i remember how well shaun alexander runs in the cold. the last time he played in the snow, he had 40 carries and 201 yards. take that mr. columnist man. but yeah football tomorrow. i have been waiting for this game all season. you knew after that horrible week 4 game that eventually the seahawks would have to play the bears again in the playoffs. the seahawks were ugly in that game, and can only do better. mostly i have been waiting for this game because the bears are one of my favorite teams to watch.

i am sucker for defense. that is why i hate watching the sonics so much these days (not that hatred stops me). in baseball i love pitching (fuck you mariners). but week 4, even our defense didn't show up. they let rex grossman light us up, and i hate that guy. this week, i want to see our defense. i wish we had trufant. even more than him, i miss marcus tubbs. our line is completely undersized now without him. he was the guy that made our rotation a little more respectable. now the heaviest dude we have is russell davis, who is listed at liek 306. and he sucks. tubbs better be healthy next season. he brings size and athleticism. he is one of the keys to both our run defense and our pash rush, more so than any other single guy on the line. our defense has played great these last few games. our run d has stepped it up. lofa has whipped his guys in to shape at just the right time, and is playing some of the best football of his career. having michael boulware back at safety helps. the pass rush is no great shakes, and doesn't really have a chance against that monster chicago line. i hope we can at least get some hits on grossman. when they actually do let him pass, we have to get in there fast with our linebackers because he likes to go deep whenever he has the time.

and on pass d, i figure we are doing as well as we could be. i really like jordan babineaux as a corner. i thought it was dumb to put him at safety, even if he is a good safety. i actually thought he should have been starting this season, with kelly herndon as the nickel back covering the slot. on the other side of the field, slim has grown up fast this season. watching kelly jennings in his first few preseason games was painful. he didn't look great at the beginning of the season, but slowly has started to acclimate to the pace of the pro game. even when he doesn't make the tackle, you see him around the ball now instead of cringing away. and these few games he has started? he has really proven himself to me. not by making great plays all the time, but by making sure he contains his reciever on over the course of the entire game, instead of just a play by play level. he may be small, but he is fast, smart, and as physical as he can be. he is a surprisingly competent tackler. our pass d is actually almost at the same level in our base d as it has been all season. it isn't until we get into the nickel and the dime that we are vulnerable. our new loan broker pete hunter had a huge game against the cowboys though. i told matt that someone he had never heard of was going to come up big in that gave against the cowboys, and he had 5 tackles, a fumble recovery, and a that defended pass on the final hail mary of the game. he has nothing to lose, that is something. he is still by far the weakest part of our defense, and i expect them to try and isolate him on the sideline as much as possible when he is in the game, but what else can you do? if we survive, it looks like we will have trufant back next week.

that is what this game is going to be all about for the seahawks. survival. if we win this game, our defense is going to win it for us, and it all starts with stopping thomas jones and cedric benson at the line of scrimmage. force them into passing plays we know are coming, because we do have playmakers in the secondary. give our offense time on the field. on offense, it is going to be about shaun alexander surviving brian urlacher and his goons. he is going to get lit up today, but hopefully it happens five yards down the field instead of behind the line of scrimmage. we need him, because we need to keep the offense on the field, and the bulk of the hits on any one else but matt hasselbeck. if alexander can survive that defense and give hasselbeck the time to move down the field, we have a chance of staying in the game until the end. everyone is talking about seahawks offense vs. bears defense. this game is really about seahawks defense vs. bears defense. which reminds me. the bears player i am most worried about is devin hester. this game is going to be a field position war, and we don't need that guy busting out with two td returns and ruining any momentum our defense can build

frivved up by Ben at 1:19 PM