PHOENIX – The Monday Night Meltdown. To those not familiar with that debacle in Cardinals history, it may be remembered as an ordinary regular season game. But for those who watched it live from the stands or on television, Arizona’s 24–23 loss to the Chicago Bears at then-University of Phoenix Stadium is an indelible part of this franchise’s history.
It produced a litany of stunning plays and perhaps the most iconic postgame news conference in NFL history.
“If this was on Sunday at one o’clock, there were 10 other games; it doesn’t get the notoriety it got,” said then-East Valley Tribune columnist Scott Bordow, who covered the game. “It’s fitting for the Cardinals, this sad franchise, that the game happened to occur on Monday night when the rest of the league was watching, and that’s what made it so memorable.”
The date was Oct 16, 2006 – 20 years ago tonight –– when the Cardinals and Bears faced off under the bright lights of Monday Night Football. The teams were trending in opposite directions so the game didn’t look that exciting on paper. Instead, it birthed one of the most iconic Monday Night Football games in NFL history.
The Cardinals entered the game at 1-4 under coach Dennis Green, while the Bears had everything coming up navy and burnt orange with a perfect 5-0 record in a season in which they ultimately made it to the Super Bowl before falling to Peyton Manning’s Indianapolis Colts.
Arizona was hoping to make a statement at home and it embraced the underdog mentality, playing almost a flawless first half while keeping Chicago off the scoreboard to take a 20-0 lead into the locker room at halftime.
Green’s Cardinals looked primed to pull off the upset.
“I mean everything went perfectly for the Cardinals in the first half,” former Arizona Republic beat writer and columnist Kent Somers said. “They could not have played any better.”
The second half was a different story. The Bears ended the shutout with a field goal. That’s when the figurative rain turned into a downpour.
The turning point in the game came at the end of the third quarter with the Cardinals still holding a 23-3 lead and in possession of the ball at their own 15-yard line. Quarterback Matt Leinart fumbled after Bears defensive end Mark Anderson hit him from behind. Safety Mike Brown scooped up the ball at the 3-yard line and ran it in to cut the lead to 23-10 after the PAT.
The Cardinals were still in good shape late in the fourth quarter with a 23-10 lead when Hall of Fame running back Edgerrin James fumbled the ball at his own 40-yard line. Cornerback Charles Tillman recovered and ran it back for a TD that cut the lead to 23-17 after Robbie Gould’s PAT.
Cardinals radio analyst Ron Wolfley still remembers his kiss-of-death statement to play-by-play man Dave Pasch right before the miscue.
“I remember saying to David, ‘The good thing is, Edgerrin James is not a fumbler,’” Wolfley said. “I barely got that out of my mouth, the ball was snapped, David was calling the play and cut me off, and suddenly the ball came out on that very play.”
Not even the announcers could believe what was taking place as the Cardinals’ collapse was occurring. And when Devin Hester returned a punt 82 yards for a TD with 2:58 to play, the Bears took the lead for the first time at 24-23.
Arizona still had a chance to recover, but Neil Rackers missed a 40-yard field goal attempt with 48 seconds remaining, leaving the home crowd stunned and Green stewing on what would be a one-question postgame news conference.
In a game where the Cardinals hoped to pull off their biggest upset of the season, they let the opportunity slip away. Somers said a large portion of the blame fell on Green for his play calling.
“The Cardinals got very, very conservative on offense,” Somers said. “They started to hand the ball off to Edgerrin James the whole time.
“Looking back at it, the biggest mistake was a coaching error. They went away, at least offensively, from what was working in the first half.”
After the game, Green took his customary spot at the dais and fielded a question from AP freelance reporter Mark Brown that really had nothing to do with Green’s answer. In spite of the result, Brown asked about the strong performance of the Cardinals defense.
It was clear that Green was ready to blow. The moment is better watched on video than in words.
In the quote, Green referenced an earlier meeting between the teams in Week 3 of the preseason, when Arizona had defeated Chicago, but he downplayed the result. As he spoke, Green became increasingly angrier.
“They are who we thought they were. We played them in the preseason. … The Bears are who we thought they were! That’s why we took the damn field!”
After slamming the podium, Green said, “Now if you want to crown them, then crown their ass! But they are who we thought they were! And we let ’em off the hook!
Twenty years later, the quote has garnered millions of views and most Cardinals fans and media can recite the quote verbatim.
“That one quote was everything in that rant, and I think that one quote is what made this kind of legendary still 20 years later,” Bordow said. “If you Google ‘NFL coaching rants,’ I guarantee you that’s going to come up.”
The loss also removed any hope that the Cardinals might turn their season around. They finished 5-11, in last place in the NFC West and the team fired Green on Jan. 1, 2007, one day after the regular season ended.
“It’s how they lost the game that really bothered him,” Bordow said of Green. “The game was theirs and they blew it with mistakes. That’s what set him off. It’s the way they lost the game on Monday Night Football that set him up to explode.”
After the initial outburst, Green still wasn’t done. As always, he had to do a radio hit with the sideline reporter, Paul Calvisi, and Wolfley remembers it fondly.
“Our producer literally said, ‘Coach is coming your way right now and he’s really pissed,’” Wolfley said while laughing. “So he walked in there and Paul just conducted one of the best interviews I’ve ever heard. What a pro Paul really is for handling that situation.”
Wolfley could only laugh when looking back on the postgame proceedings. They only added to what was already one of the wildest nights in franchise history.
“‘The Bears were who we thought they were, and we let them off the hook’,” Wolfley said, reciting Green’s infamous tirade. “One of the unbelievable moments in the 20 years of being in the broadcast booth.”
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