Lucky Luciano

you could be right. angelo is in the market for a goalie.

i think it was a different 'type' of pad he was referring to.

the stuff that comes out of our GM's mouth is simply mindboggling. it "behooves" them to keep a player because we "paid him his money" already? what the hell does that mean? this is vashers 7th year in the nfl. he should have been healed from any injury he suffered in 2007 last season if it was going to happen. does his play warrant even a backup slot on your roster and especially at nearly $3 mil against the cap with what we witnessed on the field? at this point in his career i can't even see potential anymore yet we not only pay out that kind of money but have to keep a spot on our roster and cut someone else to keep him. if he thinks vasher played "OK" from what he saw then why did our coaching staff keep him on the bench even when we were desperate for corner play? is that a dig on lovie and his ship of fools?

he looked OK to you? vasher has a base salary of $2.95 million in 2010. not bad for someone how far down the list from a starting position at CB? yup angie, it is business as usual.

i agree. i don't understand anyone saying peanut is undersized for a safety. in fact he is pro-typical. even to argue he needs more weight, to put on 5-10 lbs for someone who is 6'1" is nothing. 1. peanut has good to very good speed for a FS vs. average at BEST for a corner. his biggest weakness is playing man off the LOS with quicker faster corners. playing free safety eliminates that problem. he is already playing back and instead of him backpeddling 5-10 yds every snap he is in position to start with and moving forward instead of back. it should give him a lot more time to react to the qb's/wr's which in turn should increase his interceptions and his chances at stripping the ball (which he excels at) increases. 2. it's said he won't be able to take the physical abuse. i disagree. in the tampa/lovie cover 2 a corner plays a lot of run defense off the ends. it's in his job description and peanut does a lot of it. as a free safety this limits a lot of the rb/fb/te tackles near the LOS he normally has to make including taking on some TE, FB and even offensive linemen BLOCKS which saves a lot of wear and tear on his body. he also is usually not making the initial contact taking on these bigger players. it stands to reason tackling WR's in open space is less wear and tear on your body over your career. 3. instead of shortening his career, playing FS should increase his years in the league as per #2 above. he should be able to play a very productive 3-5 years at FS and do it very well. let's face it, when a player hits 30 he loses more speed every year. at FS he doesn't have nearly the problem with speed as he does at playing corner especially when peanut would be considered having very good speed for a FS at his size. look how well mike brown played FS and consider his speed vs peanuts. peanut is also a very smart player which again makes this move superb. 4. some say we should keep him at CB because he is our best corner. i totally disagree. why would you want a player to play a position he is average at at best rather than play one he could excel in or at the least haver real potential to be better at than where he is? it makes no sense. it would be like taking a pro-bowl caliber DE and playing him at nose tackle because he would be better than the nose tackle you currently have. you just dumbed down TWO positions instead of one!! below are some FS's/safeties for comparison: CHARLES TILLMAN - 61" - 198 - 29 years old FS nick collins - packers - 5'11" - 207 FS michael griffin - titans - 6.0' 202 FS ed reed - ravens - 5'11" - 200 FS kerry rhodes - jets - 6'3" - 214 FS ryan clark - steelers - 5'11" - 205 brian dawkins - eagles - 6'0" - 210 rod woodson - 6'0" - 205 ronnie lott - 6'0" - 203

1. believe me, there is a reason certain candidates initially get paid lots more than others. by your set standard of lowballing unknown candidates you exclude every and all real top notch candidates, PERIOD. this seems what you are happy with... the unproven bottom of the barrel candidates we always hire and hope we find lightning in a bottle. if this is right then why do you even complain about the lovies and jaurons. it should be standard procedure for your way to run a franchise and business. i will have to get back with you on the articles for lovies and angelo's salaries as i am out of town. i gave them to you or others in the past but obviously you seem to have forgotten. you could try doing some research yourself, it's not that hard, and post it on here. 2. as far as his current salary... yes i believe he IS making a high salary at this point. but again you and others always seem to fail to take into account that time is money and interest on money you do or don't get is income or lack thereof. so money promised in the future is worth less than if you got it today. so add the average to this equasion and what do you get?

