bradjock

It comes down to two things IMO: 1. Is he better then Josh Beekman? The fact he's a mauler and we want a mauler, would indicate the answer is yes. I like Beekman as an "ultra-back-up" being able to fill in at all 3 interior lineman spots. Not to mention he's solid. 2. As far as us trading Brown, what do you want for him? Like it or not, we seem ready to part ways with him. What do you expect to get for him? IMO, Sims is a former 4th round pick with experience. He's worth a 4th round pick. At this point, I'd take a 4th for Alex Brown.

Nice. That would seem ideal. I had been wondering why the Seahawks wanted to get rid of Sims. I didn't realize it was because he didn't fit their scheme. That makes sense. Sims is a 4th round tender which means we'd only have to pay him 1.8 million or something like that? It's good to see there is interest in Alex Brown. Although I'm still wondering why there's no interest in Greg Olsen. I know there's a lot of love for Alex Brown, but Brown was never as good as Wale. When Wale went down, did anybody miss him with Mark Anderson filling in? I didn't.

Would you rather have a coach that says, "We don't need Greg Olsen, so will some NFL team PLEASE make us an offer? We're desperate. There's no point in offering a 2nd or 3rd cause we'll take MUCH less!"

I think there was more to it that than. Brown was slow and ineffective at FS. Our SS' sucked, and I think may have even seen injury, and we were getting torn up on the ground, thus we moved him. But in 2008, Brown was a shell of himself. Go back to Brown before the injury to see what a FS in our system can do. I was thinking we just flip-flopped Payne & Brown. If I remember correctly, Payne looked ok at SS and Brown's name was rarely mentioned. We switched the two and Brown looked pretty good and Payne disappeared. Our safeties are only good when we have a pass rush. If we could have gotten to the damn quarterback last year, we wouldn't be talking about the safety position. Why don't we ever play him in the box? What, you think our coaches are so awesome now? Don't you think Payne is better in the box, and yet how often did we try to play him at FS? And he isn't the only example. Since Angelo game to us, he has drafted SS bodies to play FS. The only time it worked was with the one guy that he didn't draft (Brown). I'm thinking Steltz doesn't have the explosiveness and he's not a big hitter to play SS effectively. That's why we don't play him there. But he has the smarts to be in the right spot at FS. But you could be right. I like to think our coaches are not completely retarded . . . foolish optimism on my part. We have talent and options and safety . . . that doesn't mean the talent and options are very good. DA looked like he could be our #1. Are you counting on that? Bennett is solid across the middle. Hester & Knox both suck at route running. If that doesn't improve, how's Martz going to take it. Iglesias??? Rashied??? That's a rough group. Wow. Knox was a rookie that developed sooner than expected, yet last years solid play is worth what to you now? He sucks at route running? One, I did know that I have read that. Two, he was a freaking rookie. What, he would be a precise route runner as a rookie. Hester isn't great, but he is a damn sight better than you will give him credit. You can call BS, but the argument against is the real BS. Am I saying we are loaded w/ studs at WR? No. But can you honestly tell me you feel more confident w/ so many other positions over WR? I would argue we have seen enough to believe we have potential starters in 4 WRs. Look, I am not dumb enough to simply assume all the potential we talk about will come to fruition. At the same time, at WR, there is at least reason to believe it can happen. I look at our group of safeties, and I am not sure any could start for another team. I look at our CBs, and frankly, I feel little more confident. Yea, we have Tillman and maybe Bowman, but after that, nada. Simply put, there is reason for hope at WR, while at numerous other positions, little to none. IMO, our WR's looked pretty good because of Cutler. If Orton was still here we wouldn't be excited about Know & DA. Cutler helped make them better. Just like our bad d-line helped our safeties look worse. Our WR's have an over-inflated value due to the QB. I guess it is against time to call BS. Sorry, but that just doesn't happen nearly as often as so many want to believe. Most often, there are more than one reason a player slipped in the draft, especially if you are talking about the 5th round. How many guys have we drafted who we heard all about how they were 1st rounders that slipped for this reason or that. DJ Moore and Harrison come to mind. Corey Graham & Zach Bowman are the two I think of. Some scout or magazine somewhere said, "They could have been a first rounder if he hadn't gotten hurt" Which I'll admit could easily be BS. Moore slipped because he's a midget and he doesn't have elite speed. I can't remember about Harrison. I am not saying you can't strike it big, and frankly, in the 5th round I am far more willing to take chances. 5th rounders have weak odds making NFL rosters regardless of injury, so taking more risk in the 5th round is fine. My issue is taking such risks earlier, particularly the top 3 rounds. Mark Bradley's the only guy like that I can think of. Maybe Chris Williams. You're right, we haven't done it much. Starting a response, went back to read the original discussion, came back and deleted what I wrote. It was going off into a Martz scheme tangent. More specific to the question of whether Cutler can do well out of the gate w/ the OL and surrounding talent. You mention how Martz did well early. I would still argue that is questionable. Yes, Stl is an exception, but with exceptional talent to allow such a situation. Do you really think we have talent that even could emerge similar to Stl? Nope. I have said this before, but I think Cutler is going to light it up in terms of yards this year. My concern is TDs, turnovers and rushing. I think we're in good shape because last year we counted on Pace, Hester, Forte, and Olsen so heavily. IMO, Turner's insistence on sticking with those 4 cost him his job. By the time we bench Pace our season was over. How many times did we force it to Olsen? Martz knows that Pace is done, Hester's a slot receiver, Olsen needs to go, and Forte sucked last year. We've addressed these problems and upgraded the line by signing Manumaleuna. We're going to be good on offense.

