Lucky Luciano

i think the major focus here is that sooner or later (or never if you are jerry angelo) you need to draft good ball players for the FUTURE. players that will take time to develop their potential so you don't HAVE to throw them into the fire right away. the only problem we have with that scenario is the talent these rookies (even IF we had them) need to replace is even worse than a good rookie starting on day one because we have NEVER drafted even average talent to take this into account!!!!! "we have faith in them"? "we trained them"? you can teach a dog to fetch too but i wouldn't have any faith in him learning to fly no matter how much we trained him. "you want those five guys the same week-in and week-out"? well let's see angie, you want them even if the quality of their talent wouldn't land them a freakin job in the canadian football league as a depth backup? "they don't have to be the best players"? hmmmm... as long as they "know each other the best on the field"? you simplistic moron. they at LEAST have to be average talented players to start with. if you can't even see this reality from past years performances you are completely worthless to us as a GM.

not sure what wbbm carries on game day but here is the link: http://chicago.cbslocal.com/station/670-the-score/

i will agree with the statement "chronic" relating to our offensive line problems. we ran the linemen finks drafted as long as possible and replaced them with some 'decent' players or at least average players who most did nothing to distinguish themselves. some very poor choices by our fearless leader mikey. but if you thought we were bad before, our REAL problems started when angelo took control of the reins as our GM. didn't they have a fair line in '99-2000 with a young brockermeyer, who was fair to good, and big cat at tackle? the guards were vilarale who in my opinion was an above average guard on the right side and todd perry who seemed to have injury problems on the left with kreutz at center. they had some decent depth with wiegeman at G/C, and rex tucker at G but were weak for depth at T. in 2001 they got rid of perry and went with tucker at LG and wiegeman a pretty good player also was gone. brokenmeyer was injured (i don't remember)? their depth all around on the offensive line was poor with an aging big cat. this was the beginning of the angelo dynasty. by 2002 it was a catastrophe. at tackle brokenmeyer was gone. we drafted columbo who was promptly injured after 5 games at LT (playing out of position?), and replaced by bernard robinson (a 5th rd pick in 2001) and big cat was getting up there in age at 34. at left guard angelo must have gotten rid of perry and he was replaced by tucker who was always injured who was replaced by gandy (a 2001 3rd round pick), and kevin dogins a ham and egger from the bucs. this was the year the mighty metcalf was drafted in rd. 3. by 2003 we fielded gandy at LT, 2002 undrafted steve edwards at LG, kreutz, vilarrial at RG, got rid of big cat and replaced him with the always great aaron gibson at RT. our depth was horrendous with metcalf, rookie josh warner G/C (another walk-on), scott sanderson T, rookie q. mitchell (another walk-on?) at G/T and corbin lacina G. great talent you put together there angelo. 2004 - 2011 the mess just goes on and gets even worse.

who have i taken to the woodshed other than jerry angelo? i just see our GM spouting nonsense and it does piss me off. but even that said it is truly legitimate to ask if he is an idiot (at least in a football sense), in my opinion, when i see the same exact problems year after year after year and the same solutions to these REAL problems ignored or made worse by him it seems to me a logical conclusion there is something very, very wrong in our front office. this stuff ain't rocket science. i can't emphasize enough that a healthy franchise is built THROUGH the draft and not in free agency especially in this day and age of the salary cap. a good GM has to be able to see this and draft not just for the immediate but for the future with players that will take time to develop at certain positions like the offensive line and quarterback specifically. the offensive line is like no other position in football because it relates not just to wins/losses but to the health of this key player in your franchise. so starting rookies or questionable talented players is extremely dangerous for the health, not only physical but mental health of your quarterback. thus it directly relates to whether you win superbowls or just make it to the wild card spot or less each year. that leads us to the now... we have paid a great amount of value to get a 'supposed' franchise QB and to risk his permanent health the way this team does is not sensible in any shape or form. this should be the key importance that is on a GM's mind from the moment he made this transaction, yet he seems to believe he has done enough to get our offense in a superbowl run and the protection of this most important player on the entire team seems like an afterthought to angelo. now, you asked about what i like about this season. the only answer i can give you is i like the prospects of our defensive line. i feel fairly comfortable with our linebackers. i think url has a year or three left and briggs plays lights out. i like what we have done with our runningback situation over the offseason. i believe we have made it stronger than last season but again with reservations that depend upon our offensive line to be even average. now having said that it brings me full circle with our problems stemming from the front office. every strength on this team is NOT due to angelo's drafts. it comes from free agency or someone he has not drafted himself (briggs exception) which as good as he seems to have been at times in this area it shouldn't be needed as a crutch for bad drafts. if that was not your intent then i apologize. it seemed to me that the correlation i referred to was being rebuffed by you to question my team loyalty which i have seen on this board numerous times and if you want a pissing contest just state something like that and i will see red. in truth the point i was trying to make was that people, even fans of any particular team, don't remember the losers of particular seasons or much about them. case in point, how many bear fans if you asked them would even know that we made the playoffs in 1977 and 1979? or why we didn't go further than we did in those respective seasons? what you do remember is the superbowl winners. you remember the steelers winning multiple superbowls in the 70's, you remember the dolphins doing the same, and even the raiders. the 49ers of the 80's or the more recent pats. nobody remembers the losers as much or even at all as a winner. case in point... ask anyone about the 85 superbowl no matter what team he is a fan of. even if he wasn't born at the time he should be able to give you information about them to at least a limited amount. ask the same person to give you information on the 79 bears or any other team that didn't go to or win the superbowl that year.

