Lucky Luciano

so in YOUR opinion it is our "strategy" that we have had some of the worst coached teams in the history of the nfl over the last 10 years? and jerry jones? jerry jones is a meglomaniac. he thought/thinks he is a football genius much like the imbecile that headed this organization for 20 years with the only difference he is willing to spend money. as to the coaching staff... he didn't spend money on coaches in the past because he thought he could steer the titanic cowboys from the top. he finally decided to actually SPEND the big bucks when he decided this didn't work and tried to actually get the best available coach out there and win a superbowl. at least i have to give him credit for spending money to improve his team even if he spends it badly. wanny? maybe you should re-read your own post OR the one you replied to. i assumed since you stated "For the last ten years or so" that our discussion entaled the last TEN years. so that TEN YEARS to my estimation starts in 1997!!! this happens to be the last TWO years of wannys tenure in chicago in which the ONLY viable reason wanny was in chicago was because he was under contract for big, eatable money. if you seriously think that even that idiot mikey was praising wanny for a good job in those last 2 years you are sadly mistaken. just for the record i AGREE that the original wanny hiring wasn't a cheap or even a stupid move. wanny WAS the top dog at the time so i have no problem with the initial hire and have stated so numerous times in the past. now let's go to jauron..." well liked and regarded assistant w/ long creds" let's look at his record as a defensive coordinator UNDER a head coach who's forte' IS defense... JAGS: 1998 - 17th in points given up; 25th in yds given up; 23rd in 1st downs; 23rd in passing yds; 22nd in rushing yds; 26th in yds per attempt 1997 - 15th in points given up; 23rd in yds given up; 25th in 1st downs; 24th in passing yds; 13th in rushing yds; 11th in yds per attempt 1996 - 19th in points given up; 15th in yds given up; 21st in 1st downs; 16th in passing yds; 19th in rushing yds; 21st in yds per attempt 1995 - 28th in points given up; 21st in yds given up; 17th in 1st downs; 17th in passing yds; 24 in rushing yds; 17th in yds per attempt now.... are these the long credentials you were talking about??? or did we just hire him cause he is a such a peach. here are a FEW of the prospects or new head coaches the year jauron was hired that became head coaches: mcginnis, billick, seifert, rhodes, cunningham, palmer, andy reid, mike holmgren. were there others? i would think so. here is one other thought.... if you are going to hire a coordinator who is working under a head coach of the same ilk, why not offer a contract to one who ranked in the top ten rankings in his field and who just won 2 superbowls, maybe like kubiak? just for curiosities sake... how did jauron's first contract compare to what other franchises paid their head coaches? and finally lovie. if lovie was so hot why were we interviewing and courting saban? if lovie was so hot why were we interviewing russ grimm? if he was so hot why was he still available after we were done with all this? you can spin this however you want, saban was the first choice and money talks and bull$&!+ walks. i am not totally trashing the lovie pick but if you don't think money had something to do with his hiring you are wrong. he was the best of what was left. also, why else was the media and everyone else saying lovie's contract dollars were less than some offensive coordinators in the league and were critisizing the bears for not renegotiating his contract quickly enough? because he had a market fair contract? i think not. so on a final note... we should just keep lowballing coordintors to entice them to come to chicago as head coaches, is that correct? well, we have gone for 50 years with this "strategy" and so far we have ONE superbowl trophy and that because muggs halas and jim finks WERE smart football people and WERE willing to open up the pocketbook. QUOTE "in 1997-98 we kept wanny way past was was even reasonable as our HC. he was a complete failure yet we kept him 2 years longer than was sane. why? because he still had a big hit $ wise if we replaced him. THAT'S cheap. moving on........." Funny thing about selective memory. It is hard to have such and win many arguments. Wanny was a the young stud DC, and we got him. Prior to the end of his deal, he was given more money. Not the sign of a cheap team. You say if we were not so cheap, we would have fired him sooner. I argue the issue was not money, but poor management. Do you believe he EVER should have received the new deal in the first place? I didn't. But giving him the new deal showed a total lack of management. END QUOTE it's also funny that YOU either have selective memory or just don't read what i am writing. does "kept him 2 years longer than was sane" ring any bells? again referring to YOUR "last 10 years" argument, wanny's LAST 2 years fall into that catagory. i argue that it was not only "poor management" which i relate also with poor payroll practices and plain old football intelligence in this case, but not wanting to fire wanny because they would have to pay his salary for 2-3 years because of an ill advised extension. besides the monetary hit in this case they would look like fools. but... do you think this may have had some impact on why they may have wanted voidable contracts in the mcginnis regime as someone stated? like maybe so they COULD fire coaches without monetary penalties which makes them not look any less foolish but does keep the money in their pockets? speaking of his extension: of COURSE he was given more money, his contract was coming due the following year (1997). have you ever heard of anyone signing a coaching extension contract for less money? was this a terrible re-signing at the time? win/loss record considered, not neccessarily to some but certainly to me and any who really watched this guy coach a team. by the second year of wanny's term there were warning bells ringing. by the end of his fourth there were enough red flags to cover the earth. QUOTE As for later, I would argue many, if not most teams, have carried a coach longer than they should have because of the contract left. It is not unusual. What I think would have been unusual would be to fire a coach so soon after giving him a new deal. END QUOTE so this means what? that because other CHEAP teams will accept mediocre to horrible coaches years longer and field garbage teams with no hope of winning a superbowl in order to save money and screw it's fans, it's ok with you? QUOTE in 1999 we lowballed our first choice as HC in mcginnis and lost him as a prospect. THAT'S cheap. phillips then hired jauron after mikey was canned by his own mother. As I recall, there was a hell of a lot more to that whole thing than just money, and yet, you pretend that money was the whole thing. As I recall, it was also a big deal when Mikey went public and said we had signed McGinnis, when we were still in negotiations. I do not recall it being a matter of lowballing him, but a matter of Mikey being a dumbass, and McGinnis realizing what it would