Damn I need to get NFL network.

Thanks for the info. Although I have to disagree with Davis being a good in-line blocker. He's built a lot like Olsen. I know we demanded Davis to focus on blocking, but I can't see him being very good at it.

Our desire to get rid of Alex Brown was a suprirse. IMO this is purely money driven. I'm wondering if there's anybody else we're not thrilled with we'd consider dumping to save money. Here's a few that pop to mind: Olin Kreutz--His play has dropped off, he's getting old, and he's making good money. We've talked about Beekman could play. (although we'd need another guard) Devin Hester--He's making one helluva a lot of money to be a mediocre receive & mediocre punt-returner. He's a bad route runner which makes him a liability for Martz. He's been a bad return man for 2 consecutive years. Tommie Harris--He needs to look impressive during TC. The year after the Super Bowl there were numerous contract extensions signed. The only one I can think of who's truly earned his money is Peanut.

IMO, either Olsen or Clark will be gone. Possibly both. I look for us to add an additional TE that's similar to Manumaleuna's size and has the same blocking ability/attitude.

Despite all the rumors this tells me that Peppers is our new RDE and the team felt that Brown wasn't going to make the transition and be effective at LDE. Izzy and Anderson have already lined up at LDE and been somewhat effective on pass rush, no worse that what Brown is likely to do as LDE. Add in that Anderson was the swing DE last year so he will likely be looked at for that role again with Izzy the starting LDE. We use a 3 man rotation so we'd be paying a backup player $5 mil to sit on the bench. Why do we have to assign positions? Peppers, Anderson & Idonije have all played both sides extensively. Why not move them around? You have to figure teams will be far more likely to run at Mark Anderson. So why make it a given of where he'll line up? I'm guessing the team feels Melton can sit on the bench as well as Brown except the dropoff is huge if Melton gets on the field. Prediction: Melton will be one of those off-season stories of how a guy has gotten stronger and better and he's ready to make an impact. Isn't he athletic enough to be a 3rd down pass-rusher like Mark Anderson was his rookie year? If I'm wrong and Peppers is our LDE then cutting Brown loose makes no sense to me at all. Lets say this was strictly about money. Would you rather have Peppers & Anderson or Wale & Brown? I'd take Peppers & Anderson. As far as the trade rumors I don't think it's such a big deal the word is out. Why would a team trade for him --- because they feel his current contract is cheaper and a better deal for them (no bonus) than what they'd have to pay up front in bonus/salary to get him. I'm guessing this is out because we've been trying to trade him and failed. I'd be happy if we got a 5th Rd pick for him but doubt we get a pick that high. Still that's a pick that might help our secondary. The 5th round is where we pick CBs right? Agreed. Although with Brown saying we'll cut him, why would a team give us anything?