i don't know... you tell me what it makes me. if you don't GET the point, fine, just ask but don't give me that nonsense bull$#!& LOVE EM OR LEAVE EM or imply someone is not a fan who doesn't fall into lock step with poor management practices.

isn't the point of all of this that if angelo could draft anyone with talent we wouldn't have to pick up these types of players and hope for the brass ring year after year? angelo has drafted FIFTEEN defensive linemen in 11 years and not a single one is even a starter on this team!!! by the way, brady was a 6th round pick. actually this is the top of the mountain of my critique of angelo. within 4-5 years we will have absolutely nobody we have drafted to replace anyone on this team as it stands right now. on offense we have no young prospect for any guard position OR left tackle at all. we have no prospect for a #1 receiver. we just traded away our first round TE who was the only one with any chance of being a pro-bowl caliber player. on defense we need 2 cornerbacks, MAYBE 2 safeties, 3 linebackers, 2 probable defensive ends, and unknown at defensive tackle. this is not a half empty glass scenario. this is the reality as to how this franchise has not drafted quality players for over 10 years to fill our roster as starters. finally, let me say this... close to me is meaningless. ask any fan, especially non-bear fans, what they thought of the 77 bears, the 79 bears, 86 bears, the 87 bears, etc. etc.

well, what do you call someone who faces the same problems every single year for 11 years and fails to even see what is plain to any layman, let alone nfl expert, and does nothing to correct the problem? someone who makes the same mistakes every year and still expects different results? insane? i call them stupid but if you prefer insane i can live with that.

do you think maybe there is a 99% valid reason why people criticize him? let me ask you to define your definition of the duties or job description of an NFL GM. here are mine: 1. he has to find and hire the best coaches. this is paramount in how well your franchise will perform. let's look at how he has done... he extended dick jauron's contract when it was completely unnecessary. he extended the contract of maybe the worst offensive coordinator in the history of the NFL in john shoop. he fumbled the hiring of chris sabin and finally hired a coach in lovie smith who wasn't even stellar in what he did in the nfl. smith had no idea how to even give input into an offense let alone decide who should be hired. a coach who was unbending in his philosophy on defense whether is works or not. someone who DOES hire and promote cronies instead of qualified personel and sticks by them to a fault JUST like jauron did who he just fired. on top of all this angelo extends HIS contract when it was unnecessary also and we are stuck paying a lame duck coach enough money that the owners won't cut him loose when the president, gm and head coach all should have been fired for gross incompetence. he hires shay another candidate for the worst offensive coordinator in NFL history. he then fires him and hires someone who has failed in the worst way in the college ranks as an OC. in the mean time he fires a DC who actually is doing his job well to replace him with someone who is a crony of his HC who is one of the worst DC's ever hired in chicago and keeps him around for 2 years before demoting him. then hires another OC crony of his HC who nobody else in the NFL will give a contract to in martz. will that turn out? who knows. it nearly got our franchise qb killed last season. 2. he has to be able to draft successfully and especially in the first 3 rounds. of the 26 picks that he actually made and didn't trade away in rounds 1-3 there is 2 penciled in quality starters (who are on their last leg in the NFL) in tillman and briggs. i could possibly give you forte so that would make 3? so, in 10 years (not counting this draft) that is IT!!! that is not bad, that is pathetic!!! now you say, but what about the other 53 picks in rounds 4-7? i can't think of a single quality starting player on this entire team he drafted in these rounds that are here and starting. if a GM can't draft even average starting players over TEN YEARS that is failure in the first degree. why do you think we have so many free agents on this roster? wouldn't it be fantastic to just have to worry about resigning good starting players we drafted or drafting short to long term replacements for quality players we already have? so yea... whatever.

