I will admit to a startling sense of self-satisfaction yesterday when I yelled at the TV for Lovie Smith to put somebody back to return the Niners’ ill-fated end of the first half field goal. That’s not to say that I predicted Nathan Vasher would set a new NFL record with a 108 yard touchdown return and an improbable 10 point swing (though really it was just seven, because the field goal never stood a chance) in the Bears 17-9 win. But like the free kick after a fair caught kickoff that nobody ever uses, the live ball on a field goal is one of the coolest things in football. Cool, because it hardly ever happens. Even cooler when it happens and the Bears, of all teams, take advantage of it.

Did you also know that after a touchdown the team that was scored on actually can decide to kick off if they want to. That’s the way the rules are. It’s the defense’s choice and since there’s no compelling reason to give up a touchdown and kick the ball back to the scoring team again, sometime in 20s the refs stopped bothering to ask.

While the Bears win over the Niners was fun, if only for that one weird play, it was ugly. And it was ugly for several reasons.

1. The Bears’ orange uniforms. You thought the throwback ones they used last Thanksgiving were bad? These were worse. All these were, were the home blues with orange everywhere the blue should be and blue where the orange should be. Why you mess with the coolest uniforms in football is beyond me, anyway. The Steelers have cool uniforms, but nobody rivals the home navy blue Bears’ uniforms. That’s twice the Bears have decided to not wear them in five home games this year. Somebody at Halas Hall needs a good smack.

2. Cedric Benson’s right knee. Unless he’s got an extra hinge in there that we don’t know about, he blew the whole thing up yesterday. On the replays you could see it bend at a nearly complete 45 degree angle. That can’t be good.

For every dope who booed Cedric in the early part of the season for holding out, this is why you get all the money you can when you can. This is also why the Bears drafted a running back in the first place. You think they needed three good ones? Running backs get hurt. Especially when your number one has a history of it.

The Bears dodged a bullet early in the season when Thomas Jones’ ugly knee injury turned out to only be a sprain. Chances are, they won’t be so lucky this time. On a day when you couldn’t throw a pass straight (not that most Bears’ quarterbacks ever have been able to) having Adrian Peterson around was a godsend.

3. Bobby F#$%in’ Wade. Two weeks ago, in this space, I wrote this:

Has a punt returner ever had a worse day without actually losing a fumble? Wade continually caught the ones he should have let go and let the ones go he needed to get under and fair catch.

Well, Bobby decided he was through trying to infuriate us without fumbling. So, he fumbled everything. It’s bad enough to make an incorrect decision on fielding a punt and then losing it. It’s another thing to do it three times in the same game.

If the Bears had lost, Wade would be responsible. In fact, he’d have almost solely responsible. That almost never happens. Even if a player blows a game at the end, iyou can almost always point to a number of things that combined with that screw up cost his team a game. This time, you could have just pulled out his three botched punts and had your entire case for why the Bears would have lost.

Against a team that completed ONE pass and had 161 total yards, if not for Wade’s three turnovers the Niners don’t come close to scoring a point. If you had put nobody back on punts the Bears would have pitched a shutout.

I know that Wade is second in the NFL in punt return average (and first in the NFC), but his advantage is solely gained in the 73 yarder he ran back against the Lions for a score in week two. Take that one out and his average drops from 10.9 per return to 8.7. Eight point seven isn’t that bad, it would be tenth in the NFL, but you can argue that the worst thing that happened to the Bears’ return game was the 73 yard return.

Even in high school you learn the rule that you never field a punt inside the ten yard line. If it’s going to be close when you line up for the return, you stand on the ten and if you have to take a step back to go after the ball you just let it go and run out of the way. It’s not that hard to learn.

On December 28, 1990, Johnny Bailey returned a punt 95 yards for a touchdown in a 21-10 loss to the Chiefs and Ditka chewed him out on the sidelines for even fielding it.

Nobody’s saying returning punts is easy. Especially on a day when the wind was blowing from the Niners’ bench straight across the field to the Bears’ bench. But on all three of Wade’s fumbles it was his own fault. The first one he didn’t catch and at the last minute he scooped it up as it was bouncing down the field. He had no place to go and was hit almost immediately. If he let it go it was clearly going to bounce of bounds, so he wasn’t going to save the Bears much in the way of the field position.

The second fumble was the most forgivable of the three. He broke it for 17 yards before losing it. Though you’d think after you lost one fumble, you’d be sure to secure the ball as you were going down.

The third one was the most ludicrous of the day. He’d already fumbled twice, the Bears had a lead and the ball was coming down inside the five yard line. There is no reason in the world to be trying to catch it. None. Even if you do, you’re likely going to get tackled inside the 10, so let it go and hope it bounces into the end zone for a touchback. Not Bobby. He fields it and fumbles it at the two yard line.

The Niners have first and goal at the two in a 14-6 game. Against any other team in the NFL it’s going to be 14-12 with them deciding whether to go for two or not.

Luckily for Wade, it was the Niners, and luckily for him on second and goal Cody Pickett decided not to run for the pylon in the front corner of the end zone. If he does he scores. Instead he tried to cut up the field, was grabbed by Brian Urlacher at the one and stood up so that Walleye Ogunleye could knock the rodeo clown (no, really, Pickett is one) into next week.

As ugly as the game was, an it was, indeed, very ugly. The Vasher return was one for the ages.

It started with him up near the line of scrimmage checking out the Niners formation. If they had shifted to a fake, or given any inkling they might fake it he’d have to stay. When he figured it was going to be a punt (which, given the wind was a given because you couldn’t throw in that stuff) he ran back more than 35 yards to the back of the end zone.

The kick started off looking good then was violently turned towards the Bears’ sidelines, just like Robbie Gould’s had been in the first quarter.

Vasher made a terrific catch, given the way the ball was wobbling and the way the wind was shoving it away from Nathan. Then he thought about downing it, which would have been dumb since time had run out (it’s even dumb when time’s not running out because if you don’t try to return it at all and let it go you get the ball at the spot where the missed field goal was kicked from, if you down it you get it at the 20.)

So Vasher started the return. Most of the 49ers were standing, watching the kick and not worrying about going down the field to cover the kick. But when he got to about the 10 yard line two guys were coming down after him, he made the move that sprung the play when he did a spin move and stayed on his feet. As he ran to his right the Bears were setting up a very impressive convoy of blockers.

He got to midfield and you knew he had a chance, as long as he didn’t pull a Roosevelt Williams and faint with exhaustion. (Plus, RW McQuarters wasn’t around to forget to block for him.) As the convoy got close to the end zone, you could see Lance Briggs shove the kicker, Joe Nedney out of the way. But Nedney didn’t go down, so Briggs hit him one more time, burying him (where he still might be) around the ten yard line. Brian Urlacher made sure nobody else got a hand on Nathan and 108 yards from where he caught it, and probably 150 yards from where he started the play, Vasher had finished the longest return in the 130 year history of the NFL.

Not a bad thing to have on your resume.

Next up for the Bears, the 7-2 Carolina Panthers at Soldier Field. The Bears won’t come out and say it, but they sat Thomas Jones to try to get him as close to 100 percent as possible for this game. It’ll be a matchup of two of the best defenses in the game. If the Bears win, they’ll have the second best record in the league. If they lose? Ahh, screw it. We can worry about that next Monday if we have to.