Disagree two-ford. One, I think we very much would like to see far more from our FS, but we have fielded such weak FS', our expectations have been lowered. Look at how Lovie used Mike Brown. We asked far more of our FS then. You're forgetting that in '08 we started Brown at FS. We moved him back to SS, not because he was bad, but because we wanted him do do more then drop back in coverage. Two, we can always hope Steltz could play FS, but I am not sure we have seen enough to give much of an expectation. steltz frankly displayed much of what was expected pre-draft. He can play in and near the box, but really struggles downfield. Typical of our SS', but not what you want. When did Steltz get beat deep down-field? I remember it happening, but passes were seemingly always overthrown. If he's good in the box, why don't we ever play him in the box? I understand your point about WR, but on the other hand, we are loaded at WR w/ more talent and options than at most other positions. Bullshit. Seriously. Just about every position we're weak at I could argue we have talent and options. We have talent and options and safety . . . that doesn't mean the talent and options are very good. DA looked like he could be our #1. Are you counting on that? Bennett is solid across the middle. Hester & Knox both suck at route running. If that doesn't improve, how's Martz going to take it. Iglesias??? Rashied??? That's a rough group. The majority of picks we have made on players who fell in the draft due to injury concern have not panned out. You mention Graham, but he went down w/ injury his first year, played okay his 2nd, and has since been in the coach's doghouse and doesn't seem to be a factor. Bowman had one good year, and another he went down his first game. I agree with the idea of avoiding players who have injury red flags. Why would you ignore a 1st round talent who falls to the 5th round due to injury red flags??? That's what I was talking about. As for Williams, I don't think he would be a good example, as he didn't fall in the draft due to injury concerns. If we passes on him, and others did as well, he could be an example, but we took him where he was expected to go, so he wasn't an example of a player that fell in the draft and was available for great value. Agreed. Unless Williams would have been a top 10 pick. Actually, Martz' passing games take off the first year, but I am not sure the offense as a whole does. His offenses put up big passing stats, but weak rushing, and high turnover rates, w/ mediocre scoring. I think the passing yards a QB like Kitna got under Martz makes people blind to the rest. Again, bullshit. How about the '99 greatest show on turf? I do realize that team had a ton of future HOFers but they went from rags to riches overnight. I concede it's difficult to read too much into Detroit or San Fran because those teams were just god awful.

Or last year when Lovie said Beekman was still the starter and Omiyale would have to win the competition, only to be given the job when everyone at camp said he looked like crap. To me that was more about not liking Beekman then it was liking Omiyale. For some reason, we liked a bad Omiyale better then a mediocre Beekman. Don't forget that we went back to Omiyale after Orlando was hurt/benched. The Chicago media believes it's just a matter of time before we announce Omiyale is the RT. To me that means we really like Louis or we're searching for a veteran FA guard. Still though, I am not sure we signed him with the intent of making him our starter. When we signed TJ, A-Train looked more like a backup and I think everyone knew TJ was signed to be the starter. Here, I think it is much more up in the air. Is it up in the air? When we signed TJ, we were still thinking Anthony Thomas could be the real-deal. We didn't want to believe he was bad. We ignore the fact Forte looked like crap all last season. We blame the line and we blame his injuries. We forget he looked bad at the end of his rookie year. But all last season he looked slow as hell and he sucked at the goal line. Hell, I thought Bell looked just as good. We also blame Forte's poor number on Turner becoming pass happy. Again, we ignore the fact that the only reason we became pass happy was that Forte could gain any yards. IMO Taylor's the starter.

I'd thought they meant "half-back." I'm sitting here thinking, WTF??? Won't Dez Clark & Davis also be H-backs?

This reminds me of a few years ago when we signed Thomas Jones on the first day of free agency. Lovie declared Anthony Thomas was still the starter . . . that lasted about a month.

What the hell's the H-back?

