Seahawks vs. Bears aftermath

So the Seahawks are 1-2 with a road trip to Indy looming next week. Is it time to panic?

I say heck yes. They're done. Finished.

Kidding. Well sort of. While it's too early in the season to rule any team out, this is certainly not a good way for the Seahawks to start their 2009 campaign.

Injured or not, Seattle shouldn't be blowing a 13-point lead at home if it fancies itself a playoff caliber team (that's right, I just said fancies, deal with it).

"You’ve got to [put teams away when you're winning], because these guys are too good," center Chris Spencer said. "Those guys get paid just like we get paid, and they’re really good athletes over there, so they’re not going lay down. When you’re up you’ve got to put guys away."

The Seahawk did avoid a long injury list like last week's game. Cornerback Ken Lucas re-injured his groin and couldn't finish the game, and guard Rob Sims left with an oblique injury. Tackle Brandon Frye also injured his groin but stayed in the game.

While there was plenty of blame to go around today, Seahawks coach Jim Mora was most willing to dump it on kicker Olindo Mare, who missed two field goals in what turned out to be a six-point loss.

“No excuses for those,” Mora said. “If you’re a kicker in the National Football League, you should make those kicks. Bottom line. End of story. Period. No excuses. No wind, it doesn’t matter, you’ve got to make those kicks. Especially in a game like this where we’re kicking and scratching and fighting and playing your tail off, and you miss those kicks? Not acceptable. Absolutely not acceptable.”

So does that mean a change might be coming (quick, what did we do with Brandon Coutu's phone number?)

“We’ll look at changes everywhere,” Mora said. “We’re not going to fight our ass off and have a field goal kicker go out there and miss to field goals and lose the game. Not going to happen.”

While he was getting dressed in front of his locker, Mare noticed reporters lingering. Asked if he wanted time to finish dressing, Mare said, "I don't know, are the questions going to get any different?"

To his credit, Mare didn’t avoid questions about his misses and put a lot of the blame for the loss on his shoulders. Mare said the wind played with both the kicks, both of which had plenty of distance but missed wide left, but that he should have made the kicks anyway. “Just two terrible kicks and it kind of cost us the game.”

“I blame myself for that and I feel bad for all the guys in here that worked so hard all week,” Mare said. “To let it come down to one guy to screw it up for everybody, it’s a tough pill to swallow, but I’ll be back.”

Those misses were part of the second- and third-quarter stretch of the game where the Seahawks let the game slip away. It started when the Bears converted a four-and-goal touchdown pass two plays after a fumble was overturned by replay.

On the ensuing possession, Mare missed a field goal at the end of the half. The Seahawks got the ball back to start the third quarter, but T.J. Houshmandzadeh fumbled two plays into the half. That led to a Bears touchdown. Then Mare missed again, then Seneca Wallace threw an ill-advised side-arm pass that turned into an interception an a Chicago field goal.

“That was a critical stretch right there,” Mora said. “Like I said, when you’re margin for error is small, those are critical moments in the game that you can’t have happen.”

So what good can be taken from this?

First and foremost, the play of middle linebacker David Hawthorne, who had 16 tackles, including one for loss, and an interception. Hawthorne battled to make the team last year as an undrafted rookie, but is playing now in place of the injured Lofa Tatupu.

Nate Burleson looked like a go-to receiver with nine catches for 109 yards.

Julius Jones ran hard and picked up 98 yards on 19 carries, and also had a 39-yard touchdown catch, a nice bounce back after a non-productive day in San Francisco last weekend.

Chris Spencer returned to the lineup and stayed healthy, as did Deion Branch.

Um. . . Let's see. What else?

Those green uniforms looked pretty darn good. Oh wait, maybe not that one so much.