be like to work for him. END QUOTE did i "pretend" that money was the "whole" thing? i guess i don't remember saying it was the "whole" thing. please show me where i said that. but i would also like to state, if the money were excellent rather than low/mediocre with strings attached do you really think he would have left like that? i seriously doubt it. QUOTE jauron - after one good season, with an anemic offense, and a playoff in-and-out we not only renegotiate jauron's contract but his pitiful OC as well. was this done as an atta-boy or in regards to cheapness? if jauron really turned out to be a perennial contender when his contract DID come due, two seasons from then, it would have cost this franchise a LOT more money than it did re-upping his contract than when it did. the smart move was to wait and see how the next season fared. moving on...................... Are you serious? So your argument is that it is better for a team to wait and pay a premium rather than try to get a deal done early? I think every manager in america would disagree. I suppose you wait until a stock hits a high before you buy too. Don't want to get a bargain. You call it being cheap. The 32 teams in the NFL call it good business. END QUOTE am i serious? $%#@ YEA i'm serious. so, just to get your business portfolio correct, you are willing to enhance and extend an employee's guaranteed contract another 4 years when that employee has: 1. worked in that field for a grand total of three years or LESS. 2. his record boasts modest profits (one playoff spot) for only ONE year out of those three years. 3. he is still under contract for at LEAST one more make-or-break year at no added expense to you. well brother, let me know when you want someone to run YOUR corporation cause i want in. we are not talking about keeping a coach who has a proven track record and you are re-signing him for a third + go-round (someone similar to a fisher and bilichek type coach or someone else who DOES have previous experience) to save some coin, you are talking about upping an inexperienced guy with a short mediocre or worse track record to save a few bucks before he has even run out his existing contract. does snyder ring any bells? am i willing to spend a little more to let him work over his last year/s and make a real informed decision on his whole body of work up to that time? yes i am. if i want to keep him happy and feel there is some pressure to do so i give him BONUS money those year/s he deserves it. that way i am not tied to 2-4 years of dead money if it turns out he was having a fluke of a career to that point. i pay market value for a proven commodity and don't try to cut a fat hog in the arse by pinching pennies!! QUOTE in 2004, one year longer than we should have kept jauron (again so we don't pay a coach who isn't here) we shop around for that clown sabin at LSU, who everyone is drooling over, but decide we don't want to pay him as much as he wants. again we settle for 2nd or 3rd best when we hire smith. Again w/ the selective memory. Pretty much every report I recall said Saban was looking for a boat load of personnel power, power usually the GM employs. I recall the sort of money we were talking about, and it was FAR from cheap. I remember that deal dying mainly due to Saban making the power play, and Angelo not wanting to give up the power he had. He dealt w/ the power struggles w/ Jauron, and didn't want to go through it again. END QUOTE hmmm.. i seem to remember it somewhat differently. must be my "selective memory" block. first of all saben was looking for a major payday. you say you recall the money we were talking about. so what was it? how did it compare to his salary at LSU? what power/struggles did saben want that you somehow know angie didn't want to go through again besides drafting personel? list them. saben was already getting paid real good money from LSU so what's the incentive to leave? MORE MONEY! the reason i remember was that we wouldn't/didn't offer that big incentive payday to dig him out of there. yes he did want power but do you seriously think that couldn't have been negotiated with our franchise if the money was BIG enough to lure him into the nfl? QUOTE hmmm, not cheap? No, it wasn't cheap. It was about so much more then money, but because you have it in your head the team is cheap, that is the only way you know how to look at things. That is about the only way to explain how a team can fork over a big extension, and you rationalize it by saying it would cost more later. END QUOTE the only way i know how to look at things? that is truely laughable. so a team signing a coach to an extension, if it looks like he MAY succeed, to beat the cost of what his fair market value would be when his contract came due is in itself not cheap. stupid maybe but not cheap. when it becomes cheap is when that coach is signed to that extension to save that money you are talking about and even AFTER he has failed you still employ him because OF the guaranteed extension you signed him TO. QUOTE other than building the new training facilities what has the ownership spent money on? the stadium is not theirs plus they have greatly increased their seating income. the gm replaced mikey so the salary is probably comperable. so where are they spending loads of money that makes you think they are not cheap? First, I would point to the scouting department. Prior to Hatley/Phillips, we had the smallest scouting department in the league. Those two men built up the largest. Second, I would point to signing bonus money. I know your arguments. You believe signing bonuses do not matter because a team can not spend more than the cap, but the simple fact is, you are wrong. In fact, you can and teams do every year. Under Hatley, we began spending bonus dollars like never before. Now, you can easily argue against who we spent it on, but the reality is we began to shell out the coin for bonuses unlike in the past. END QUOTE the scouting department???? you have said yourself in past posts you don't know anything about it other than it 'probably' is larger than it was in the past (which you don't even state or know how FAR in the past that is). if you have any facts as to how many we have added or even have, then post it. if you have any facts how much we pay them then post it. if you have any facts even on how they delegate these scouts by position or even which side of the ball their duties cover then post it. if you have any facts which schools are targeted by our scouts then post it. you know, unlike you, i can only go by results. the results in my estimation ARE the facts. even if we have a thousand scouts and we end up with the results we have over the last 5+ years then we either don't have enough or we need better scouts. let me ask you... if you were employing scouts to look at offensive players we end up drafting in chicago, how much do you think they are worth? how much would YOU pay them? would you maybe look for either better scouts or more of them or just keep the staus-quo and accept the CRAP we draft? QUOTE I'm sorry, but do you watch the draft, or follow other teams. How many teams do you think take a player 5 or 10 spots higher than where