NFC PLAYOFFS : Big, Bad Bears Meet Old What’s-His-Name and Giants Today

On one side there is Otis Wilson, Mouth of the Midway, Lester Hayes east, Dennis Thurman north, a defensive player determined to prove that he can say absolutely anything about an opponent, so long as he can back it up on the field.

There also is Wilber Marshall, devastating tackler, a guy who hits quarterbacks so hard that the commissioner of football takes $2,000 out of his pay and wonders if Wilber’s team hasn’t become some sort of hit squad.

There also is Mike Singletary, Superbacker, National Football Conference defensive player of the year, a man who whips off his glasses, puts on his uniform, wraps himself in a cape to protect himself from the Metropolis weather, then flies into action, daring offensive linemen to come up with something other than Kryptonite that can stop him.

Those are the linebackers of the Chicago Bears.

On the other side there is Lawrence Taylor, linebacker of the New York Giants.

Never mind the ball. Never mind Walter Payton or Joe Morris or Jim McMahon or Phil Simms. The guys to watch in this morning’s NFC playoff game at Soldier Field are the linebackers--Taylor and the three Bears.

Oh, the Giants do have other linebackers, but Taylor is the one who gets the raves. There has been so much babbling about St. Lawrence flowing out of New York the last couple of years, you would think he was winning the Super Bowl and rebuilding the Statue of Liberty in his spare time.

Funny thing about Taylor, though. For all his magnificence, the people here in Second City cannot seem to remember his name.

When hypercritical defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan of the Bears was talking about overrated players before last season’s NFC championship game at San Francisco, the first man he mentioned was “what’s his name, that person who blitzes for the Giants.”

Taylor, he meant.

And when Wilson was discussing the Giants last week after one of the Bears’ warm-weather practice sessions in Suwanee, Ga., he started stammering about that good linebacker New York is supposed to have--”Lawrence, Lawrence something . . . help me, I really can’t think of his name.”

Welk? Olivier? Of Arabia?

Nope.

Taylor, he meant.

Word of all this naturally filtered back to New York and New Jersey, where the Giants have been searching for all the incentive they can get going into a game in which they are 9 1/2-point underdogs.

Taylor scoffed and said: “People are always talking. Let’s see who’s talking Sunday when we walk off the field.”

A teammate rushed to Taylor’s aid and talked about how a Ford is always wishing that it were a Mercedes.

Wilson, he meant.

All of this fuss should at least lend a little color to a game that will be played at 9:30 a.m. PST in the Windy City cold, which also should add some color to the players’ faces and fingers--the color purple.

Bear Coach Mike Ditka took his team to Georgia to prepare for its playoff opener--an NFC Central Division championship and 15-1 record earned the Bears a bye--even though Chicago’s home-field advantage in the playoff season is supposed to be its familiarity with the cold. “We needed to go somewhere where we can work on things, get things done,” Ditka said. “We can’t let the weather disrupt our preparation.”

His players have kept warm in their hibernation, but they have also gotten restless. “Let’s get this show on the road,” said McMahon, the antsy quarterback. “I’ve played this game in my head a hundred times. Let’s get out there and play the stupid thing.”

In the Giants, who have won 11 of 17 games, among them their 17-3 playoff victory over the 49ers, the Bears realize that they are up against one of the toughest defensive teams they will face all season. McMahon, for one, knows what Lawrence’s last name is.

“Taylor is tough,” McMahon said. “But I believe the guys who protect me will keep him out of my face. At least, I hope so.”

Payton, the running back who fears he may never again have this good a chance to go to a Super Bowl, said: “If there’s a man on this team who is taking the New York Giants lightly, they’re out of their minds. The Chicago Bears are a great team. I think everybody knows that by now. But if we think the Giants are going to look at us and say, ‘Ooooh, ooooh, the Bears are so bad, we’ll never beat them,’ they’re out of their minds.”

Payton’s job today will involve more than just carrying the ball. In some situations, he will have to help All-Pro center Jay Hilgenberg block the blitzing Giant linebackers--Taylor, Harry Carson, Gary Reasons, Byron Hunt and a second-stringer who created all sorts of problems for the 49ers, Andy Headen.

“Our offensive linemen have their work cut out, but we’ve got a lot of faith in them,” Ditka said. With good reason, too. Hilgenberg and tackle Jimbo Covert, who also should be seeing a lot of Taylor today, are the first Chicago offensive linemen to make the Pro Bowl since center Mike Pyle, Ditka’s old teammate, did it in 1964.

Covert’s concerns are multiplied because the defensive end who lines up on outside linebacker Taylor’s side, Leonard Marshall, has probably had the best season of any defensive player on the Giants. Some NFL people believe opponents have spent so much time and manpower stopping Taylor that Marshall has been free to do as he pleases.

It does seem obvious that this game should be a defensive struggle, and probably not a thing of beauty. “I think both Mike Ditka and I agree on one thing,” Giant Coach Bill Parcells said. “And that’s that the physical aspect of the game comes first, the aesthetic aspect second.”

Parcells, in his third year with the Giants, took his team to a 10-6 record in the regular season, just as Ditka did last season in his third year with the Bears. The Giants were underdogs in their first playoff game, against the 49ers, just as the Bears were in their playoff opener last season against the Washington Redskins. Both won, using what their own coaches referred to as nasty defenses.

Parcells also uses something else. Rabbit’s feet, lucky charms--whatever he can get his hands on. One Giant fan recently heard about the coach’s superstitions and sent him a lucky silver dollar from Las Vegas. Parcells kept it. Another fan sent a lucky penny. Parcells kept it.

Only was a line drawn when Parcells’ wife caught a cleaning woman trying to stuff a horseshoe into the coach’s shaving kit.

A guy has to use whatever he can these days.

“Just because you’re superstitious doesn’t mean you’re a loonybird,” Parcells says.

And just because you can’t remember Lawrence Taylor’s name doesn’t mean you have forgotten that he’s there.