Loadholt started RT for Minny last year. Why can't we find one? You are higher on Steltz than I am. Also, Lovie says our safeties are interchangeable. We all know that's not true. As for RT, Shaffer's a solid pro. He's just very average. I can't imagine any rookie beating him out. Our safeties were bad but our entire secondary was bad. We'll see if we can get pass pressure and if it will make a difference. We are young and talented enough at WR. I'd like to see what Iglesias can do before throwing another pick on WR. Drafting a TE would be completly insane. As for our WR's, Knox & Hester both seem ideal for the slot. Bennett is your across the middle guy. DA is interesting as hell. Then there's Iglesius. We easily have room for a 6th WR. With TE, as I have mentioned, we need another true blocking TE. There are pro's and cons with that take off. Stats can be decieving. The main question is how good Chris Williams can be as our every day LT. Tait talked about how difficult it was to switch from the right to the left. If Williams can be above average, that changes everything.

Just because we have bodies on our roster doesn't mean much. Who the hell is Johan Asiata??? We need either one guard or one tackle. The difference being what we decide to do with Omiyale. While he's listed at guard, IMO we'll move him outside. At guard/center we'll have Beekman, Garza, Kreutz and probably Lance Louis. At tackle it's Shaffer & Williams. Then Omiyale. We're not going to carry more then 8 offensive lineman. Either Shaffer's the back-up or Beekman. It's not that hard to find a quality veteran guard via free agency.

It's not a need by any means, but as far as I'm concerned, once you reach the 4th or 5th rounds you take the best player available. I suspect that Khalil Bell's success was more of a fluke then the norm. I know you're a big fan of Garrett Wolfe, but he didn't fit in Ron Turner's system, and that won't get better with Martz. You see teams deploying 4 rb's with success. I don't see any problem with taking another rb?

Right now, I see 4 positions on the team where we are below the league average. 1st being FS, with a close 2nd of LG and RT. Despite what Lovie says, all we ask of our FS is don't get beat deep. The most important pre-requisite for this is intelligence. I'm thinking Craig Steltz might actually be able to fill this need. As for RT, we're not going to be able to find a starting caliber RT in the 3rd round. At least not immediately. I'm curious to see what Omiyale can do if he's moved over there. Lastly there is DT. If I had my choice, I would take the best availible at each of those positions. I would NOT draft a QB, RB, TE, WR, OLB or SS. The lines and secondary are my only concern. After finding a steal like Johnny Knox in the 5th round last year, why wouldn't you want to take a WR? We're going to need more in the Martz system. While we have a lot of SS's, none are very good. I think we should draft a TE, but only one that specializes in blocking. One who's build like Manumaleuna. Not 6-6 250 lbs. (and for Pete's sake, NO MORE drafting guys that have talent and fell for injury reasons) Huh? Where did this come from? Corey Graham and Zach Bowman both slipped to the 5th round due to injury concerns. Both were nice picks. If you can get a guy with 1st round talent in the 5th, why wouldn't you? Chris Williams might have slipped, but he made up for it by starting every game is sophomore year. Who else are you talking about? I'm not sure if any team in the league is average to above at every starting position. So, the Bears are close to being good from the talent standpoint. What I am concerned with again is continuity of the offense. Last year, it was Cutler and 3 new OL. Now, we are looking at Martz and one to two new OL.(plus the most complex playbook in the league) If you look at the history of Martz offenses, they take off their first year. Not to mention, as for our o-line, we finished the season with Williams, Omiyale, Kreutz, Garza, and Shaffer. There's a damn good chance that's what opening day will look like. Is anyone else worried about Cutlers ability to anticipate, as is necessary with the Martz scheme? I think he's always relied on his quick release and cannon instead of seeing a play unfold. I really think we need to use him more like Big Ben. Cutler's a lot more talented then Big Ben. That and he's never raped anyone

The part is that the Chicago media is indicating: 1. We'd be lucky to get a 3rd or 4th for Olsen. 2. We seem to want to get rid of him anyway. Either way, I'm anxious to see what we do with all of our receiving TE's. Heck, if we got rid of Olsen, why wouldn't we get rid of Clark? If you can't utilize one, how do you utilize the other? Kellun Davis, like the other two, is also more of a receiver then a blocker.

You're right, but I wonder how much this would help. Do you think that drafting a guy in the 3rd round would help much this year? (then what do we do for a safety?) Aside from Andrews, what veteran do we bring in without spend much? I'm assuming you don't think moving Omiyale to RT is the answer? Didn't the o-line look much better at the end of the year? Don't you think Manamaleuna is going to make the line much better?

