bradjock

Taylor might have a good year, but these moves ALWAYS seem to bite Washington in the arse. Maybe it hurts team chemistry somehow or angers other players when they do this. But these moves never seem to work out. Either way, pft repoted that Taylor's cap hit will be 7.5 million this year. That's a HUGE chunk for a guy who might retire at the end of the season. AND they had to give up a 2nd & 6th round pick for him. It's a huge gamble for the future to try and win immediately.

On defense: I'm going to go with a cornerback, but a different one. I'll pick Zack Bowman. He's supposed to be a tremendous talent that might have been a first rounder if not for injuries. It appears that he's 100% healthy now. I look for him to be the #1 back-up at CB. Offense: It's tough to argue with Hester. I pick Greg Olsen. I look for him to make the pro-bowl this year.

That's not a horrible attitude to have really. In 2001 & 2005 my thought was we'd lose every game. So I was overjoyed when we were successful. Last season every loss felt like a knife twisting in my heart. That being said, IMO we're not that far off right now. I do believe anything is possible.

Damn I should proofread!!! Although I could have meant it to say, "We have an offense most teams would effing just flat out die if that had . . . "

Agreed. Being the worst player on the Bears defense is like being the ugliest skank at Hugh Hefner's house. It's still pretty damn good. Here's a sobering thought: THREE offensive starters from week 1 last year are likely out of the league (Fred Miller, Ruben Brown, & Mr. "I ace the sobriety test every time") If we cut RMJ, there's no doubt in my mind he'd be signed quickly. He doesn't even start. D Manning would go fast also. Our back-up/mediocre defensive players are highly sought after while our offensive starters go directly to the scrap heap. That speaks volumes about the differences between our offense & defense (although Arch is in the heap also)

What do you mean being done put together??? Like players developing or us adding a guy like Brett Favre??? As to the latter point, I'd be shocked as hell if we made any major move at this point. Here how I see it: Special Teams: #1 in the league since Hester arrived. Gould is gold. We'll be #1 again. Defense: If healthy, the best int he league. Or damn close to it. Offense: HUGE question marks. but if we can get our shit together and be average . . . not to mention, if our offense at the very least can keep the defense off the field, we won't see so many injuries. We have an offense and a special teams most teams would die for. We're not that far from being great.

I have an account with Ticketmaster, and I still had to type in those damn letters at least 200 times over the course of an hour. What a bunch of BS. Last year I paid $380.00 for two $68.00 tickets, and that was pretty much the going rate. My options were to pay it or not go to a Bear's game. Terrible. Thanks for letting me know that Im not the only one who feels screwed by Ticketmaster.

Agreed. I said this already, but IMO any veteran QB we bring in we'll likely sign for at least two years, and they'll be groomed as an eventual replacement for Rex or Kyle.

July is the time for dreaming big baby!!! If he said, "I guarantee we will make the Super Bowl!" I might have a problem with it. But guaranteeing something and predicting something are two different things. I'd be pissed at any Bear who didn't think we could win the Super Bowl.

Manning did show signs of being physical towards the end of the season last year. He's mostly thought of as being soft because of that play versus the Vikings where he bounced off Purple Jesus allowing him to score a touchdown. But we later found out that he was instructed to "get the ball back" meaning, go for the strip instead of the tackle. When Steve Wilks is saying that D Manning is fast, athletic, and physical, I believe him. Manning has been in this system for two years now, so why shouldn't he be picking things up quick? But Manning's problem has always been making bad reads, getting out of position, and arriving a step too late. I don't see how moving him to the nickel will help this. The most surprising thing about this is that we're serious about moving him too nickel and this does likely mean the inevitable end of RMJ. (I thoght perhaps we were just trying to light a fire under his ass.)

When we were interested in getting Bruce Gradowski, the story was that he would be the clear #3. That tells me he wouldn't be brought into compete, but he'd be around for a year to learn the system, get back into football since he's been out so long, and be brought along slowly. In other words, we'd be signing him more for 2009 then for 2008. If/when Rex flops and is gone, in 2009 Simms would compete with Orton. (My guess is at this point we'd draft another QB fairly high and give him a "red-shirt" type season holding the clip-board) Either way, he'd be an upgrade as a #3 QB. If he comes cheap, like with signing Kevin Jones, why not bring him in?

Myself & two other people were on seperate computers at noon last Saturday to try & get Bears tickets, with very little luck. I was just curious as to how damn hard it is to get through on these or if anyone had any luck? The only luck was 50 minutes into two tickets for the home opener came up. After trying for so long, I got all excited and clicked "confirm" without looking & went to try & get more. Finally after an hour & a /2 I gave up, and looked to see what I'd bought . . . I about shit when I saw the total cost for two was $540.00. They're United Airline/Cadillac Club Seats which are apparantly bad seats with minor VIP privileges (which I really don't care about). I wasn't exactly thrilled to have to spend that much for 2 tickets that aren't close to the front row. I was just curious if anybody else has had better luck trying to get through on Ticketmaster or if there's any trick to it (I'm going to try and get tickets for when we play the Rams in St. Louis).

