(Sports Network) - There was no way to cast this one in a positive light.

Six days before they would be forced to deal with the defending Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers, the Chicago Bears were discussing how they could possibly move on following the season-ending wrist injury that had knocked the face of the franchise, Brian Urlacher, out of commission one day before.

That the injury, a dislocation that required surgery, came in a 21-15 loss to the hated Green Bay Packers was like rubbing a mountain of salt in a painful open wound.

"Every great team has a guy that no one else has," center Olin Kreutz told the Chicago Sun-Times. "And Urlacher is kind of our guy. We've got to find a way to recover from it, obviously. But it's going to be tough to replace a Brian Urlacher. You don't replace Hall of Fame guys with just anybody."

"He had put himself in position to have an outstanding year," said head coach Lovie Smith. "He was playing well in the game before he went down with the injury. Even after he injured his [wrist], the competitor in him, he wanted to play.

"[It's] big shoes for the next guy that steps up, but injuries are part of the game. He'll come back as strong as ever next year."

For now, the Bears will shift Hunter Hillenmeyer to the middle, where he will be a marked man as teams try to size up his abilities at that spot.

"Honestly, I feel more comfortable in the middle," said Hillenmeyer on Monday. "My best year in college [at Vanderbilt] was the one year out of four that I played in the middle. I loved playing middle when I got the chance in my second year, but obviously with a guy like Brian here, I was never going to get to play in the middle except for something like this happening."

Perhaps the elephant in the room in regard to the Urlacher situation is that it is far from the Bears' only problem as they prepare for Pittsburgh.

For all of his undeniable talent, there had been whispers that the 31-year old linebacker was in decline, and there was an argument to be made before the season that defense was a much bigger issue for Chicago than the Jay Cutler- led offense.

After the way the attack played against the Packers, you can now call it a draw.

Cutler was mostly awful in his formal Bears debut, completing just 17-of-36 passes for 277 yards with one touchdown and four interceptions. The new Chicago signal-caller showed no real chemistry with tight ends Desmond Clark (1 reception), Greg Olsen (1 reception) and running back Matt Forte' (0 receptions), who were three of the Bears' top four pass-catchers last season.

To make matters worse, running backs Matt Forte' and Garrett Wolfe compiled just 70 yards on 28 carries between them.

At least the special teams did its best to take part in the disappointment, as a bizarre fake punt attempt fell flat when Wolfe failed to get the necessary yardage, setting up the Packers with a short field that resulted in a Mason Crosby field goal four plays later. Long-snapper Patrick Mannelly apparently thought Green Bay had 12 men on the field and that the Bears had a free play.

"Originally the count was 12 men," said Mannelly. "I didn't see the guy run off the field. We actually have a play in. If there are 12 men, it's pretty much a free play. So it's just a direct snap to Garrett and you just try to get as many yards as you can. I didn't see the guy run off the field. I wish I would have. I would have never done that.

"It was just a dumb play on my part not seeing that. I feel stupid. I thought we were making a smart play, and unfortunately it didn't work out that way."

LIONS: In a result that surprised pretty much no one, Matthew Stafford did not out-duel Drew Brees on Sunday.

Stafford, a rookie appearing in his first meaningful game, didn't have much of a chance to outplay Brees, who in his initial appearance of 2009, after becoming the second quarterback in history to throw for 5,000 yards last season, threw a mere six touchdown passes in the team's 45-27 win over the Lions.

But the No. 1 overall draft choice Stafford did give Detroit a puncher's chance, going into a hostile environment, throwing for a respectable 205 yards on 16-of-37 passing, suffering just one sack, and rushing for his first NFL touchdown. The one-yard touchdown reach, which capped off a fine eight-play, 71-yard drive to start the second half, put the Lions within 28-17, but they would get no closer than 11 points thanks mostly to Brees' exploits.

Stafford was by no means great, throwing three interceptions and suffering some obvious accuracy issues, but first-year head coach Jim Schwartz did not seem overly concerned with his franchise quarterback's play.

"I think there was about maybe two or three incidents that he didn't hit the target he needed to hit," said Schwartz on Monday. "He's an accurate passer. I think time will prove out that he's an accurate passer. I don't have any issues there. There were a couple more that either his legs got tangled with somebody, and somebody pressured or he was being hit when he threw so they probably look a little bit worse. There was a couple instances that I think he looks and says, 'Hey, I'd rather have those throws back.'"



PACKERS: So far, so good for the new-look Green Bay Packers defense.

After shifting from a 4-3 to a 3-4 under new coordinator Dom Capers in the offseason, Green Bay built on a strong preseason effort on that side of the ball in their first meaningful matchup, against the Bears. The big story for the Packers defense was their four interceptions of Jay Cutler, but anyone who has watched the Green Bay secondary over the past couple of years knows that big plays from that group is not especially unusual.

What was more encouraging was the team's work against the run. After getting pushed around at the point of attack for much of 2008, the Packers held Bears running back Matt Forte' to just 55 yards on 25 carries, a paltry 2.2 yards per carry.

Defensive linemen Cullen Jenkins and Johnny Jolly were at the heart of the effort. Jenkins had six tackles and one of the team's two sacks of Cutler, while Jolly notched an impressive eight stops from his place on the interior, while also making an athletic one-handed interception of Cutler in the first half.

"We talked to [the defensive line] about when it's time to be disruptive when we have you on the move, be disruptive," defensive line coach Mike Trgovac told the Green Bay Press-Gazette. "And they did that for us. When it's time to hunker down on those double-teams - and we didn't win every one of them - and keep our linebackers free, we had some very good examples of that."

Jenkins, Jolly, and linebacker Brandon Chillar were given defensive game balls for their play against the Bears. Chillar had a game-high seven solo tackles and also notched a sack of Cutler.



VIKINGS: It won't be this easy for Brett Favre every week.

He can't count on a 180-yard, three-touchdown effort from running back Adrian Peterson every Sunday, or that he'll get a bunch of short fields thanks to a defense that sacked Brady Quinn five times and forced him into a pair of turnovers.

Put simply, Favre won't have the luxury of facing the Cleveland Browns every week. But, as the cliche' goes, you can only play the teams on your schedule, and all that matters is that the new starting quarterback of the Minnesota Vikings can place a "W" next to the top line on that slate.

Favre didn't seem to do a heck of a lot in the 34-20 win at the hapless Browns, completing 14-of-21 passes for 110 yards and a touchdown and throwing mostly screens, dumps, and various other short passes. But hey, there are other quarterbacks on the team that could have screwed up those seemingly simple assignments (cough...Tarvaris Jackson...cough), so Minnesota can't possibly turn its nose up at that type of success.

"Workmanlike, there were no blips," Vikings head coach Brad Childress said of Favre's play. "Not to make it sound like unspectacular was bad thing, but he made the routine plays routinely. I talk about that all the time."

Favre can continue to wade into the water of the NFL season this week, as Minnesota heads to Detroit to face a Lions team that allowed over 500 yards of total offense to the New Orleans Saints last week. In Week 3, the Vikings will play their home opener against the 49ers, though a few fans in the Twin Cities could be forgiven for looking past that one to the Monday night encounter on Oct. 5th...against a green-and-gold-clad team hailing from Green Bay, WI.





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