i agree. although in my opinion it is STILL the standard M.O. that it was in the past people don't seem to see the light even when it's shining in their collective eyes. 1. people point to lovie as an example of how we have changed and pay our employees above standard. it is not true if you look closely at how we operate. we lowball the initial candidates, per lovie who was one of the lowest paid HC's in the entire nfl (the same can be said with angie), and in the same breath HAVE to lowball his assistants otherwise they would make more than the HC/GM. if the HC performs even reasonably well we then give him a raise and extension. in the meantime the costs of coaching salaries has risen over the years our coaches were getting paid a pittance. this in itself dumbs down the amount of the raise. so you have to average the salaries these coaches get over their entire tenure in chicago which gives you the true salary base of what you pay your employees. it's an old business accounting trick that makes you seem like you are really in the upper echelon in salary scale when at best you are average or below when enticing current/future employees. 2. again and yet again i will point out that the nfl pays ALL salaries and bonus's out of the salary cap allotment. the difference would be to be considered SUPER cheap like bidwell in arizona was some time ago when he basically was at or below the minimum that the nfl agreement forced teams to pay out in salary. what you pay players in salary and bonus's means nearly nothing in considering the owners of any franchise being considered cheap or not unless they pull the bidwell trick to it's fullest extent. finally... unless you as a president and GM are complete morons (not only in nfl football operations but even in accounting) by threatening the HC with termination upon set conditions because he is a failure (and if you expect to hire good new assistants to work with him after firing the previous ones) YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE TO PAY THEM MORE MONEY than you normally might have to pay assistants whose job security is not a factor!!! it's basic common sense!!!!!!!!!!!!!! to lowball anyone when the candidates hold the trump cards is plain out ridiculous yet again we plod on with business as usual for this cheap arced franchise run by fools.

ask butkus about former bear medical staffs. seems like a pattern.

i am sure this is what you were referring to but just to clarify a bit of history: plank's career lasted from 1975 through 1982 so not involved realistically with the superbowl team. a fair to good team during his era but not great. you are correct though that he was a buddy ryan coached player and was one of the most feared hard hitting safeties in the entire nfl during the 70's. this was doug plank during his career... super hard hitting safety who led with his helmet a lot and played like a madman. he would literally try to run through a player and put a hurt on them. plank hit like a ton of bricks but did not wrap up the player or was a very good tackler. they usually fell over at impact but if not they went by him and this is where gary fencik came in as a perfect compliment to plank. fencik was one of the best open field tacklers (and blitzers also) i have ever seen play. if plank didn't knock em down fencik would make the sure tackle. it was a fantastic combo to watch. as far as rivera and buddy ryan... rivera was a rookie in '85. buddy had not much use for rookies and if i remember right rivera hated buddy ryan and mentioned this later in his career and coaching life. how much he learned about coaching from buddy in that one season i don't know but it was a pretty short time and if he did learn a lot ryan must have really put a lasting impression on him. most of rivera's career came under tobin who was maybe the luckiest knucklehead to ever fall into a good thing and not completely destroy it (although he tried). he will always be fondly remembered by me for trying to take an attack defense that was the best in the nfl and turn them into a "read and react" defense. wat an idiot.

here is the problem we face doing this... we have virtually wasted, yes WASTED, 1-3 years by keeping our president, GM, and head coach in place. unless the mccaskey's really truly believe that lovie will win us a superbowl in the next 2 or 3 years they are just hurting the franchise in a big way. even if they do think this the case then their judgment is in serious question. people want to talk about the lockout year and how it's smart to keep the people in charge during this turmoil. i say it's a fantastic mistake doing so. with new key people in charge we are years ahead of turning this franchise around. they would have found their future HC this year, they could have retooled their scouting department and by the time the lockout year was over we would be ready to contend for a superbowl with our coaching staff set, our offensive and defensive schemes learned and familiar with by our players. everyone would be ready to hit the ground running. as it stands it will take at least 2 years in a new system to be real contenders in the playoffs to get into the superbowl so where does that leave us now? in the same boat we had keeping dick jauron or wanny for that extra year.

i'm not being facetious when i ask this... who on the colts or saints is a realistic candidate for either coordinator position in chicago? how do these supposed SB coaching candidates compare in quality to the names that were thrown out here like fewell, zampese, jackson, or chud? it seems we blew off chud (a pregnant wife is near meaningless when the stakes are this high) and we certainly have blown off zampese. we supposedly lost jackson to the oakland raiders which in itself is mindboggling and now even lowly martz is rumored to have lost interest. quite frankly tice may or may not have been a good hire as line coach but realistically does he qualify as offensive coordinator material? what i have read on this board is his forte' is running game smashmouth football? if so how can that possibly be a good piece of the missing puzzle to our offense after giving up the moon for an elite qb? and doug plank for DC? whether that works or not it is a serious gamble to put a failing defense into someone with so little experiences hands and expect miracles especially when our HC is tying his hands to start with. he wouldn't have the experience to even tell lovie to FO if he wanted to.