not half as useless as a reply like this.

not to be facetious, but progressively better than what? we gave up 52 sacks last season!!! if everyone thinks tice is such a genious by getting the most out of the worst talent in the nfl to rank an offensive line at the bottom of the league then think what he could have done with even AVERAGE talent to work with. even just starting training camp can you possibly believe that without an unlooked for miracle this offensive line could possibly rank in the top 10 by seasons end?

Dan Pompei On the NFL 9:26 p.m. CDT, August 8, 2011 Chicago Tribune - http://www.chicagotribune.com/site/newspap...,6161371.column this is why our GM should have been fired 4-5 years ago and we are in the position we are in now in regards to this 'offensive' line. by neglecting the draft for quality offensive linemen over the last 10 years he has put this club behind the 8-ball with this mind-set. every player he mentions, except tait (who in their collective wisdom they played a very good player out of position nearly his entire time in chicago and wasted his career), was a stop-gap short term player who you bring in when you do have GOOD young linemen you are grooming to become quality starters or a young quality starter that may have been injured. what "young guys" is he talking about bringing along? walkons and 7th round draft picks? does he really think tice or any coach in the history of nfl football can turn players without quality talent into HOF players? before it was marinelli and now it's tice's turn to make up for angies lack of expertise as a GM. they are "unknown" for the most part, you idiot, because it is HIGHLY unlikely they will turn into very good players. the league, INCLUDING you, have passed on drafting them high or even drafting them at all because they looked the least likely to succeed because of limited talent or physical attributes. no angie, WE didn't make our bed, YOU did!!! you bet the farm on a quality free agent quarterback, that i might add you couldn't find one to draft, and surround him in a system not just to fail, but to physically end his career in the nfl!! then you state "you can't have stars at every position"???? are you completely nuts? in an nfl GEARED to give the offense every advantage in the rules they play by YOU fail to even give this team the basics to succeed. by poor drafting at every single position, offense AND defense, over your tenure in chicago. the only quality players left to give this franchise a flying chance is to bring in free agents to make up for your failure. it is a lose, lose situation. you not only don't have the ability to cure it but to even REALIZE what is wrong!!

hmmm... the seahawks think max unger is a better option at center than spencer? yea, me too. too bad jerry angelo didn't just draft max unger like he SHOULD have in 2009 in the 2nd round instead of *trading out for the all amazing 3rd round pick jarron gilbert (where is he now again? oh, that's right, we already CUT him) and 4th round pick henry melton who can't beat out idonije. seems we would have a pretty good center for the next 10 years. *the seahawks drafted max unger with OUR pick.

sounds kinda like an iffy pickup... some interesting fan comments: http://network.yardbarker.com/nfl/article_...ob_bell/5817961 then again, he just might fit in LOL!!

toub and maynard infighting? http://espn.go.com/blog/nfcnorth/post/_/id...bears-dave-toub

we don't need to go any further than this. QB was a HUGE need at this time and getting a franchise qb instead of hester along with the two first round picks we gave up to get him later there is no doubt about it. whether the clowns we had running the offense could have taught cutler anything is another matter.

i'm sorry, but the overall 8th pick in the draft for any special teams player is not a good deal even if we are going to use 20/20 hindsight. if i were using hindsight, as in this case, i would pick a primo qb, de, or cb. a player who is a game changer on every down and not just on change of possession.

