Coach Marc Trestman won’t say whether he had a talk with Brandon Marshall about his controversial tweets. Neither will Marshall, who wouldn’t let a reporter finish asking whether there were repercussions from his social-media challenge to box a Lions fan.
‘‘I mean, I’m not into the TMZ thing,” said Marshall, who Friday spun his boxing tweets as part of some sort of anti-bullying strategy. “I’m not a real fan of that type of journalism. So I refuse to go there. If you want to go there, you can do that on your own time.”
Trestman said Friday that he would address the issue with Marshall, but on Monday, he simply said that it was “an issue between Brandon and I, and I’m going to leave it at that.” Marshall wasn’t a distraction, he said, even as the Bears prepared to try to win their first game in 35 days.
“I didn’t have any sense or anything other than Brandon working hard in practice,” Trestman said. “That very evidently carried over into the game.”
Marshall had seven receptions for 90 yards in the Bears’ 21-13 victory Sunday against the Vikings, including two jaw-dropping touchdown catches. His dominant-as-usual blocking — “Very effective and very determined,” Trestman said — helped the Bears screen the Vikings to death and run Matt Forte off the edge. Forte had 175 yards from scrimmage, while Alshon Jeffery led the Bears with 11 catches for 135 yards.
“Yeah, I mean, before the season, we never thought we’d be in this position,” said Marshall, who skipped out of Soldier Field on Sunday without doing interviews. “So when you look in the locker room, that’s why we’re continuing to scrap and fight. We believe in the men in this room — coaches and players.”
One man who used to be in the room — former Bears coach Lovie Smith — will return to Soldier Field for the first time Sunday as the Buccaneers’ coach. Marshall, who played one season under Smith, called it just another game, though he knows others might make more of it.
“I won’t get into that,” he said. “I won’t get into it throughout this week. I won’t get into it with you right now.”
He said he was familiar with Smith’s defense from practicing against it for a season but wouldn’t begin studying the Bucs until later Monday.
He didn’t act as though the victory over Minnesota was a watershed, either, saying he didn’t learn anything new about his teammates. The weeklong lead-up to the game also was the same as before.
“Football’s football,” Marshall said. “We just execute. It was a little rough, still had a slow start, still wasn’t good enough, but we got the win, and we’re going to enjoy it.
‘‘I guess we’re done enjoying it. We got back to work [Monday] and watched film, and we really held each other accountable and focused on how we can continue to get better and build off of it.”
The victory “feels great, but we still have a huge challenge ahead of us,” Marshall said. The Bears need to play one game at a time but have to be aware of the big picture — their next loss might be the one that officially knocks them out of the playoff conversation.
“Just keep doing what we’re doing,” he said. “All you can do is just get better. All you can do is go to work. That’s the only way I know how to do it: Get up every day. It’s all about routine and regimen.
“You have to believe in that, and eventually something’s going to give.”
Email: pfinley@suntimes.com
Twitter: @patrickfinley