I'd be a lot more anxious to give him the benefit of the doubt if we had a "plan B." I'd be just as upset if we'd done nothing to improve the safety position and we went into saying, "McGowan's our guy, and Mike Brown will stay healthy." But we did add Steltz, and we're hoping that Payne will stay healthy & D Manning will improve. Yet at guard we've done nothing. We hoped Beekman might step up, but at the OTA's there were hints that he was behind Anthony Oakley & Tyler Reed on the depth chart. Then there is St. Clair, who's probably the best LG, but he's also the back-up RT AND LT. That's stretching it a bit thin. Not to mention I don't think Chris Williams will be ready to start opening day. When was the last time we had a rookie win a starting job? Olsen, D Manning, Benson, Tommie Harris . . . even Urlacher. I can't think of any rookie starting on opening day. (Just for the record I think AP gets the opening day start over Forte, although that may not last long.) Why we've added depth at every position but LG is mind-boggling to me.

LOVED the Jones signing. What's not to like? I'm pretty damn happy with everything we've done this off-season. We've resigned our own guys, cut dead weight, and hope to have their replacements: Archuletta gone, Draft Steltz Cut Moose, sign Booker Lose Berrian, get Lloyd Dump Miller, draft Williams Fire Benson, sign Jones For every action, there's been reaction. (ok, we're still looking for a 3rd string QB, but I suspect we'll find one soon enough) But we've yet to replace Ruben Brown. I wouldn't mind seeing St. Clair play LG, but to assume that Williams is actually ready to start at LT is a huge assumption. As for Metcalf, just about every year the guy gets a chance to start and either sucks or gets hurt (usually a combination of the two). I just hope like hell we JA can find somebody to replace Brown (or even bring Brown back, although I know that's unlikely)

The braying jack-ass is out at 670 THESCORE to be replaced by Mully & Hanley. I'm THRILLED to be able to listed to the SCORE in the morning's again.

HUGE difference in positions. How many good cornerbacks are waiting to be signed? I can't think of any. How many good running-backs? Shaun Alexander, Travis Henry, Cedric Benson, Ron Dayne . . . maybe those 4 aren't "good" but they're definitely big names. I agree that at some point someone will give Cedric another chance. But I wouldn't be surprised if it's November before that happens.

In the last two drafts we've spent a 2nd & 3rd round pick on the exact same position. If we believe Wolfe is not NFL worthy, we need to give him a shot. If not, we should sign a guy like Jones.

The Lloyd news does not surprise me. When he signed with Washington he was very similar to Berrian. This might be his last shot in the NFL if he doesn't make it, so he has everything to prove. That's too bad about Hass, but not really surprising. I hope like hell Williams takes it from St. Clair pretty quickly so St. Clair can move back to LG. I sure as hell don't want to see any more of Terrance Metcalf. If it's a competition, Grossman wins everytime. But Orton's a helluva a lot better with the checkdowns. I look for Williams to replace Hilly if he can do the same type of intangibles that Hilly does.

Briggs was not the one given credit for hurting Benson in practice. That was Urlacher & Mike Brown. Neither are Rosenass clients. When Benson was hurt, the video was out of the 2 hits by Urlacher & Brown and it seemed pretty normal IMO. Maybe it was a little hard for a scrimmage, but standard for what you see on any given Sunday. The fact that Briggs was tight with TJ probably didn't help Cedric. But we've constantly heard stories about Cedric not being interested in football, goofing around, not taking it seriously, and so on. If Cedric acted like he gave a shit, he'd still be with the team.

Did Angelo ever mention "team" when it came to Tank? I remember him talking about the organization, and the Bears, but I don't remember him saying that Tank let the team down. I could be wrong. But IMO Benson has let the team down in many different ways. That's what Angelo was talking about. There's still this sense that his teammates hated him and he never took football seriously. As much as I've bashed Benson I started getting excited hearing about how he's arrived leaner, faster and more dedicated. The bottom line is a simple 3 strike policy: Bad teammate--check. Didn't meet expectations--check. Embarrassed the franchise--check. He's gone.

One of the papers reported that Lovie ordered the players not to talk about it, and if they had to say anything, to just talk about themselvs. I don't remember him giving that order with Tank. Of course most of the players were in his corner. None of his teammates would have said, "We're so glad the jackass is gone."

I never understood that line of thinking. We sign Alexander to a 1 year contract, and he's supposed to help Forte get better??? It's far more likely he'd be hiding his cup. That's why we have a running-backs coach. If not, why couldn't AP mentor him? He's never been accused of not knowing the position or not giving 100%.

I agree with the first part. I'm tired of hearing about how many women Lance has impregnated and all the guys who are disgrustled with their contract. The turd has been flushed! now we can move on. I disagree on Alexander. Only because he's a terrible receiver and if he came here, he'd be expected to be a hero. How could Forte ever flourish with him around? I can't remember Jones ever playing or rushing for over 100 yards a game so there's not much pressure there.

Terra, I usually hate it when you say "Good riddance" to a guy who's been cut. I can't say that this time. You pretty much nailed it on the head this time. Heck, if he just would have quit saying stupid things about his teammates picking on him, or how good he'd be if he just got the chance, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt. Other then the fact he loves his mother (or at least loves boozing with her) I struggle to find any redeeming quality in him.