maybe he likes airplane rides. you ever think of that?

i just don't understand what their thinking is on stuff like this. lovie seems to protect his players to a fault yet when he needs to do so legitimately this 'possibility' comes up of failing miserably to protect a young players psyche. mindboggling.

agreed. in fact is not reporting, if they knew, a serious disservice to forte? he took a lot of heat from the media and people questioning his abilities. not good for only a 2nd year players confidence.

whatever. yawwwwn... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

could be age is becoming a factor in 2008 till now although he made the pro-bowl in 2008. in 2009 the pack changed his position by going with the 3-4 plus his season ending injury in wk 11. still at 9.5 sks a season, 2008, for a LDE is a good prospect in my book as it's over a 50% advantage over ogys 6. it would all depend upon the injury and how it plays out.

yes it was a bust season that they tried to salvage with luke warm success by ending the strike. the actual games were attended, if i remember right, less than even preseason games. i believe when the strike happened buddy ryan (maybe ditka too?) told their respective teams not to walk the line which they ALL did not if i remember correctly. that said, there were a few scab nfl players who did cross the line throughout the league but i never remember them refusing the benefits won by the nfl players union that they didn't stand behind. 1987 was a sad ending for walter paytons career (who to his fantastic credit DID stand fast in solidarity).

and as usual you have come to the wrong conclusions and add nothing even mildly important to the conversation with the exception of the usual jibes and acidic giant-head wit expected from an infantile meglomaniac.

first... would you like some cheese with your whine? if you can't take someone asking you to elaborate, or to question, define, or prove the validity of your statements and EVEN opinions or comments then what is the point at all? if not just state that as a qualifier in all your posts and save yourself (and me) a lot of typing and wasted space (not that the post you are replying to was even directed at you in the first place). second... just what are you even talking about? it's an opinion? so what. does that make it untouchable? in fact if you read it carefully it does not read as an opinion but as a statement of fact or an opinion BASED on fact. take your pick. jason: Nearly all the risk is on the owners, and the players get an abnormally large portion of the pie compared to numerous other industries. Just look online at various pro sports teams that have lost money on a fairly consistent basis while their players continued to rack up millions. And what choices did the owners have? Either risk financial future by keeping up with other teams, or get rid of the team and cut losses. next... you are "not sure anyone has said" teams are losing money? LOL!!! did you even read the specific post you are defending? if not read the paragraph above. moving on... nfoligno: Players are quite willing to be equal partners when it comes to taking the money, but when times are down, they don't seem to want that same level of committment. sounds like it would be utopia if they did doesn't it? now i want to ask anyone on this ENTIRE board if they think fair is fair in good times and bad times whether the owners of any NORMAL healthy corporation would accept it if you put it to them thus: we as employees will accept the percentage of company loss in cut wages in the bad years if you share ALL the excess profit percentages in good years exclusively among us (we also want to see the books to be sure you aren't loading them). they would laugh you right out of their rosewood offices!!! don't believe it? ask anyone who owns or runs a corporation and especially one with stockholders. why? because the upside for profit is too great unless your company is swirling around the rim and ready to go down anyway. that is the way business works and to have them complain about salaries being lowered in specific bad years by healthy flourishing companies is posturing for sympathy to the ignorant and is pure balderdash. that is an interesting 2 edged sword. I believe the greatest aspect of where players get a piece of the pie is a more constant number, stemming from media contracts and such. and you don't think that is a major portion of where the owners get their piece of the "pie" from? you act like the players get ALL of the gross revenue. how much is allotted every single year to the owners? (please take into account my mathematical ignorance and if the figures are not correct please feel free to do it correctly and post it) last year the cap was about $138 million dollars. so that means if the players are getting 65% (?) of total revenue for the cap the owners just got about $74 million dollars to pay their franchise expenses and consider profits NOT INCLUDING what isn't collected by the nfl to determine the cap figures. also when the NEXT years totals come up to figure the SALARY CAP everyone gets less money if the gross totals add up to less don't you think? isn't THAT having the players take a pay cut or is there some magic involved that the players still get more? hmmmmm.... ummmm... well then why don't you spend a little time doing just a LITTLE research on your own to substanciate your claims or statements and post links to information to dispute facts and opinions i state? i'm certainly willing to change my mind if you or anyone else finds real evidence or valid, educated (even non educated) opinions contrary to this. in fact it would save ME hours looking up things you SHOULD have. but oh yea, i forgot. you never do that. i put this in to give the reader a look at how some of the other owners of sport franchises in DIFFERENT sports operate or think and included this article from another country to show a different perspective or owners psyche. if you don't think it was interesting, so it goes. and your entire paragraph means just what in regards to this post? times are tough and jerry jones can't sell naming rights after building a BILLION DOLLAR stadium? LOL!! which teams struggle to sell out these days? what are the reasons you SUPPOSE would cause that besides times are tough? why does soldier field sell out as has been stated in the past (not getting full attendance but selling out)? why do you think the bears attendence records were so GOOD this season while times are so tough? yea, what would a flake like *Dr. William S. Kern as interim chair of the Department of Economics at Western Michigan University know about stuff like this. *"William S. Kern has been a faculty member since 1987. His areas of specialization include microeconomics, comparative economic systems, and environmental and natural resource economics. He also has written and made presentations on the impact of sports franchises and new stadiums on regional economics. Prior to coming to WMU, he taught at Franklin and Marshall College for five years and also held faculty positions at Colorado State and Emporia State universities. He earned a bachelor's degree from Florida International University in 1976, a master's degree from Louisiana State" yea an opinion piece by a journalist and sport radio host: Dwight Jaynes You may remember me from my 25 years at The Oregonian and Oregon Journal. Or my stint at the Portland Tribune or appearances on local talk radio. They call me "The Godfather" now, especially in the mornings, from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. on the "Morning Sports Page" with Gavin Dawson and Chad Doing, on Portland's No. 1 sports station, 95.5 The Game. ok let's look at this... did you not site snyder in the past as being a bad owner who grossly overpays for players in the past, present and future? doesn't that shoot to hell the notion that players salaries are killing the owners? or do you now believe because he has 30 thousand more seats in his stadium that makes him more money than the freaking new york yankees?

