Smith a quiet, confident leader of men

MIAMI -- Players rarely get yelled at by coach Lovie Smith, and on their first night in the host city for Super Bowl XLI he didn't give them a curfew either.

"We won't have curfew tonight, but as a general rule the rest of the week we will have curfew," Smith said. "That won't be a problem for us. We have real men. They know what's at stake.

"They know if one guy takes a wrong turn we'll all hear about it. We're just going to police each other a little bit, but at the same time we don't have a boot camp. We're not going to make them be in their rooms at 8 o'clock. We're going to enjoy Miami, know that there's work to be done and go from there."

The move followed directly in line with Smith's practice of treating players like men. It's an attitude which endears him to them.

For instance, linebacker Brian Urlacher couldn't remember the last time his coach yelled.

"I don't think I've ever heard him yell on the field," Urlacher said. "I know he's never even said a cuss word. I don't know when the last time it was he yelled.

"He gets his point across to us pretty well. Same way with our assistant coaches. They're pretty good the same way. They get their point across without yelling. It's very instructional. You know what you're supposed to do. There's no doubt what your job is on a given play. That's the No. 1 thing that your effort has to be good on a given play and all game long. That's all he really cares about is stuff like that."

Smith acknowledged it's his philosophy not to behave like a drill sergeant.

"I don't think you have to downgrade guys and have to curse them out and things like that," he said. "I think what players want you to do is coach them. As much as anything they want you to teach them. We spend the majority of our time trying to do that.

"I'm not just talking about me. My staff, that's what we try to do, get the point across. Normally if there's a time when you want to yell at a guy, you can start trying to tell him what he did wrong. We try to do that as much as possible. Is that to say that we never raise our voice. No, we're not saying that. Do I get upset from time to time? Of course I do. I just think you can deal with that a different way than that approach. What I've found is that we have real men. They understand. You don't have to put them down. They're not your kids. If you treat them like that, they'll do whatever you ask them to do."

The mutual admiration is obvious. Smith still doesn't have a contract beyond 2007 and Bears players want that situation resolved.

"I want him to be there as long as I'm there," Urlacher said. "I couldn't imagine playing for anyone else after playing for him the last three years. He's a great man, a great coach. He knows football.

"Anyone who knows him or talks to him respects him."

Different strokes -- The Colts have taken a different approach than the Bears by staying in Indianapolis until later today.

It's rather curious Smith has taken a different approach than his mentor, Colts coach Tony Dungy.

"Some guys might like doing that," Smith said about arriving late. "I wanted to get down here as soon as possible. By Wednesday we'll be on a regular work week for us and we'll get a chance to get an extra practice in."

Smith said they put in 80 to 85 percent of the game plan last week in Lake Forest.

"We're right on schedule right now, but we need this week," he said. "It'll be a couple weeks since we've played. We're anxious to get in a good week of practice. We didn't do a lot of sweating last week up there. We should be able to take care of that and then get one good padded day of practice in and then go from there."

Temperatures were in the mid-70s with a little humidity Sunday.

The Bears are the home team for Sunday's game, so they have their choice of wearing light colors to combat the heat, or their regular home dark jerseys.

Learning experience -- It was suggested to center Olin Kreutz that the Bears' 31-13 loss at home this year to the Miami Dolphins was a learning experience.

"Yeah, how to get our (rears) kicked," Kreutz said. "That was about it.

"Miami did a pretty good job beating us down. They have a good defense and they did a good job against us."

Youth must be served -- Kick returner Devin Hester first realized he was a speed demon in the fourth grade.

"When I was in my fourth grade year and in elementary school they had a fifth grade field day, and that's when all the fifth graders and the fastest one in each class race," Hester said. "My brother was bragging about me. He is older (in fifth grade), and he said, 'My brother is in the fourth grade and he can beat all you all.'

"They had a big argument about it and they actually came and got me out of class and I ended up racing them and beat all of them."

Popular guys -- Wide receiver Muhsin Muhammad described Chicago for national media as a Bear-crazy town.

"The city of Chicago has just been bananas," he said. "Any time you go out, you get serenaded at almost every restaurant you go to, bombarded when you pump your gas.

"But it's awesome, it's all great. So to finally get here and be into the week -- so now we have a normal week of preparation -- it's almost a sigh of relief that 'come on, lets get this thing started.' We're all excited that now it's finally time. We jumped off that plane and now we can finally begin our regular preparations."