i have no problems with the cutler trade, but... 2003 we trade down out of the top 5 in the 1st round and get haynes and grossman? 2006 we traded out of the 1st round to get daniel manning? our first pick a raw safety nobody ever heard of when we had chris harris and mike brown? look up our starting offensive line. a thousand year old r. brown at LG, a one knee'd LG in garza, a RG in t. metcalf, a LT in tait who is playing out of position at extremely average play, a DINOSAUR in fred miller at RT. and we trade down to get a project free safety????? 2009 we trade down in the 2nd round, our FIRST pick because of the cutler trade, and end up with gilbert and melton when our offensive line is even worse than in 2005????? so the guy we gave up two 1st round picks for has absolutely nobody to block for him?? that is not insane? 2010 again we trade our FIRST pick in the draft, we have NO 1st rounder, a 2nd round pick for a defensive player who was benched after 3-5 years in the league???? again while our FRANCHISE qb is being beaten to near death because we couldn't block a junior varsity high school defensive line? just these instances alone would get a completely incompetent GM fired, yet we give him our vote of confidence? as far as j. peppers goes... we drafted 8 DE's and 6 DT's over angies tenure in chicago. if angelo could draft any talent after EIGHT years on the defensive line we wouldn't have needed to get him.

pretty misleading in a lot of areas. it's fine that hester moved up but in reality nobody in their right mind would draft a special teams player in the top 10 (or in the 2nd round for that matter) unless it was angelo. also us being ranked 18th doesn't even come close to how poorly we drafted/traded away first day picks or chose quality/any players at positions we needed. what's jeff fisher doing these days? wouldn't he be a nice addition if we sent sweaty teddy packing?

i agree totally. if the guy is a good RT let him PLAY right tackle. keeerist, didn't we learn anything from john tait?? we wasted his entire above average career as a RT in chicago playing him out of position!!! now we just need a good guard in the 2nd or 3rd round and pick up that CB asouhmuga, or whatever his name is, in free agency and this would be one of the better drafts/offseasons on paper in decades.

you don't see what? and what exactly does that mean? that if i care about where this franchise is going and if i don't agree on how they are getting there then why bother watching? i'm sorry but isn't WINNING what this is all about? if this is just some ice cream social to pass the time on sunday afternoons like it seems to some then i agree, it's time to stop wasting my time watching and spend my weekends having tea and some smashing games of croquet on the lawn. huh? 1. "building" is when you have talent and add pieces for depth? i guess i never heard that before. what does that mean and how does that relate to us? 2. "rebuilding" is needed when you have no talent? one half of our entire offense, the OL, is the worst in the entire nfl. this is the portion that makes ALL of the other offensive pieces work and we could have used 5 out of 5 players there last season along with a FB/TE who actually could block. on defense we need at least one and probably two DT's, one upgrade at DE, one healthy strongside LB, one or two safeties and two CB's. this doesn't even account for quality depth behind any of the starters on this entire team. how deprived of talent do you need to be for you to believe rebuilding is in order? doesn't any of this concern you? in my estimation you have to look forward to be able to run a franchise successfully. because of poor drafting for so long we are completely depleted of young talent that we need to replace key players (example urlacher or kreutz) in the near future. it's only common sense to figure that even if you draft good ball players, which we DON'T, it will take them 2-3 years to grasp the system and be able to contribute the full amount of whatever talent they have. we have NOTHING on the bench that i can see that fills those needs.

exaggerations and assumptions? whatever. i don't know where you come up with us being set for quality starting players. the point is we NEED rebuilding. you couldn't build a team strickly through free agency in the past (george allen tried it) and you certainly can't build one to last in these days of the salary cap. i posted this in a previous post and i certainly don't see anything since that has changed... CB - none are very good. peanut is aging and quite frankly hasn't been a good CB for some time (although he would have been an excellent safety). that means we need 2. is there any depth on this roster you could say is good enough to start for any real good team in the nfl? S - d. manning is consistantly average at best. wright? an unknown at this time, c. harris?. safety, especially free safety, is a very important key when running the defense we currently do. we need at LEAST one very good one and maybe even a very good strong safety to boot. LB - all three starters are 30 + years old. who on this roster is qualified to be a starter behind them? DL - both DE's are 30+. one DT, adams, is 30+. tommy harris is done. so what depth is there currently on our roster to replace any of them as sure starters? OL - kreutz is 33. who else is worth anything on this starting roster? maybe c. williams in the future? at what position? we need in essence 2 tackles, 1 guard and a center. FB - mamu is over 30 that comes out to 14 key starters who are aging or suck who need to be replaced within the next 1-4 years. i want to emphisize this... 14 key STARTERS who will need to be replaced over the next 1 to 4 years due to AGE and/or quality. this is also assuming that our wide receiver corp will even be worth a dam and we don't have to replace some or all of them too. unless we draft 'quality' starters in every round for two years straight we are going to be in one hell of a mess in the near future and not unlike when wanny left 11 years ago.