what other industries are you talking about? pro sports is an industry where the employees ARE what is sold to the public. NAME the amount of nfl teams that lose money on a fairly consistent basis. what is that percentage as a whole? show me the bottom line from their financial statements. show me what they do different from the ones you don't consider losing money. is geography/location a factor? poor football operations management policies which includes personnel and their salary along with the final results in wins/losses? overpaying initially for the franchise? overestimation of sport popularity or initial profits in specific areas? poor borrowing practice? is it a planned tax break for the owners? overestimating the value their franchise will rise and be worth? do you consider the owner/CEO salary factors in your estimation? or is it just a wide brush whitewashing statement that the players are to blame because of salary? sorry but until i see the actual financial statements by owners and how they are losing money just for the good of the fans i ain't buyin it. some interesting reading: http://www.sandiego.gov/chargersissues/doc...waystowin.shtml http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/wealth/b...iressports.html http://www.bos.frb.org/peanuts/sptspage/inning4.htm 2000: Zimbalist suggests that if the NBA owners are truly serious about competitive balance, they should pursue the NFL’s strategy of revenue sharing, but that faces serious obstacles in both basketball and baseball. The best solution, he argues, is one also suggested by Fort: Foster competition by breaking up the existing leagues and creating new ones. With two leagues in each sport, largemarket teams would have to share their market with teams from competing leagues, and cities would not have to compete against one another by offering new stadiums to attract teams. http://www.upjohninst.org/publications/ch1/kern-sports.pdf 2009: The NFL is different. It’s still a money machine, the country’s most popular sport and it has leverage. Ironically, since it’s so popular, it’s still in a position to dictate terms to cities. And those terms are terrible. They want stadiums that are now costing up to a billion dollars and are not a good civic investment, since many are used only about 20 times a year and look like giant blimp hangers blighting the landscape. http://www.dwightjaynes.com/owners-getting...orts-facilities 2009: As the Redskins close out a decade of losing, one thing is undeniable: off the field, the team has been a roaring success. The Washington Redskins make more money than any other professional sports franchise in the United States. Their estimated annual revenue is $345 million, according to Forbes. Their closest contender, the New York Yankees, bring in somewhere around $320 million a year--but the Yankees bring home championships, 27 and counting. http://www.wopular.com/redskins-revenues-h...pro-sports-team here is some fun reading that is dated, 2001: http://espn.go.com/page2/s/2001/0710/1224543.html