they think they will be drafted? If a team thinks a player will fall in the draft, they trade down. You argue it is about money, and that is all, but it is also about getting extra picks, and still getting the guy you want. I remember that year Pepper was drafted. It shocked everyone Minny took him when they had Brad Johnson coming off a very good year. By your logic, we should have stayed at #4 and taken Rex if that is who we liked, right? END QUOTE do i watch the draft? yes and obviously closer than some. so let's see... how many teams take a player 5-10 spots higher than where they THINK they will be drafted? how about at least ONE? how bout at least ONE that takes players ROUNDS before they are projected to go? uhhhh maybe like chicago? yes i do argue at least SOME of it is about money. i have watched this team draft players since it was first aired on tv. and YES i have seen the bears call a player prior to picking him and ask if he will sign for X amount of money before they pick him and at times someone not projected to go in that spot simply to save money. speaking of pepper and grossman as you say... i WOULD have stayed at #7 and picked pepper IF i thought he was the best qb left on the board and i needed the best qb to play in chicago for 10 years AND he projected as that quality qb. if i thought grossman was a special qb that could lead this franchise for 10+ years then YES i would have picked him at #4. saying that, i think the consensus was that leftwich at the time was certainly a better prospect yet we decided to go with a cheaper model. i will say this... being in the spot to pick at #4 does not come around for chicago that often (or maybe it does more than i wish?). it was yet another year we needed a qb badly. a year we had a very high draft pick. it most importantly was a year with a real #1 qb prospect in palmer. THAT was the one time to really go for that homerun swing and move up at whatever the cost to pick up carson palmer at the #1 overall. it would have hurt some but the rewards for that chance at the best project out there in the last few years would have been worth that risk and being only THREE spots up wouldn't have been devastating like moving up from the bottom in given draft picks. no guts no glory. it's one thing being causious and another being afraid. so instead we get haynes and grossman. QUOTE "i also have to ask.... if we had a real management system in place, including gm, scouts and talent evaluators, who knew jack about offense and especially about qb's, would we have chosen this "most ready to start" qb in the first place?" But this is not about money. We do have a GM and large scouting department. You can argue, and I will do so w/ you, they suck, but that is not a money issue. END QUOTE how can you say that with any authority? do you really think this organization is completely stupid? dumb i will grant you, but THAT stupid that they don't realize we haven't had an offense in chicago in 50 years??? they would have to have lived on mars. if half the fans in chicago can give you this answer as to how to GET a better offense don't you really think they know this? lets go back to your corporate scenario... if you owned a corp and 45 of the last FIFTY YEARS one half of your company was running in the red wouldn't you, or even the mccaskey's, either figure it out themselves something just 'ain't' right or HIRE someone else to figure out why this kept happening? they KNOW what the problem is. they are NOT drafting quality offensive players and haven't since jim finks left. they certainly have not over the last 10 years!! ask any other owner, ask any nfl expert. ask any knowledgable fan how you get quality players in the nfl. you scout them with good personel. you hire someone to evaluate what they are giving you and draft those players. if they keep failing to give you quality information on who to draft year after year it would be insane to keep them on staff don't you think? you hire either more if there is not enough quality info coming in or you fire and hire new ones. you hire quantity AND quality at least until you get on your feet. this stuff is NOT rocket science. QUOTE "to top this off, which of our coaches would you have chosen for ANY input on drafting a qb? crowton? jauron? shoop-a-doop? none of them had ANY nfl offensive experience worth mentioning. also, who in this entire organization was qualified to not only evaluate mcnown, but actually coach him?" First, I would point out that Shoop was a QB coach. Second, w/o trying to get into each and every assistant coach on the team, how does this help your argument we are cheap. I do not like the coaches we have hired, but that is not a 'cheap' issue, but a decision making one. END QUOTE if shoop is hired to be your qb coach don't you think this idiot should know something about what makes a quality qb and has input? if you don't think he does then you hired the wrong man, which turned out to be the case again. same goes for crowton. so for X's sake hire someone who does know about it like a bill walsh or somebody who does have a good record picking and grooming qbs in the nfl. QUOTE One, most believed our draft pick at #4 would have been the DT Robertson, not Leftwhich, who many fans wanted but I recall little to indicate our staff was high on him. Two, as I recall, it was Rex all along our staff liked, and thus we traded down rather take him at #4. I do not get your argument. If our staff liked Rex over Leftwhich, is it your argument we should have taken Rex at #4 just to prove we are not cheap. Yea, that would have made our team look so much better. END QUOTE sure most believed our #4 pick would be a DT. why would we think our fearless leaders would grow some stones and go for the pick that we not only needed most but would help this team more than any pick in the last 25 years in carson palmer? this when we had the pick and the need to get it done. as far as the staff saying it was rex they liked all along... what else would they say after he was drafted? if our #1 need was for a franchise qb and especially grossman, why take a chance he would be gone FIVE picks later and choose a DE instead ahead of him even after you traded down once? in my estimation you either feel he is a franchise qb or you don't. they obviously didn't TWICE. so why not really make that extra effort and move up to get the one that is? because it's pure fear that stays the hand. fear of making a career decision that will cost a lot of money. QUOTE As for moving up to get Palmer being too expensive, yes, it is. Not so much due to money but picks. Cincy was asking for the moon to move down, and for a struggling team w/ so many needs, it just didn't make sense to give up so many picks. END QUOTE if we gave up our first that year and some combination of that year and the next to me it's worth it even if we gave up that first the following year. to be honest... palmer looked to be the best prospect since payton manning at the #1 overall spot. certainly better than his brother. how much is it worth to get a possible 10 year franchise qb in chicago? you say it's not worth giving up that many picks with a struggling team. so i have to