Bears and Steelers are coping without Urlacher and Polamalu

LAKE FOREST, Ill. (AP) — Life without Brian begins for The Monsters of the Midway. The Steel Curtain has a large dent, too, after one of its big hitters went down.

So the stars are sidelined. Don’t tell the Chicago Bears and Pittsburgh Steelers that the hits will be fewer and lighter today at Soldier Field.

Chicago’s Brian Urlacher is out for the rest of the year, and Pittsburgh’s Troy Polamalu is out for the rest of this month. The rest of the Bears and Steelers are about to find out just how deep their rosters are.

Urlacher underwent season-ending surgery this week after dislocating right wrist in Chicago’s season-opening 21-15 loss at Green Bay. If Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger sounded a little giddy, well, he wasn’t wishing physical harm on the Bears’ star. Nor did he mean any disrespect toward Hunter Hillenmeyer, his replacement at middle linebacker.

It’s just that the Bears are a little less intimidating without their six-time Pro Bowler.

“I’m not upset that he’s not out there,” Roethlisberger said.

Bears quarterback Jay Cutler probably feels the same way knowing the Steelers will be without one of the game’s best safeties for three to six weeks. Polamalu tore medial collateral ligament in his left knee in last week’s 13-10 overtime win over Tennessee.

Of course, he has other issues on his mind, starting with how to live up to that savior billing that hit him the moment he arrived in a trade with Denver. Considering the last franchise quarterback the Bears had was Sid Luckman 60 years ago, and that there haven’t been many good ones since Jim McMahon in the 1980s, that’s no small task.

A Bears fan growing up in Santa Claus, Ind., Cutler knew that.

What he didn’t foresee was a debut that brought back memories of such stalwarts as Cade McNown and Moses Moreno when he threw a career-high four interceptions. Yet, if Cutler were looking for targets to blame, he had no shortage of options.

He could run a keeper of sorts and point the finger at himself.

He was on the run and out of sorts, forcing passes in an ugly performance in which he wound up 17 of 36 for 277 yards with a touchdown. It didn’t help that the retooled offensive line couldn’t hold its ground, or that running game stalled and the receivers weren’t in sync with Cutler.

“We were definitely trying to make something happen,” Cutler said. “I was. They brought a lot of blitzes, showed us a lot of different looks. I thought the line did a great job of picking everything up for me. I, maybe, got out of the pocket a little bit, ran around some. It’s going to come in time.”

It was a rough night for the tight ends, with Greg Olsen catching one pass for 8 yards and Desmond Clark leaving with a rib injury. His status is in question.

Matt Forte was a non-factor, too, managing just 55 yards rushing on 25 carries, and he did not catch a pass after leading the team with 63 receptions as a rookie.

But the focus is on Cutler.

As if the poor game wasn’t enough, he took shots from former NFL coaches Jim Mora and Mike Martz on the NFL Network this week when they ripped his demeanor in the postgame news conference. No one is knocking his talent, though, not after he set a Broncos record with 4,526 yards passing last season.

“I don’t believe Jay Cutler will ever play like that again,” defensive end Alex Brown said, referring to the opener.

The Steelers know how well Cutler can play. They got an up-close look in 2007, when he threw for 248 yards while completing 22 of 29 passes for three touchdowns in a 31-28 win for Denver.

“He made some incredible throws and incredible plays, not only running the ball but throwing the ball, too,” Steelers defensive end Brett Keisel said. “So he’s a very versatile quarterback and based on the game last week, he’s going to want to come out and show us why Chicago wanted him so bad. It’s going to be a tough challenge.”

It figures to be that much more difficult without Polamalu, who was injured in a scramble for a blocked field goal.

Although losing a five-time Pro Bowler hurts, the Steelers have survived big hits before. They have so many playmakers that the Steelers believe they can fill this hole no matter how deep it is. So they’re turning toward veteran Tyrone Carter, who filled in for Ryan Clark after his spleen was damaged two years ago.

The Bears are in a similar spot with Urlacher, who hadn’t missed a game since he sat out seven in 2004 with various injuries. Chicago was winless without him.

Now, it’s a different team, a better team.

“We still have our goals out there that we want to do,” defensive end Alex Brown said.