How'd this go from D.J. Moore to a discussion about playing rookies? Some of these guys don't help your cause. Most were pissed that Mark Anderson didn't start his rookie year. I'd bet Forte would have been the #2 if Cedric hadn't gotten arrested. Rookies play due to desperation, injuries, or incompetence. I'll give you that rookies will play over vereran's we've written off, like AP & Rashied Davis. Further evidence to this is there's always that guy who doesn't see the field his rookie year and he's the starter the next. This is true about Bennett, Beekman, and Dvoracek (IMO DD was only IR'ed because he wasn't going to play). The writing's on the wall for Moore to be this year's sophomore starter at the nickel spot. I see him either getting the chance to make an impact or he'll be cut.

One. If the season started today, I think Omiyale would be our starting LG. After being benched, he was again started at LG and finished pretty solid. If we add an OG, I agree Omiyale could move to RT, but w/o that addition, Omiyale is still likely our LG. I'm curious as hell to know what Tice & Martz think about Omiyale & Beekman. I'm sure they've formed opinions, but I've not heard them. Maybe they think Beekman's solid and Shaffer's good enough to start at RT? I'm just saying I'm sure we know which direction we're headed, but we haven't announced it yet. Two. The staff just does not look at Beekman and see an LG. Frankly, they said as much his rookie year. I recall when he was moved to LG in camp due to various injuries. The coaches even then said he had too small of a build to play OG, and yet he started there all year and did pretty well. Regardless, the staff just never felt he was big enough and continued to try and replace him. Similar to other positions on this team, it seems like our coaches make fairly quick judgments on players and there is virtually nothing a player can do to change those opinions. We have a new set of coaches now, so it could be interesting to see how things change, but I still think that lacking the addition of an OG, Omiyale is still looked at there. Agreed, but again, I think it's more about how they view Beekman & Shaffer. Three. You continue to beat the drum of Louis being used as a blocking TE, but let me ask, have you ever read or heard that? I know there was talk about his position the day he was drafted, but since then, he was set up as an OL, and the staff have been pretty out-spoken as to his development along the OL. I have never actually read about our staff looking at Louis as a blocking TE, even on occasion. Have you? All I know is that we spent a ton of money on Manumaleuna to play a unique position. Expecting any of the other TE's to do what he does is laughable. Saying Kellun Davis will back him up makes as much sense as him backing-up Chris Williams. Based on the money we've spent, having a 6th blocking lineman is crucial to Martz. SOMEBODY has to back him up. It's quite possible we'll draft a guy. But if you look at our current roster and see a guy who's capable of doing what Manumleuna does, please share. Not to mention that if we really liked Louis that much, we'd insert him at LG and not have to add anybody else. Everyone assumes Omiyale will be moved to RT, but I am not so sure. This is simply not a great year for OGs, either in FA or the draft. On the other hand, this is said to be a great draft, both in terms of talent level and depth, for OTs in the draft. So I can see us getting an OT in the draft, but keeping Omiyale at OG. That's because it's much easier to find a guard then it is a tackle. Who are we going to find on the cheap or in the 3rd that's immediately better then Shaffer?

1. I can't imagine we can spend much more money. In this market where everyone is counting their pennies, I'm still flabbergasted that the Bears emerged as the big spenders. I could be wrong, but I don't see us making any more significant financial offers to players. If it's low, Seattle would just match it. 2. We can't afford to give up any more draft picks. With a few bright spots, our last 5 drafts have been pretty awful overall. It's amazing how quickly we went from being the youngest defenses in the league to becoming a bunch of guys in their 30's. We need to add young players. 3. There's other veteran guards we could sign without having to give up a pick.

Olsen: We keep hearing from the Chicago media that Olsen does not fit what Martz plans to do and the entire league knows it. I've heard this enough that I'm personally convinced they are true. I like Olsen and he's probably the best receiver on the team, but I'm convinced he won't be here next year. Deon Grant: Lovie came out and stated we need to upgrade the safety position. Until we do so, I'm guessing it will be assumed we'll be interested in every safety available. I look for us to take one in the 3rd round of the draft. O-line: The o-line was a priority and we greatly upgraded it by signing Brandon Manumaleuna. Dan Pompei called BM the best offensive tackle on the Bear's roster.