ask, (considering we will never know as we have never done it and we just continue to struggle decade, after decade, after decade with the same type of afterthoughts at the most important position in football) how much is it worth to you? QUOTE "another miscue: we SHOULD have gotten 29 year old FA drew bledsoe the previous year, 2002, when he was a free agent but instead we went with a B.U. in the cheaper miller." Yea, and the 2001 season Miller had for us had NOTHING to do w/ it. END QUOTE which part of millers (15 total games started in his career) 2001 rankings of 24th in passing yds; 12th in TD's; 13th in INT's; and 19th in net passing yds do you think would pre-empt you from aquiring a 29 year old all-pro, pro-bowl quarterback in free agency? QUOTE "mirer? this was one of the stupidest decisions in this entire franchises history. again this came about by not having any personel with any clue about offensive talent. we relied exclusively on a DC turned HC in wanny. to trade that high of a draft pick for mirer who was NOT even a starter on his own team was ludicrous. if we had any offensive evaluation personel besides mikey, they would have certainly put the brakes on that trade. but then personel cost money." Sorry, but you are killing me. We have had a full compliment on the staff. I agree w/ the idea we have needed more offensive backgrounded coaches, but that simply has NOTHING to do w/ being cheap. Is it your argument that an OC costs more than a DC? I don't think so. We spent money, but didn't spend it well. Fine. But it does NOT help your cheap argument at all. END QUOTE are you seriously saying that in 1997 we had a full compliment of offensive personel decision makers? just shout out when you get to their names: ed, tim, patrick, brian or mike mccaskey; ted phillips; rod graves; tim lefevour; ken valdiserri; mark bienvenu; john bostrom; tim bream; fred caito; george chryst; clyde emrich; greg gershuny; doug green; caroline guip; gary haeger; bryan harlan; jeff hay; tony medlin; ken mrock; bryan pett; carl piekarski; dean pope; russ riederer; max siatek; jack tropeter; scott worthem; pro scout - mike mccartney and our massive force of FOUR college scouts - charlie garcia, charlie mackey, bobby riggle, jeff shiver, or gary smith PLUS an unknown cast of thousands. which of this full compliment of offensive oriented staff do you suppose gave the green light on mirer? and finally, yes, hiring coaches with little or no experience to fill your staff is probably not due to any monetary considerations at all. in fact i'm sure they were in the top ten paid coaches at every position. QUOTE "i think to cut this short, all the instances you mention are perfect examples of what you do when you don't have anyone in the entire organization that knows anything about offense and especially about quarterback talent. if you have failed this miserably for 45 of the last 50 years don't you think SOMEONE in management could figure out some changes need to be made in the way we evaluate and choose our qb's?" You act like we have not had OCs or QB coaching on the team. We have had offensive coaches, just not as head coaches. Again, that simply has nothing to do w/ money or being cheap. END QUOTE yet again i will ask you to name a single offensive coach under tenure in chicago that has gone on to even be an nfl OC let alone head coach besides ditka's abramowicz in NO as his OC. why do you think that is? do we go all out to pay someone top dollar to come to chicago and are just too stupid to pick a single good one over last 50 years? forget about head coaches, besides turner (who's only nfl OC experience was IN chicago) have we even ever hired an OC with even OC experience in our history? QUOTE "i just can't believe that to be true.... if our scouts are telling our GM to pick certain players and he keeps picking others that bust, he needs to be fired." This was your response from my comment that scouts can tell Angelo everything, but it is still Angelo's call. A scout does not tell Angelo who do draft. They give reports on prospects, and Angelo takes it from there. END QUOTE so, are you saying then that all of our great scouts have given angie good offensive players to draft but he just doesn't want to listen to them and drafts the dogs? QUOTE "so that leaves us with we don't have a large enough staff to scout offensive players," According to what are you basing this on. Bad decision making does not mean a lack of resources. It may question the ability of those resources, but does not mean resources are lacking. The article talking about the need for QB specializing scouts also flat out says no one in the league has one. So unless your argument is every team is cheap, I do not think this is a money issue. END QUOTE so, in your estimation we have plenty of scouts but they are just stupid. how many years do you believe we should pay stupid scouts? 20 years? 30 years? or do you think we might look for more scouts who aren't as stupid and pay them what they are worth? that way we have the cheaper stupid scouts we can always rely on for bad picks in a pinch and a few good scouts who unfortunately actually cost real money but give us a better offensive selection to draft from. what in gods name ever gave you any idea i think our scouts work for free? cheaper maybe because either they are NOT as good as other scouts for other franchises that draft offense well OR the only other possibility is there just is not ENOUGH of them. so in the last case, open up the purse and freaking hire some more!!!!!!!!!! also i will tell you yet again how many scouts are employed by chicago for college player evaluation that i can account for greg gabriel, and MAYBE 3-4 others that i can't find info about. is that enough? you tell me if you think any of these 4/5 have done a good job offensively evaluating players. and you, just because we hire a gm and pay most of our salary cap out to players now, think it means we are the elite of the nfl spending wise and the only problems we have are from us having hard luck. i ask you this AGAIN... show me where we have spent the money other than player salaries. we paid (estimate) $20 mil in 1997 for new facilities at halas hall. what else? list anything you can and not just this "some people" conspiracy CRAP. prove it with facts that our scouts are paid top dollar. prove it with facts that our scouting staff is large enough. prove it with facts we don't hire qualified staff that are new to that coaching position or 2nd and 3rd rate assistants. show me with facts that we pay them the going rate. i will tell you that i have stated 'cheap' as a real POSSIBILITY for this franchises problems NOT that it is set in stone. maybe i'm wrong and they aren't cheap but then what is the other possibility why we have failed for decades? i can only go by the results i see. if this were a new franchise then ok you get some slack. but this is an 80+ year old franchise. we should know how it's done and be able to do it better. we should know when it's not working and we should know what to do about it. so far over the last 25 years we haven't even come close. so if not enough money in the right places then what? you tell me.

