{"id":11466,"date":"2010-12-11T13:31:28","date_gmt":"2010-12-11T18:31:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=11466"},"modified":"2010-12-11T13:31:28","modified_gmt":"2010-12-11T18:31:28","slug":"bears-vs-patriots-football-game-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/bears-vs-patriots-football-game-preview-11466\/","title":{"rendered":"Bears Vs Patriots Football Game Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

New England Patriots at Chicago Bears, Solidier Field, Chicago, IL
\nSunday, December 12, 2010, 4:15 pm EST, TV: CBS
\nOpening Line: Patriots -3
\nCurrent Line: Patriots -3
\nOpening Total: 45
\nCurrent Total: 38
\nMoney Line: Patriots -140 \/ Bears +120<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Bears
With the quarterbacks taking center stage, Bears running back Matt Forte might be the difference against the Patriots on Sunday<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Chicago Bears (9-3) have thrived in the underdog role all season but will be hosting a team on Sunday that turned in the most dominating performance of the year last Monday night in the New England Patriots (10-2).\u00a0 The Bears are an impressive 5-1 straight-up as underdogs compared to 1-4-1 against the spread as favorites and now face their biggest challenge when New England (-3) comes to town off a 45-3 thrashing of the Jets.<\/p>\n

Chicago squeaked by Detroit on the road last week 24-20 after trailing 17-14 at halftime and giving up 253 yards to the Lions before the intermission.\u00a0 Bears head coach Lovie Smith then lectured his team at halftime, and the defense responded by allowing just 49 yards and three points in the last two quarters.\u00a0 However, Smith and his players know they will be playing a much different opponent this week in the three-time Super Bowl champions, who have averaged 40 points in their last four games.<\/p>\n

The Patriots could not have played much better than they did on Monday night and will obviously be playing on short rest following a big win against a divisional opponent.\u00a0 But New England head coach Bill Belichick does not have the word \u201cletdown\u201d in his vocabulary and should still be well-prepared regardless of the situation.\u00a0 Belichick\u2019s main concern should be his team\u2019s 31st-ranked defense, which played well against New York at home but has struggled on the road.\u00a0 In their last three road games, the Pats have surrendered an average of 28 points despite a 2-1 record.<\/p>\n

The weather is expected to be a factor for both teams\u2019 offenses, as the total has dipped seven points from the opener of 45.\u00a0 There is a 70 percent chance of snow in Chicago with temperatures reaching the 20s and the wind making it feel more like single digits.<\/p>\n

The Patriots have won 20 of their last 21 games against NFC opponents but will be facing a Bears defense that is giving up just 16 points per game, ranked third in the NFL.\u00a0 New England quarterback Tom Brady has not thrown an interception in the last seven games, totaling 17 touchdown passes since his last one in Week 6 against Baltimore.\u00a0 But Philadelphia\u2019s Michael Vick had not thrown a pick this season before playing against the Bears, and his interception turned the tide in that game en route to a 31-26 loss.<\/p>\n

Chicago quarterback Jay Cutler has seen his teams go a perfect 19-0 when he has a passer rating of 100 or more, something he has accomplished four times this season, including twice during his team\u2019s current five-game winning streak.\u00a0 Cutler has gotten a lot of help from Bears running back Matt Forte since the bye week, as a balanced offense has translated to an efficient signal caller who has at times taken to running the ball himself when the pass protection breaks down.<\/p>\n

Forte has averaged 79.2 rushing yards in the last five games, which may not seem like a lot but could be the difference against a Patriots defense that will be without their third-leading tackler.\u00a0 Rookie linebacker Brandon Spikes was suspended for the last four games of the regular season by New England for violating the league\u2019s policy on performance-enhancing drugs.<\/p>\n

Chicago has won seven of its last eight December home games but has lost the last two meetings with the Patriots during the Brady era.\u00a0 The last meeting resulted in a 17-13 win for New England at home in 2006.\u00a0 Brady threw two interceptions and the Pats fumbled three times, but Bears quarterback Rex Grossman was even worse with three picks.\u00a0 The total on that game closed at 37.5.<\/p>\n

Now that you have read this football betting preview featuring the Bears & Patriots, check out the NFL odds on this and all the games to compare the best lines at multiple sportsbooks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New England Patriots at Chicago Bears, Solidier Field, Chicago, IL Sunday, December 12, 2010, 4:15 pm EST, TV: CBS Opening Line: Patriots -3 Current Line: Patriots -3 Opening Total: 45 Current Total: 38 Money Line: Patriots -140 \/ Bears +120 The Chicago Bears (9-3) have thrived in the underdog role all season but will be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":4294,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,132],"tags":[4118,359,2539,2508,125,1930,1922],"class_list":["post-11466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nfl-handicapping","tag-bears-patriots-preview","tag-chicago-bears","tag-football-betting","tag-free-nfl-pick","tag-new-england-patriots","tag-nfl-odds","tag-nfl-picks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/194"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11466"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11468,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11466\/revisions\/11468"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}