Inside The Nfl

BACK TO BONKERS

In Chicago on Sunday, the Bears played as important a game as they've played in some time, and they came up with very broad shoulders indeed. On the verge of exile to the Land of the Wild Card after suffering three straight losses, Chicago beat a formerly good Rams team 20-10. "We haven't had this much intensity since 1984," said safety Dave Duerson.

The game was played only a few days short of the first anniversary of coach Mike Ditka's heart attack, but this game was so big that he abandoned his vow never to go bonkers again on the sideline ("You will never hear me screaming or yelling again," he said on Nov. 13, 1988): He blew up four or five times in what veteran Bears-watchers said was his most fiery game ever. By halftime Ditka had gotten into the face of Glen Kozlowski, a Chicago special teamer, after Kozlowski hit L.A.'s Clifford Hicks after Hicks went out of bounds, thereby costing the Bears 15 yards; had screamed and wind-milled his arms at side judge Merrill Douglas after Douglas failed to call pass interference on an unsuccessful Chicago pass play; had flown into a rage at free safety Markus Paul after he dropped a Ram pass that hit him in the chest; had yanked his slumping quarterback, Mike Tomczak; and had abruptly taken over the play-calling from offensive coordinator Greg Landry. "If the ship's sinking," said Kozlowski, "he wants to be in the driver's seat."

Behind Ditka's conservative play-calling for relief quarterback Jim Harbaugh, the Bears scored 17 second-half points to win going away. "You do whatever it takes," said Ditka. "This game, we couldn't lose. We had to have it. I've been through three weeks of hell."

Should he worry about his health? On Sunday, Ditka's wife, Diana, admitted "it does cross my mind" that he could keel over during one of his sideline fits. Ditka takes an aspirin a day and has given up egg salad and potato chips, former staples of his diet. His cardiologist, Jay Alexander, told Don Pierson of the Chicago Tribune that the probability of Ditka's suffering another heart attack is low. "I never told him he couldn't get mad," said Alexander.

"Getting mad ain't a bad thing," says Ditka. "But if I thought there was a chance [of collapsing in a game], I'd quit." And the Bears would never be the same.

THE UNKINDEST CUT
After four formal meetings in three cities over 16 weeks, a new commissioner, Paul Tagliabue, has been named (page 19). But the treatment the other candidate, Jim Finks, received in the owners' battle was inexcusable. Finks, the president of the Saints, is one of the NFL's classier guys, yet this snub will follow him the rest of his life, through no fault of his own. How could the old-guard members on the league's original search committee have been so out of touch with reality? How could they have been so sure Finks had the 19 votes needed for election at the league meetings in July that they actually negotiated a contract with him? That arrogance is what doomed Finks's chances. "Poor Jim Finks was hung out to dry," says New England owner Victor Kiam. "He was tarred and feathered because the process was flawed."

I DON'T HEAR ANYTHING

Remember how concerned the NFL was about crowd noise back in August? In September and October, however, the league's attitude was, Noise? What noise? Not once since the preseason has a defense had any timeouts taken away or been penalized for delay caused by crowd noise, as is permitted by a rule adopted in the off-season.

To be sure, crowd noise continues to disrupt signal calling by offenses. During the Bronco-Seahawk game two weeks ago at the Kingdome, the crowd was warned three times for excessive noise when Denver had the ball, but Seattle was not docked any timeouts. Immediately after referee Johnny Grier told Bronco quarterback John Elway to play on, Elway was sacked by linebacker Rufus Porter.