this ALL relates to CHEAP. what other reason would you want to void a contract? i could be wrong, but it still seems to me it was also a matter of money for mcginnis's contract. you could look at it like we got him CHEAP for the first 2 years (as an initial low tender for a 2nd choice unknown) and now even it out with an extension that pays him what he supposedly is worth. how much more would we have had to pay if we had gone to a superbowl this last year and his contract came up? just for curiosities sake, what do other nfl coaches get paid in comparison to his old contract? but.... in all truth the reason why he was not mentioned is that there is not enough time expired to decide if we eat any of his contract IF he fails here and the consequences. one other item... why in the history of the bears have we NEVER hired a head coach with prior head coaching experience? could it be they would want more money than someone who has NO record of experience as a coach in the nfl? it's not like we have a record of winning with these coaches. so why offer a large contract to a tuna or gibbs type coaches when you can hire non-experienced coaches for a pittance? if they don't work out... oh well, try it again. i would be interested to know what other winning franchises have never hired an experienced head coach in their entire history.

well... i have to ask. over the last 10 years you don't think this franchise has gone cheap on their coaching staff? in 1997-98 we kept wanny way past was was even reasonable as our HC. he was a complete failure yet we kept him 2 years longer than was sane. why? because he still had a big hit $ wise if we replaced him. THAT'S cheap. moving on......... in 1999 we lowballed our first choice as HC in mcginnis and lost him as a prospect. THAT'S cheap. phillips then hired jauron after mikey was canned by his own mother. jauron - after one good season, with an anemic offense, and a playoff in-and-out we not only renegotiate jauron's contract but his pitiful OC as well. was this done as an atta-boy or in regards to cheapness? if jauron really turned out to be a perennial contender when his contract DID come due, two seasons from then, it would have cost this franchise a LOT more money than it did re-upping his contract than when it did. the smart move was to wait and see how the next season fared. moving on...................... in 2004, one year longer than we should have kept jauron (again so we don't pay a coach who isn't here) we shop around for that clown sabin at LSU, who everyone is drooling over, but decide we don't want to pay him as much as he wants. again we settle for 2nd or 3rd best when we hire smith. hmmm, not cheap? other than building the new training facilities what has the ownership spent money on? the stadium is not theirs plus they have greatly increased their seating income. the gm replaced mikey so the salary is probably comperable. so where are they spending loads of money that makes you think they are not cheap? we got both mcnown AND grossman after trading down while the most logical first choices were still on the board in culpepper and leftwich. why do you suppose that is? 1st, we traded down in hopes that pepper would still fall to us but we would not have to pay him as a top ten pick (#7) in the lower spot (#12). so we ended up picking mcnuthing because our first choice was gone. i also have to ask.... if we had a real management system in place, including gm, scouts and talent evaluators, who knew jack about offense and especially about qb's, would we have chosen this "most ready to start" qb in the first place? to top this off, which of our coaches would you have chosen for ANY input on drafting a qb? crowton? jauron? shoop-a-doop? none of them had ANY nfl offensive experience worth mentioning. also, who in this entire organization was qualified to not only evaluate mcnown, but actually coach him? a dick jauron quote: "Kordell (Stewart) could be our quarterback for a very long time, but the value in Rex Grossman was there and we couldn't pass it up," Bears coach Dick Jauron said. then our defensive minded gm decides to garner more picks in 2003 and pass up leftwich to get haynes, a total bust, and grossman. the pick was leftwich with the #4 pick but it would have been cheaper to get grossman in the bottom of the draft and a less chance to bust with 2 picks. does this say anything about the ability to evaluate qb talent? in all honesty, THIS was the year to trade up for the #1 spot if possible and get palmer. we instead traded down. costs too much for a #1 overall pick? moving on......... another miscue: we SHOULD have gotten 29 year old FA drew bledsoe the previous year, 2002, when he was a free agent but instead we went with a B.U. in the cheaper miller. mirer? this was one of the stupidest decisions in this entire franchises history. again this came about by not having any personel with any clue about offensive talent. we relied exclusively on a DC turned HC in wanny. to trade that high of a draft pick for mirer who was NOT even a starter on his own team was ludicrous. if we had any offensive evaluation personel besides mikey, they would have certainly put the brakes on that trade. but then personel cost money. i think to cut this short, all the instances you mention are perfect examples of what you do when you don't have anyone in the entire organization that knows anything about offense and especially about quarterback talent. if you have failed this miserably for 45 of the last 50 years don't you think SOMEONE in management could figure out some changes need to be made in the way we evaluate and choose our qb's? i just can't believe that to be true.... if our scouts are telling our GM to pick certain players and he keeps picking others that bust, he needs to be fired. so that leaves us with we don't have a large enough staff to scout offensive players, we don't have the RIGHT scouts to evaluate offensive talent, we don't have the key personel to evaluate what the scouts are saying, plus our coaching staff must be inept or they have no input on draft evaluation, AND we don't have quality personel including specialty coaches to evaluate and train the players CORRECTLY we do get.