i agree that the way pro sports are run in todays world is atrocious. it's pure greed that is driving the nfl today. it's all geared up for bottom line profit structure and whether the game is hurt or changed for the worse is a 2nd or even 3rd consideration. in fact what you are seeing today is not the same game that was played 25 years ago. the media contracts have forced rule changes and even the way you watch football. how many times have you seen a game that comes back from one of the dozens of commercials they force into every pause in the game to actually have missed plays? that would NEVER have happened even 15 years ago yet now is reasonably common. the nfl is geared for offense because they (the media) have determined that mindless fans would become restless if the scores don't resemble basketball scores and changed the rules of the game. the accountablility for player performance is certainly a problem with no real solution. performance can be hindered by injury, fellow players, coaches or scheme. i don't know how you could account for this fairly on a year by year evaluation of salary. although if they made contracts shorter with no bonus money and the contracts guaranteed to be paid 'might' be a way to counter some of the problems. for instances if you sign a player at X dollars for 2-3 years you pay him that salary for 2-3 years and there are no bonus bucks paid up front or on the backside or any way out of the contract unless you bought the player out. it would probably raise the actual amount of yearly salary but wouldn't hold teams accountable for unpaid money that was backloaded. in my opinion the rookie contracts need especially to be worked out fairly for both owners and players. this is also a complex arrangement on potential as some positions (qb for instance) take longer for the player to learn to play at a high level. agree on this. the 82 and 87 strike years were sham seasons that changed the way the nfl operated. the owners bet on the 'more money for them' horse and it appeared to come in last. nobody cared or wanted to watch scabs play during the 87 year and the entire year was a bust. same with the shortened 82 season. some good reading if this interests you can be found here that will give you some insight on how the nfl progressed and how the players actually started getting what they SHOULD have from robber baron owners and fought for basic rights that that should have been a given especially considering the amount of money involved: http://nflplayers.com/user/template.aspx?f...1036&type=c

for me this says everything. if they are legitimate paupers why not let the world see their profit percentages and if player salaries are bleeding them out, i will cry along with them. until then i have no sympathy what-so-ever. just curious, do the corporations like kraft have to make statements to their boards on profits/losses in this area? if so i would like to see them. as far as nfl players getting too much? compare it to any other major sport in the world. total paid out in salary compared to length of time able to play due to injury vs age retirement and complete physical condition when they do. baseball players are averaging what? 5-10+ million a season? how many are forced to retire due to physical injury including concussions compared to football players.

although getting up in age he should still have 2-3 years of good productivity. the main concern is the season ending injury he suffered and how serious that will effect his future. that said, kampman was one of if not the best LDE in football. he has pretty much done this on his own without the help of a pro-bowl RDE like ogy had in miami. if he were a year or two younger and the injury had no effect i would offer the moon for this guy. as it is if his knee is not wrecked i would offer a good contract for him. his stats: sacks 09 - 3.5 08 - 9.5 07 - 12 06 - 15.5 05 - 6.5 04 - 4.5 03 - 2 02 - .5 http://www.nfl.com/players/aaronkampman/ca...ts?id=KAM725424

if anyone in charge, including coaches, gm, and president of this franchise really understands what they are doing shouldn't they know what they are looking for? in my opinion we don't need yes men for cutler to grow as a qb in the nfl. just someone who is smarter than he is and understands how to get the most out of his players on and off the field. as far as wishing ill on our season or employees... i hope you are not inferring that i am in that category of "i told you so" as being more important than the REAL long term health of this club no matter who is running it. i have voiced my displeasure involving the management and truly believe we are seriously lacking good competent people in charge but i don't wish to lose to prove that i am right and they are wrong. it will come out in the final results of what is done or not done. but so far i don't see their side winning anything past or present. even this small point.

i have to ask... what gap is ted phillips bridging? could the reason you haven't heard a "peep" from the family for 10 years be because ted phillips is simply a parrot and all along we are hearing the family (mikey) through ted phillips mouth? another reality again is that the money paid to our players comes strictly from the nfl and the only convincing by ted the head would be to spend what is doled out for that specific purpose on what it was intended for instead of pocketing it. to me it starts at the top. if we don't win superbowls that is the place to lay the blame. without someone in charge of football operations that is even reasonably competent to make the major decisions regarding scouting or the job our gm is doing how can we be successful except by accident?