cowher in 15 years made the playoffs in 10 of those years. cowher had THREE losing seasons in FIFTEEN YEARS and one superbowl ring!!!

yea, and maybe more than a few have forgotten it took us FOUR years after a superbowl loss and a complete non-injury season to even GET in the playoffs where we beat one team, the mighty 7-9 seahawks, to even get a chance to lose the nfc title game. just for the record, do you know how many teams over the last THIRTY YEARS never made the playoffs once in three years after a superbowl appearance? three. 1) the 1998 atlanta falcons under HC reeves 2) the 2002 oakland raiders (who have sucked ever since 2002 with the knucklehead owner/gm al davis running the show) under callahan, turner, shell, kiffin, kiffen/cable, cable. 3) drum roll..... the 2006 chicago bears under lovie smith, jerry angelo and ted phillips. that said, one playoff game every 4 years is enough for you to be happy with our system of deadbeats running this franchise? whining? is that what looking at the possibilities of improving our franchise to become a top competitor is, is whining? the mccaskey's must really love fans like you who just pay the money and shut up. "percentage wise" is how you want to evaluate and compare coaches and players? by reading stats off of a page of numbers is the only way you know how to decide whether someone can coach or play football? me, i like to use my own eyes and throw in some brain usage to go along with what is in print. cowher and fisher can both coach players because i have seen them both do it. there was a fantastic turnover of players in pitt in which they let numerous good players go in free agency yet continued to put quality players on the field to replace them. this doesn't even include the large number of assistant coaches he put together over the years due to attrition. the same can be said for fisher in tenn. he has had many players lost to free agency and poor drafts from his gm yet he continues to get the MOST out of whatever players he is forced to field. can you say that about lovie? who has he made better? how has his game time decisions improved? how about his assistant coaching choices? how many coaches have been fired by him/angie yet the core of the problems that caused them to be fired never goes away. how far off is this team from getting back to the big game? i don't know, you tell me. with a completely healthy team we beat 3 teams this last season with winning records. the packers, who beat us 2 out of 3 times last year including knocking us out of the playoffs and are favorites to win the division THIS year, the eagles, and the jets. so where is this great improvement for next season coming from? who have we drafted that is waiting on our roster to step in and improve what we saw last season? oh that's right, we don't have ANY previous draft picks that could step in and start on any other team in the nfl but ours. is free agency again our solution or is it that you now for some reason have faith that our GM will draft even average players now that can play other positions besides special teams? sorry bub but that ain't whining, that's reality!!! hmmmm.... let's look at the modern era of football, like the FORTY FIVE YEARS the superbowl has been in existence, and we have one superbowl ring and one loss. yea, that's "pretty damn good". "man crushes"? is that some kind of alaska thing or is that just nonsense babble from someone suffering from cabin fever and not having had a date without 4 legs for the last 5 months?

isn't that bigamy?

three years isn't that long? that is about the amount of time a new coach coming into the nfl gets to accomplish something before he is fired if he fails. this also gives a mandate for the worst GM in football memory to stick around for another 3 years and pile drive this franchise into the ground with a lack of talent. oh, and don't worry teddy boy, the outstanding job you have done as our president means your job is safe too. as you say it's not that surprising. that concludes us from entering into the hunt for a quality veteran coach. so once again we don't have to worry about paying out the big bucks for a cowher or fisher type as they will already be gone and if the lovie boat sinks we can hire some nobody for peanuts yet again. our reward for incompetence and mediocrity shines a light on the business/sports world for all to see that this mom and pop franchise is run and governed by greedy fools.