CrackerDog

I think there are potential calls to be made on damn near every play in the NFL. They pick and choose and sometimes they see things and sometimes they don't. I never saw the replay on the Hester return, if there was something to be called there, so be it. And yes, the team played sloppy, as Jason said, and probably deserved some of what they got. It's just that when everything seems to be going one way, call after call, there's a legit reason for a fan to get frustrated. Particularly when I saw the refs blow several offensive holding calls (that would've benefitted the Bears) go uncalled. Frankly though, there is a reason to be concerned with the undisciplined nature of this team. As I mentioned earlier. Not sure where to point the finger there.

Amen.

I don't buy it either. When Urlacher went down with the Bears, when he was their heart and soul, we got worse but we didn't friggen turn into a HS level defense. I'm sick of excuses. Tucker either produces with what he has or I'd shitcan his ass.

I agree with this post, 110%! All spot on observations. We got a few breaks from the officials too, however. They had bad afternoons, as a whole. It seemed like early on they hosed the Bears over and over on bullshit calls and then realized it and decided to try to even it out. It was a clusterf*ck on their part.

True. I've not seen such an undisciplined effort by a Bears team in a long time. Bring back Lovie! McCown made some outstanding throws. I'm coming around on him. With that said, I'd have prefered to have Jay out there when we were down by 14. Just think he had more of the tools necessary under those specific circumstances. Not something that can be proven, obviously. Besides, all of this discussion about QB ignores the elephant in the room.

No. But it had less to do with it than the mugging. Yes, potentially. Below this post you talk about "athletic potential" and in this case, as one of the best TE's in the league, I'd say had he not been forcefully pushed (pulled) out of the play, he would've had a chance at it. That would've been my "judgment" when I saw the play in full speed. Not sure how the hell the other ref saw it differently. And I think it should've gone to review because of that. I try to do it in a somewhat humorous manner. Like you said, locker room talk among the guys. Whatever, if it offended you I apologize. I don't think it did though. I think you were fine with it and the admins threw out the threat of censorship to shut down the chatter before it got more out of control. Which is cool. As to your being an expert on some things and not others, you seem to think highly of yourself on many things and come across as arrogant. I know I come across as an ass here myself but again, it's hopefully in good fun, we've got our personas here, etc. No blood, no foul.

Attempting? You do realize the word mature has two meanings, right? Just mean that their coaching staff, QB, Megatron, etc have been in the same system now for a while. When we were "winning despite ourselves" we were also in the very early stages of this offense gelling. And since then we've been going with our #2 QB and/or an injured Cutler. Damn I can't wait until we get this offense completely healthy with a little more time to grow, with a D that gets them the ball back more often... I'm giving myself a semi.

I thought Jason said locker room talk was acceptable? Alright gents, I probably crossed a line and I'll step back. Peace.

Yep, and they've won games they probably deserved to lose (as have we) but they did it with a mature roster while our boys were still growing into the new system. That said, we've got lots of problems on our team, don't get me wrong. Not being able to play D, get much of a pass rush, cover anyone on third down... It's going to be a challenge. But don't count us out!

OK, I'll expand on my thoughts since you asked so "nicely"... In this case, the receiver wasn't out of position due to his momentum, he was out of position because he was grabbed with both hands and ridden out of the play. I wouldn't even be surprised if the contact was well before the ball was in the air but I've never seen a replay that shows Brady and the endzone at the same time. Anyone who can't see that this was a blown call is dingy. How the official is graded is irrelevant because frankly they have to take into consideration the human element on the field. And they've got each other's backs as far as I'm concerned. Hell, I don't think there's ever been a discussion on this board about officiating where you didn't take the side of the refs! That play should've been reviewable at a minimum. Refs throwing a flag, having a chat about it, then reversing themselves means that, by default, two people saw the play differently. In those cases, it seems to me, there ought to be a third set of eyes that can take a look at it. and all of those slow-mo elements might actually help determine all of the things we've been talking about in this thread. But these dudes walked off the field basically saying it's a judgment call, f*ck off if you don't like it. If you stop being a pompous ass and complete dick about everything maybe you'll get better results from people like me who don't take your shit. Until then, expect short inflammatory responses under those circumstances.

PFFFFTTTTT.... You saying I'm wrong only proves otherwise.

If Troy Brown could do it for the Patriots, Hester, who has experience at the position and is of similar build, certainly ought to be able to pitch in. With that said, it's always been my opinion that Devin Hester was a friggen moron and could only be trusted with things that required nothing more than instinct. If he's being asked to do anything more than cover someone man to man, I think he'd be lost out there. But under the circumstances, I'd actually like to see him get out there a bit and prove me wrong.

