Olsen determined to rebound from adversity

LAKE FOREST, Ill. – Whoever first said that “a life without difficulties is a classroom without lessons” no doubt wasn’t talking about dealing with adversity on a football field. But Greg Olsen can relate.

After losing the first two fumbles of his NFL career in last weekend’s 20-17 loss to the Carolina Panthers, the Bears tight end is eager to bounce back in Sunday’s home opener against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

“I’m sure if you asked the top guys in the league if they’ve had those kinds of days where things didn’t go their way, I’m sure every single one of them would say, ‘Yeah, I’ve had a few of them,’” Olsen said. “That’s just part of playing at this level. Things are going to happen and you’ve just got to learn from it and move on.”

Having committed the Bears’ only two turnovers of the season thus far, Olsen will focus more on tucking the ball away, something that was never a problem when he played at the University of Miami.

“My whole career I think I had maybe fumbled one time my freshman year of college and didn’t lose it,” Olsen said. “It’s not something I’ve had a history with in the past, so maybe sometimes you take it for granted, and sometimes things like this refresh your mind that, ‘Hey, don’t take anything for granted. Just get back to doing what you’ve done your whole life.’”

Although Olsen knows that opponents study tape, he doesn’t think that his two fumbles will cause tacklers to go after the ball more aggressively than usual when he’s carrying it.

“They want to strip the ball no matter who has it,” Olsen said. “I think probably every guy in the league at one point has fumbled the ball, so that would mean everybody has a target on their backs. I don’t worry too much about that.

“I think they have to worry more about game-planning to stop our offense and stop the tight ends and me personally from what we can do making plays and don’t worry about that other stuff.”

While Olsen can’t recall ever fumbling twice in one game, he did rebound from a poor performance at Miami.

“I had one game where I dropped two passes that were fairly routine passes and that was pretty much the first time I had dropped a pass in a game,” Olsen said. “That time I moved on the next week and had a real good game. You just get back to focusing on the week of practice, and that’s the same approach I’m going to have this week.”

Offensive coordinator Ron Turner gave Olsen a pep talk after the Bears returned from their road trip.

“I talked to him Sunday night when we got off the plane and said, ‘You’re a great player. You’ve made a lot of great plays for us. You’re going to make a lot of great plays for us. We’re going to come to you. You made two mistakes in that game. I made some mistakes in that game, too.'" Turner said.

“It wasn’t one play that lost the game. It wasn’t two plays. It was several plays; several opportunities we had and several things that we did. Greg’s a competitor. He’ll bounce back. No one feels worse than he does about it. We have talked to him and he knows we believe in him.”

Teammates have been supportive, but Olsen doesn’t need to hear any words of encouragement from them to know what he did last week and how he must overcome it.

“What are they going to say?” said Olsen, who has caught four passes for 43 yards in two games this season. “They know I was disappointed and not happy with those two plays. They know I hold myself to higher expectations than that and that I was harder on myself than anybody else could be.

“At this level in professional sports, things happen. You’re not always going to be 100 percent. Mistakes happen; that’s why a team loses. If everyone did every play right, every play would be a touchdown on offense and a three-yard loss on defense. Things don’t always go the way you planned. You’ve just got to not let it happen too often and just move on and get better.”

(chicagobears.com)