NOTEBOOK : Bear Effort Pleases Tough-to-Please Ditka

Chicago Coach Mike Ditka didn’t figure to explode into one of his infamous fits of rage after the Bears pounded the Rams into submission Sunday night at Soldier Field, but he wasn’t exactly jumping for joy either.

“I’m happy, but I’m a reserved happy,” he said. “We knew we would have to score some points and we challenged the guys during the week to do that. We made some big plays early and a lot of things fell into place.”

Ditka said Donnell Woolford’s first-quarter interception--that led to a Bears’ touchdown and a 14-0 lead--was an early turning point in the game. And he praised quarterback Jim Harbaugh’s performance as “outstanding.”

But it was his team’s overall effort that pleased him most.

“We could probably play better, but if we play this hard all the time, good things will happen for us,” Ditka said. “I’m very proud of the team effort we had out there.”

Down the hall in another interview room, Ram Coach John Robinson was whistling another tune.

And it sounded a lot like a death dirge.

“We have to accept the criticism and the embarrassment of our actions,” he said. “Any criticism anyone levels is probably justified. I think our problems are team-wide. They start with me and go through every member of our football team.”

Bear tight end Jim Thornton, in his third year out of Cal State Fullerton, left the game after being poked in the eye.

“He probably has a scratched retina, at least,” Ditka said. “He may have injured a muscle in there. The eye’s completely closed now, so it’s hard to tell.”

The first punt of the game came with 45 seconds left in the first half when the Rams’ Keith English kicked a 31-yarder.

The Bears, who led, 28-0, at the intermission, scored touchdowns on four of five possessions. (Time ran out in the half on their fifth).

The Rams elected to go for the first down on two fourth-down situations, coming up short on a fourth-and-one play from the Bears’ 38-yard line late in the first quarter and a fourth and three from the Bears’ 30 midway through the second quarter.

Bears’ punter Maury Buford wasn’t called to duty until there was less than two minutes remaining in the third quarter.

Jackie Slater recognizes that the Rams are in desperate straits, and he realizes that it is a natural reaction for a team to panic when times are bad.

But the veteran Ram offensive tackle said his team won’t give up, despite its 1-4 start and despite its poor play.

“When you say, ‘Is it time to press the panic button?’ my impression is people letting a yellow streak creep up their back, turning tail and quitting the season,” Slater said. “I don’t think that’s the kind of team we have. I’m certainly not going to turn tail.

“I’ve been on a lot of teams here, some that have started slow, some that have started fast then had slumps. But what I really enjoy most is when a team digs deep inside of itself, finds character and pulls out a win or a few wins when things look real bad.

“That’s what I’m looking forward to with this team: to winning when we’re down, to finding character in the hard times. That’s what I enjoy about this game.”

Harbaugh liked the Chicago game plan and the protection he got from his linemen.

“I think the game plan was real good. We threw on first down, second down. We kept the defense off balance pretty good,” said Harbaugh. “I had pretty good protection. I had to get out of the pocket a couple of times.”

Harbaugh, responding to local newspaper criticism of the Bears’ offense while extolling the Rams’ attack, said: “They said you could put L.A.’s offense and our defense together and have a pretty good team.

“The same thing happened when I was in college (at Michigan). They talked about how bad our offense was and it obviously made the guys on the offensive squad mad. I think the guys here might have felt the same way.”

Times staff writer Tim Kawakami and the Associated Press contributed to this story.