this is something i have been asking myself since the 70's... why does the chicago bears field such poor qb's year after year at the most important position in the game? 1. they adhered to the wrong philosophy that defense wins championships. 2) every head coach by the bears, post halas, has been defensively minded. they have NEVER even had an offensive coordinator that was top notch in his field let alone a head coach. if anyone doesn't believe that, name a single offensive coordinator that has gone from the bears to the same position or better on another team . EDIT - i deleted the "not counting ditka". even ditka's hiring of coaches in new orleans didn't take our OC but special teams coach. 3) they were/are cheap. A) the cost of good qb's salaries compared to other players in the nfl was/is huge and they weren't willing to pay it. the philosophy of bear management in the 70's to present (pre-finks and post finks) thinks they can sell enough tickets or fill their coffers by fielding a good defense and rarely worried about the offensive side of the ball or it's consequences. C) the cost of personel including specialized scouts and coaching was more than they were/are willing to pay. if you don't know what you are looking at is it surprising you don't pick one who is any good? any other business in the world would hire specialists to find out what is wrong and CORRECT IT if they failed for over 40 years. not us though. this is something gakman, myself and a few others have been yelling for, for years on these boards, that needs to be addressed.

mechanics: to a degree it can be important. although if you have someone who really knows how to coach and/or evaluate qb talent this may not be a serious problem. this should be evaluated by the coaching staff when a draftee is interviewed and observed on film and in tryouts as to whether they believe any problems this player may have could be fixed by coaching or NOT. speed: is not a serious concern for me. physical quickness would be more what i would look for. i don't especially need a qb as a running threat but would prefer one who has enough quickness to pickup at least short yardage when needed and avoid sacks by moving in and out of the pocket. agility: to me this relates to footwork and IS important. especially when moving in and out of the pocket and setting to make his throws, agility is a real consideration. athleticism: only to a degree. i don't particularly need a triathalon type of athlete. quick release: this can be a mental/taught aspect unless there is something physically or mentally wrong with him. big shcool: not a total concern but taken into consideration as to when you really want your qb to start. a smaller school qb 'may' take a bit longer (and maybe not in some instances) to adjust to the speed and complexity of the nfl. again this is an individual mental aspect of each player. as stated.. the physical aspects are important and can't be denied. in my estimation the absolute minimum size for an nfl qb is 6'1". even at 6'1" is pushing it for me in todays nfl. i just would not go for a player that size in the draft unless he was very, very special. the optimum size to me is 6'3" - 6'6". hand size is also an important physical consideration and i agree, arm strength is a very important consideration to determine if a qb can make all the types of throws needed in the nfl and not become physically one dimentional. i have argued this point multiple times. each of these and hundreds more over the years have had the physical requirements but lacked the most important trait of a pro qb, the mental aspect of the pro game. attitude: certainly you don't want some arrogant thug or hostile player that will not fit into your lockerroom. you also want someone who has leadership qualities. intelligence: yes a good qb needs to be able to relate the playbook to game situations but in my estimation the important things any qb that succeeds in the nfl has is the ability dissimilate information quickly and MOST important be able to function in a 3D mental environment. he has to be able to put together in his head in a split second what defense he is seeing and where the defenders will likely be, where to put the ball which relates to where the receiver will be at a given time, the speed of the ball and the height to throw it. THIS is the foundation of touch and accuracy. this is something that can't be determined in an interview or written test and can't be determined in college game film to a finite degree, as to how this player will react to the speed and complexity of the nfl. all you can do is try to determine how mentally nimble a player is in relation to these football aspects and hope. and finally, another very important aspect is coaching. if you have coaches that can teach the pro game and really evaluate what that player is or is not capable of and build a game plan that fits his skill and talent that is a HUGE plus in the developement of quarterbacks. this in MY opinion has been one of the worst attributes of the chicago bears for decades and doesn't appear to have changed. leaf - 6'5" mcnown - 6'1" mirer - 6'3" unitas - 6'1" montana - 6'2" brady - 6'4"

first of all you HAVE to subtract the cap hit from all the players you just released. that is 5.8 million dollars in guaranteed money. you can't just not count it. second... although it might sound nice, do you really believe all these players are going to work for base salary? you really think faneca is going to play for $3mil a year? or briggs play for $3.75 mil a year?? or harris for $5.5 mil? the $11 mil i stated is pretty close to what is left in the polk after you pay the signing bonus money and paying the released players signing bonus money. we still have lost key players and have only $11 mil to pay rookies, new signings to replace what we lost and pay the salaries of briggs, barrien, faneca and harris.

again, i will disagree with your take on this and state that cap is cap is cap and you can't go over the cap whether the owner is rich or not. i understand you saying that an owner can pay out more during a season in amortized amounts over a period of time but in reality this only worked as well as you are stating in the beginning of the changeover from a non-cap to capped league for a few years and that time is over. you are stating amounts in a perfect world where there are no other salary obligations but in reality the previous bonus money and other guaranteed money is coming due year after year for multiple players you signed in the past and you DON'T have some magic amount you can still spend because you are rich. the amortized bonus money can ONLY be extended for a maximum of 6 years so at the most, you can spend POSSIBLY somewhat more in a very limited to non-existant amount of time and eventually it all gets paid back. so no matter how you cut it you can only spend the caps limited amount which is allotted by the league from revenues and nothing more for player salaries.

you may be cutting this a bit thin don't ya think?? ayanbadejo - $ 599,320 barrian - $ 1,022,680 briggs - $ 7,206,000 grossman - $ 2,492,300 miller - $ 4,704,560 walker - $ 1,800,000 r. brown - $ 2,204,320 moose - $ 3,119,080 TOTAL - $23,148,260 subtract accelerated pro-rated signing bonus's miller - $2,400,000 - (2 years at $1,200,000 per year) moose - $3,000,000 - 3 years at $1,000,000 per year) walker - $400,000 - (4 years at $100,000 per year) TOTAL SAVINGS - $17,348,260 IF each of these players signing bonus was set at the MAXIMUM amortization of 6 years (which is unlikely) here is what it costs... Berrian ($15m) $2.5 mil SB per season Briggs ($20m) $3.33 mil SB per season Harris ($30m) $5.00 mil SB per season Faneca ($15m) $2.5 mil SB per season TOTAL - $13.33 mil SB per season. (this accounts no money for base salary or other incentives. any guess as to what that might be?) that means there is a $4,018,260 savings not counting salary or incentives of your new players. 2007 salary cap $109,000,000 2008 salary cap $116,000,000 this equals approximately a $7,000,000 increase in the salary cap from 2007 added to our $4,018,260 savings gives us a surplus of about $11 mil. without including ANY amount for these new contract salaries for players you just signed or ANY money allotted to rookies, we have a difference of about $11 mil. in our 2008 season. PLUS... we have lost at LEAST our #2 quarterback, a special teams ace, a right tackle, and our #2 receiver. so i have to ask... is that even possible, let alone easy, to add all these players under the salary cap as you stated and still field a team? i seriously doubt it.

i forgot to add.... we lost both championship games those seasons too but did have a perfect season.

i guess i don't see where the fins are up on the bears if you want bragging rights the bears have had TWO undefeated seasons... 1934 13-0 1942 11-0 where do these fin bums get off like this is the first time in history? do it TWICE, miami, then come back and talk to us.

6'1" is the absolute minimum for an nfl quarterback in my estimation. this minimum size has to come with needed qualifiers to be a successful nfl qb... mainly athleticism. the ability to move out of the pocket, scramble to find open passing lanes and become at LEAST a minor threat to run for first downs. this is one of grossman's major physical downfalls. he has almost no escape abilities. so what happens with a short pocket qb with these traits? the problems we have consistently seen over his tenure in chicago. can lack of size and speed be overcome? i would say 'possible' but in rare instances. using the shotgun a lot more than we have would certainly have helped along with a good running attack. so do we gamble and sign him to another contract? the injury to rex this season was just another nail in the coffin as to durability. as mcmahon proved, even good qb's are not worth it if they are always injured. the only way i would sign grossman is if he signs a very cap friendly contract AND if i thought this coaching staff would give orton a real shot at the starting job. a REAL level playing field to determine our starter. in my opinion griese is not our future qb so he drops to number 3 if we can't cut him and save cap dollars. the problem is, i don't feel this will ever happen. this coaching staff reminds me a lot of past coaching staffs in their loyalty to certain players whether they deserve it or not. maybe too, they will end up on the same scrap heap for it.

