Chicago Bears vs. Miami Dolphins Free Pick, Trends, and Preview

The Bears don’t really feel like a 6-3 team, and the oddsmakers know it. Save the win over the Green Bay Packers in Week 3, Chicago doesn’t have a win against a team this year with more than three wins on the season, and most of those teams have become tremendous train wrecks. In fairness though, the Bears have also lost twice by exactly three points and have only been beaten by more than that once. An offense that ranks No. 29 in the game in total ‘O’ at 297.3 yards per game clearly has its holes, as QB Jay Cutler is prone to throwing INTs, while RB Matt Forte and RB Chester Taylor have just had no room to operate behind an offensive line that has had an atrocious season. Defensively, we love what Chicago is doing, though. The front seven is really getting after it, particularly against opposing rushing attacks. Teams are only averaging 82.3 yards per game on the ground against the Monsters of the Midway, something that could really hamper Miami’s “Wildcat” offense. You don’t think of the Bears as a team with the same type of dominant defense that brought them to the Super Bowl not that long ago, but they haven’t allowed more than 23 points in a game this season and rank No. 2 in scoring at 16.2 points per game.

First it was QB Chad Henne’s job. Then it became QB Chad Pennington’s for a few plays. Then it went back to Henne. And now, thanks to a bunch of injuries to both of them, it appears as though QB Tyler Thigpen is the main man in South Beach that is going to be leading the way on Thursday night. Thigpen does have some success as a starting quarterback, as he put up respectable numbers with the Kansas City Chiefs two years ago before being unceremoniously dumped without being given a chance elsewhere. He threw for 64 yards and a TD in the fourth quarter to seal the deal for a ‘W’ over the Tennessee Titans last week. The problem that Thigpen is going to have is that he might not have the full use of his running game with the Bears being so stout up front. RB Ronnie Brown is coming off of a game in which he ran for 11 yards on 12 carries, and the team surprisingly only ranks No. 19 on the ground at just over 100 yards per game. Neither Brown nor his counterpart RB Ricky Williams are going to sniff 1,000 yards on the ground, something that both should at least be threatening in this type of an offense.

We know that the Dolphins are trendy in this game, and we know that the Bears really aren’t anywhere near as good as their record indicates. However, the visitors know that they can really take a playoff spot by the reins going into Thanksgiving week, and that prize is just going to be too much to pass up, even on a short week and on the road.