether he’s okay.

But it’s not just paranoia for Giants fans: during every season of the Tom Coughlin Administration in New Jersey, the Giants have started fast and then quickly faded into, if not always oblivion, at least a backing-into-the-playoffs mediocrity that’s almost worse. In the past, that was blamed on either Coughlin’s bellow-intensive coaching style or mediocre personnel. Both were fair guesses, but this year’s much-anticipated Giants fade – if it even happens; the Vikings loss seems like kind of a freak game to us – will be most easily blamed on a sudden rash of injuries. Starting RB Brandon Jacobs remains sidelined by a hamstring injury and early-season breakout Derrick Ward is once again doubtful with an injured groin. Add to that a still-gimpy Plaxico Burress and injuries to cornerstone T Kareem McKenzie, defensive quarterback Antonio Pierce, much of the defensive line, and the recent IR placement of LB Mathias Kiwanuka, and it’s easy to see why Eli looks like a kid whose puppy is MIA.

Despite all that, though, and despite a miserable showing against Minnesota, these Giants have generally been better than the mediocre-to-sub-mediocre teams they’ve played, and the Bears are very much one of those teams. Four more picks from Eli will make all this academic and send an eye-bulging Coughlin to Craigslist’s classifieds in search of job openings for Sadistic Catholic School Headmasters. But there’s still a good amount of talent on the Giants’ offense, and the vitally important Burress looked healthier in Week 12, which is probably the one good sign Giants fans can take from that game. The Giants’ defense also remains solid everywhere but the secondary even without Pierce at 100 percent. And they won’t exactly be facing a juggernaut in the Bears.

That said, the Bears are tough at home, coming off a decent win against the similarly mediocre Broncos in Week 12, and have been getting (for the moment, at least) some decent production from QB Rex Grossman since he was reinstalled as starter. But there is plenty to doubt here, too. Starting RB Cedric Benson was placed on the IR after injuring his ankle in Week 12, but his play could best have been described as “zombified” even before that injury; backup Adrian “The Other” Peterson is a sturdy enough replacement, but this isn’t a very potent offense. The most explosive scoring threat on Chicago is KR/PR Devin Hester, and if he returns more than one punt or kick in this game, it will be because of a serious failure in directional kicking.

But the Bears are all about defense, anyway, right? Well, last year, yes, the Bears made it to the Super Bowl despite a puffy, ineffective Grossman throwing the ball straight up in the air half the time. But this year’s Bears defense, despite a bunch of big-name players and the continued brilliance of linebackers Lance Briggs and Brian Urlacher, actually ranks 26th in the NFL in yards-allowed (that’s two slots ahead of the Bengals) and hasn’t done much to help the team win in most games. It hasn’t been worse than the offense, certainly, but matching a mediocre unit with equal and opposite mediocrity isn’t an achievement. Basically, if it weren’t for Devin Hester, the Bears would be the Chiefs with cooler helmets.

Even if the Giants are fading – and it wouldn’t surprise us if they dropped some games down the stretch – the Bears are a team they can beat. Yes, even in Chicago, even with that ugly track record of second-half collapses, and even with a quarterback who looks increasingly certain that he’ll never see his beagle again.

Giants by 6