Browns Show Ditka the Flip Side, 27-7

Now Mike Ditka knows how the other half lives.

Make that the other 99%.

For the first time in Ditka’s seven years as head coach, the Chicago Bears are on a three-game losing streak, courtesy of a 27-7 drubbing administered Monday night by the Cleveland Browns.

“It looks like a day of reckoning--not a day of atonement, but a day of reckoning.” Ditka said after Bernie Kosar completed 22 of 29 passes for 281 yards, including a 97-yard touchdown pass to Webster Slaughter and a three-yard toss to Eric Metcalf, who also ran seven yards for a touchdown.

It’s the first such streak for the injury-ravaged Bears, who started four rookies on defense, since Nov. 15-26, 1981, the year before Ditka took over and turned the team into one of the National Football League’s most dominant teams.

In fact, their 4-3 record drops them a game behind Minnesota in the NFC Central Division, the first time they’ve been out of first place in the division since the final game of the 1983 season--85 games ago.

But unlike last week, when he exploded after a loss to Houston and suggested the Bears might not win again, he was more optimistic, praising his defense, which has allowed 102 points the past three weeks after surrendering just 61 in the opening four wins.

“I believe in them and I believe we can turn it around,” said Ditka, whose team plays the Rams at home next week in a game that could have huge playoff ramifications for a team that’s made the playoffs the last five years. “I’m more encouraged today than I have been the last two weeks.”

They also have respect.

“When you beat a team like Chicago on a Monday night, that’s something,” said Michael Dean Perry, who led the defensive effort for the Browns, who broke their own two-game losing streak and moved into a three-way tie at 4-3 with Cincinnati and Houston in the AFC Central.

Perry, whose brother, William, plays for the Bears, led a defense that knocked Mike Tomczak from the game late in the third quarter after he went four of 14 for 76 yards. They also stopped the Bears on Cleveland’s two-yard line midway through the third quarter. One play later, Kosar hit Slaughter on the 97-yard scoring pass play that was the longest play from scrimmage in Brown history.

The call was made by offensive coordinator Marc Trestman, who was under fire in the past two weeks as the Browns scored just 17 points in two defeats. And it redeemed Kosar, who last week had four passes intercepted in a 17-7 loss to Pittsburgh.

Slaughter had eight catches for 186 yards.

Chicago’s only touchdown came on a five-yard pass from Jim Harbaugh to Wendell Davis with 3:47 left.