The Bulls' First Quarter: OK, you've got my attention

Needless to say, with a star player unlikely to play for a majority of the season, hopes have not been real high for the Bulls this season. Sure, the team sits atop the division at the moment, good enough for a fourth seed in the Eastern Conference if the playoffs were to start today. Still, as admirably as Chicago's effort might be on a nightly basis during what has arguable been the softer part of its schedule, there's little reason to believe that the Bulls will be much of a threat to the defending champion Heat, let alone several other "contenders" in the East.

While I was merely going to be content to note that Chicago is at least leading its division once again and not think much of it, Yahoo's Adrian Wojnarowski went and reported a little story this week that suddenly gives Bulls fans quite the reason to begin dreaming about ripping that championship window wide open. If Kevin Love indeed wants out of Minnesota, then it is awfully hard not to recall what team he was quoted as admiring last year.

While Love does not become a free agent for another two years, a suddenly disappointing Bears season provides the perfect time to begin speculating about all of the players we'd be willing to part with to acquire this All-Star forward (translation: everybody except Derrick Rose). The idea of having two 24-year-old players of that caliber on the same squad should be enough to make any fan excited.

The Bears' Third Quarter: So much for that optimism

So much for 10-2, or 13-3 for that matter. Indeed, the last time the Bears were being discussed on this blog, my confidence in the team was apparently riding a little too high. While I knew both Houston and San Francisco would be tough games, and admitted Seattle should not be overlooked, I can't really say I thought this particular quarter of the season would have gone worse than 2-2. Instead, there was but one lone victory over these past four games and Chicago now sits in second place in the NFC North.

Today's loss to Seattle was fairly devastating because now going 4-0 to finish the year is essentially the only way this team wins the division. Beyond that, a defense that had looked so stellar so much of the year looked winded, tired and, well ... old today.

The fourth quarter's success will more or less be determined by Green Bay. I know I also said something about how the Cardinals shouldn't be overlooked in that last quarterly post (I don't know why either), but assuming Chicago can beat Arizona and both of the other divisional foes that aren't the Packers, the playoffs should still be a real good possibility. Nothing is assured, of course—especially not the job of Lovie Smith.

There's going to be an awful lot of tough questions this week, which I'm sure will inevitably lead the head coach to be even more condescending toward the local media. Going forward from today, however, the pressure is on Lovie to get results. In the end, I'm thinking that an 11-5 finish should still be good enough to get into the playoffs, although I remain skeptical about this team playing too far into January.

PHOTO TAKEN FROM HERE.