it was an individual poster who (i'm guessing) used the NFLP for base information and probably used an eagles cap site to finish it off. after a few hours of searching for the information i posted previouisly, i couldn't find the original forum i posted that info from. it must be located in another dimension or plain of existence. i did run across some info in my searches for that forum post that may or may not interest you. although you probably have most of these i put down the urls in case you are interested. USA today with good stuff - http://asp.usatoday.com/sports/football/nf...5&year=2007 http://www.thesportjournal.org/2007Journal.../03mirabile.asp http://mysite.verizon.net/nygiantscap/primer.html http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:U1v5Pl...lient=firefox-a NFLPA player search for base salary - http://www.nflpa.org/Resources/ActivePlayerSearch.aspx jags cap guy - http://www1.freewebs.com/jags02/capinfo.htm a pats cap guy - http://www.patscap.com/capsources.html a skins cap info page - http://www.thehogs.net/html/Team/salary.php some team/player breakdowns - http://www.prosportsdaily.com/forums/showthread.php?t=79257 AMCAP - http://sports.groups.yahoo.com/group/AmCapNFL/

LT2_3 - you are correct. i am not sure what happened with that link. it must have been a different site that i copied and pasted that information. it was late and i must have done something wrong. i also didn't take the time to confirm the facts in it and that is why i stated it was not confirmed. the information that i was looking at was the base salary info for 2009 and 2010. i went back and tried to find the forum posting with the original info and couldn't find it but i did find some information that pretty much confirms the 2009 and 2010 cap hits on the pro football weekly site. here is the link to that site (i hope hehehe): http://www.profootballweekly.com/PFW/Featu...7/fanfceast.htm "NFC East free-agent reports - Nov. 13, 2007 Analysis: The biggest decision is whether the team will keep QB Donovan McNabb, who has cap hits of $9.6 million and $9.2 million the next two years, respectively. It has been a rough season for QB and head coach Andy Reid, the principle decision maker along with GM Tom Heckert. Some believe that 2007 second-rounder Kevin Kolb is being prepped to be the starting QB as soon as next year, even though Reid recently gave McNabb a show of confidence by keeping him as the starter." hope this helps

if angie can figure a way out to bring in the talent you *suggest he can under the cap without future cap hell i'm all for it. the reason i mentioned $9-10 mill on his contract is that is what mcnabb is supposed to get in 2009 and 2010. according to the post *below (i didn't confirm any of this so take it for what it's worth) after 3 years he can op out and leave. do we really want to deal with that in 3 years or renegotiate for 5 or more now? if we renegotiate it will probably come out to the figures i posted before as a cap hit with guarantees. as far as career length i wouldn't bet on more than age 36 as a point in which talent seriously declines in qb's. i know.. favre is 38 but i believe he is not a carbon base unit. *OG faneca; QB mcnabb; unknown vet safety or high draft pick; franchised #1 reciever; mystery right tackle either through FA or #14 pick in the draft who will want some pretty good coin; backup vet LB and this hoping that williams is even CLOSE to replacing briggs. **"The contract is, on face, for 12 years. McNabb will void the final three years of the deal (2011-2013), though, by achieving predetermined performance and playing time benchmarks. That reduces what was advertised as a 12-year, $115 contract to nine seasons and $70.551 million. But cap cost is also an important component of any contract, and the cap value of McNabb's deal does not exceed $10 million until the final year of the contract. Here are the annual cap values of the contract, according to NFL Players Association documents: $5.754 million (2002), $7.871 million (2003), $8.948 million (2004), $8.949 million (2005), $8.834 million (2006), $8.835 million (2007), $9.635 million (2008), $9.206 million (2009), and $10.006 million (2010). In addition to the initial $13.5 signing bonus, McNabb will receive an option bonus of $7 million in March 2004. The base salaries are $1.5 million for 2002; $4 million each for 2003-2005; $5.5 million for 2006-2007; $6.3 million for 2008; $9.2 million in 2009; and $10 million in 2010. There is a $999 workout bonus for this season and then offseason conditioning bonuses of $5,600 (2003-2004), $6,160 (2005-2006), and $6,720 (2007-2010). As reported last week, there are the three "dummy" seasons as the back end of the contract, and those are the "voidable" seasons. Technically, the base salaries in those years are $12.07 million (2011), $14.14 million (2012), and $16.21 million (2013)." http://www.dbstalk.com/archive/index.php/t-8122.html