Obviously not having the tie breaker hurts. I still feel like there's a long history of the Lions falling apart and I see no reason to believe that won't happen again this season. I've never felt like Bush was a legit three down back and he's already missed time. The way the Lions play they piss off the other sideline, making any sack of Stafford an opportunity to "even the score". I wouldn't be surprised if they took a few hits on the injury front down the stretch, can't play well outdoors in the elements, yadda yadda yadda. That doesn't mean the Bears will win the division but I'm not as resigned to failure as some of you seem to be.

I never suggested reviewing reviews. I said some of the things called on the field are called unreviewable and some of those things ought to be reconsidered. If you watch a replay on TV and it's obviously a blown call yet they can't review it because some things are not included in the replay rules, we end up with exactly what replay is meant to help avoid, contraversy. The NFL doesn't want your nightly news showing how the officials stole a game from your team that afternoon. If we can't review blatant errors, I'd be a fan of removing replay altogether and then just dealing with the results. Oh well, they're human. But if we mean to improve the calls on the field, we ought to do that with all options available. And before I get another bitch about making the game longer, all of the above could be accomplished while maintaining the same number of coaching challenges available per game.

LOL! Yeah, but there'd still be the same limits on the number of reviews a team could ask for. I'm just saying, there are clearly times when a call can't be reviewed because it's a so-called "judgment call" and the video evidence shows that the ref clearly made the wrong gawd damn judgment.

I wasn't a fan of not calling TO's there but the idea that maybe it rushed the Ravens a bit, them assuming the TO's would be called as they typically are, is an interesting one. And it worked out so who am I to judge? Next year, hopefully, this isn't an issue. We have a healthier D, more tools via free agency and the draft, etc. We stop them well before they get close to scoring.

As do I. Not debating that the refs aren't entitled to getting it wrong once in a while. Just that they clearly got it wrong this time. Just wish judgment calls were reviewable sometimes, particularly when they go against the Bears.

THIS! You're 100% right Mongo. To rule the ball uncatchable in that situation is to assume that the player being dragged toward the back of the endzone wasn't capable of adjusting his route. We aren't talking about an interception that took place 10 yards in front of a would-be interference call. This all transpired in the same general area. Not that I lost any sleep over seeing Brady lose. I hate that arrogant POS. And I predicted a Carolina win so I had that going for me. But the playoff implications for the beloved are clear. That's definitely unfortunate. So, despite what know-it-all Jason says, this was clearly a blown call.

I have to wonder where they'd be ranked if they'd won every game they should've/could've this year. Imagine where we'd be right now if we had a defense! http://pro32.ap.org/poll Not that rankings mean anything, I just wish we hadn't lost twice to the friggen Lyin's so we'd be #1 in the division, two games ahead of the Packers with some momentum.

Ha! Untrue, I only call you an idiot when you're being an idiot. PS. The new family photo you have up is cool. As to the "boys being boys" part of the story, I get it. I'm inappropriate with my buddies all the time. But when this first came up, the story out in public was very different than what's come out since. So Jason's revisionist take on what he meant by his first reference to Martin is horseshit, much like everything else he says. So, like I said, GFY.

You're an idiot.

Only pure conjecture on my part, based on the talent we seem(ed) to have on the team right now. But with guys continuing to drop like flies, I doubt even that would help at this point. All I know for sure is he was trying to keep the D consistent from year to year with the guys we had in place and now all or most of those guys are on the sidelines watching.

Excellent post.

I agree with you at the high school level. Above that level, get the coach up in the box, IMO. When you're looking at a game on the field you can't see what the opposition is doing to you. Hell, with some of the crowns on the fields themselves for drainage, you can't even see the opposite sideline very well. There are clearly some benefits to having your coaches being with the players as well but I think they're outweighed. Just going to have to agree to disagree.

Agree. The only question, really, is whether there's some team out there that might consider offering McCown a good deal with the potential to be a starter. Weirder things have happened. In which case, we'd lose him. I think most teams understand it's 1.5 games of results, there were odd circumstances and while he put up good numbers, not every team is going to have this system and this talent on offense (line, RB, WR & TE). So I think he gets signed back up at a reasonable price for a few years and does a good job for us, when needed. Cutler, despite his shortcomings as a person, is still the "guy" and will get his big payday, either with the Bears or someone else. You don't see QB's with his level of ability very often in the NFL. Now that the rest of the offense has been built up around him, it would be a shame to lose him because Josh Friggen McCown had a nice game. It won't happen.