where any of the qb's we had this season "fit in the picture" is certainly a cause for concern. starting with grossman, we had the jeckle and hyde quarterback. his play after being benched was a major improvement from anything we have seen from him since his rookie season. enough improvement that it left open the door as to what he really is able to perform like. it was a major loss to determine what he really is when he went down AGAIN with an injury before the final evaluation could be obtained. that leaves us in the quandry of what do you do with this guy? we know almost nothing more about him than when he was drafted. his luck, injury wise, is abysmal and that is set in stone. i can't think of a qb more mcmahonish in an injury perspective. i have stated in the past (and argued the point) that size in a qb is important and grossman is in the category of smallish, just meeting the minimum size. in almost all instances, a qb of his stature needs escapability and scrambling talent which up to now he has not had to any degree that could be considered a plus. i agree that grossman will probably not sign in chicago. one factor for me would be that the only way we keep grossman is if you really open up (not just LIP SERVICE) competition in camp with orton or even a rookie qb if drafted. he is not going to buy into that unless he has no other teams of interest for him and i don't see that as possible. whether he goes to another team and shines into a HOF qb is possible but we can't keep holding the head of our qb staff's future under water to find out. orton - i see in orton a front line qb that has that ugly word potential. if orton can really grasp the mental aspects of the game he could be the franchise qb we have been desparate to see in chicago for the next 10 years. NOT a passive game manager but a real offensive threat to build an offense around. the improvement from his rookie season is clearly evident to me but we have not seen enough of him to fully grade his mental aspects of the qb position completely. he certainly has the physical aspects and at least up to this point has remained healthy. so the toughness aspect is clearly in his favor (knock on wood). his pocket presence and escapability from what little we have seen is also a plus in his favor. his statis in the near future? i would consider him as the starter next season and draft real talent to push him. griese - i was a great supporter of bringing griese into chicago to backup our starter and in a pinch we should have been able to compete for a SB with this game manager type qb if our defense could perform at the highest level. that perspective for me has changed. griese is not as good as i expected him to be in the backup starter role. that is not to say he couldn't 'possibly' get it done in that role with better personel on our offense and a killer D but i don't see him being millions of dollars better than another vet at a cheaper cap hit and CERTAINLY not a major asset with orton on our roster either as a starter OR backup. should he stay? it depends on how much griese's cap hit is. if it's as high as you say and we won't gain anything by releasing him then yea keep him for another year. the future holds....? maybe the most serious question/problem in respect to our qb situation (other than angie and his inability to evaluate and draft talent) rests squarely with our coaching staff. i have no confidence that this staff can evaluate the talent we have let alone possess the ability to teach them to be better players in the nfl. we have seen grossman handed the keys to the kingdom year after year by these guys without any REAL competition in camp. all we got was lip service about competition when everyone and his brother knew grossman was set in that position barring injury. after seeing orton play the last 3 games of the season, can anyone say with any authority that griese played better than orton? we saw this staff start griese when grossman went down and stick with him through 3 abismal games when clearly kyle orton SHOULD have been the starter. shouldn't this have been seen by this coaching staff from day one in training camp or at the very least in practice during the season?? yet these clowns are so blind that orton was treated as if he were a leper. in fact, i thought there must be something seriously wrong with orton's mental aspect of playing qb to be treated like this by our coaching staff. this is a serious knock on their ability to even know what their own personel they've seen through camp and practice are capable of!! i will state it right now that at the very least, orton should have been our #2 starting the season. if these idiots would have PUT orton in, as it should have been, we would have had a REAL 6 game evaluation of orton when we needed it most (now grossman's contract is up). i have been saying this for years and years. every dinasty has a great qb and especially in this era without one (the nfl is geared to passing offenses) you will be lucky to show up in a SB every 20-30 years let alone win one. again, i would love to have mcnabb but i believe the cost will kill us in the short term. if he were in his prime i would say absolutely, bring him in and build an offense around him for the next 10 years. but he isn't. he is on the downslope of his career at 31 and has been beaten up pretty good in the process. how many years can he play yet? is that enough time to justify what you are giving up to get him in draft picks and salary and will it bring you a superbowl in that short of a timeframe? can you add enough good players around him in this short term time to really compete for a superbowl win? even if we were set for offensive players it usually takes about a year for a qb to get in sinc with different players and a different system. if our offensive line could protect him without additions it might be possible, but face it, we need at a minimum a right tackle and probably at least one guard to go with him. without a beekman or oakly stepping in, i can't see us filling even one of these spots in FA with a quality player we need to keep mcnabb healthy and afford to pay mcnabb. plus, you stated we could possibly get mcnabb for $7 mill a year. that doesn't sound too realistic to me considering a safety just signed a contract for MORE than that. my guess is we will have to pay close to $9-10 mill for a quality qb at least for the short term along with some serious guaranteed money in the future. this still leaves us without a single #1 receiver in the fold. you think mcnabb wouldn't look at our line and lack of receivers and think "i'd have to be nuts to go there"? even if we draft high and get the linemen we need add that cost to our cap PLUS mcnabb would take a beating for at least a year till they fit in (look at the favre situation 2 years ago). my guess if you get the guard you want in FA, faneca, it will cost close to the amount you want to pay mcnabb. i don't see us being able to pay these amounts and add that to the cost you want to pay a good safety in free agency and tagging barrien as a franchise player at probably around $7-9 mill a year by himself. if we cut half our team we couldn't stay under the cap with that many FA additions.

hehehe... i have to disagree with your disagreement. i am going to go beyond the accuracy problems which i stated he needs to work on ALTHOUGH he has CERTAINLY improved in that aspect. now on to mechanics... if you are watching orton's most recent games and especially the game against the saints i don't understand what you are saying about orton's "wind up" being detrimental. to be quite honest he has a semi-traditional (at least traditional over the last 20 years and maybe longer, i can't say for sure) throwing motion. your statements about coaches telling qb's to hold the ball cocked and high near the ear, is not used exclusively past youth type football anymore. there are exceptions and i am sure a percentage of college and professional qb's may do this (manning comes to mind) but this is not in my opinion the litmus test for qb mechanics and certainly not a large percentage of them do this. in fact (i am not sure of your opinion of brees but if i remember right you wanted to get him along with me as a free agent two? years back) drew brees has a near identical *throwing motion as orton. here is what i am seeing from orton: good footwork dropping back and orton, in most instances, is using a 4-6 step dropback from the LOS. he is planting the anchor foot correctly while holding the ball with BOTH hands (which will prevent fumbles) at chest level in the middle of his number. this is pretty standard of about every qb with maybe the exception of a **few. when he starts his release, he brings the ball out laterally from his chest and moves/rotates his elbow (which is about level with his shoulder) forward and snaps the ball from this position using the power of his shoulder, hips and back to gain velocity. all this time his shoulders are squared away toward where the ball is going, which is critical, all the while stepping into the throw on his leading foot. if he does this correctly and is not throwing off balance you will see his trailing foot come off the ground on the follow through. i wanted to look at brees considering he was groomed in college by the same people as orton and it proved out. i also DID take a look at both of holmgrens (who i very much respect as someone who can see the potential and groom/teach a qb to play in the nfl) students of the game in favre and hasselbach. hass has a very similar release as orton and favre, well, he is a wildcard that would take more time to study than i wish to spend but there are 'some' similarities. players i believe throw similar to orton, besides brees, would be brady (i believe), bledsoe and warner to name a few and possibly garcia is somewhere in that ballpark. i'd also like to comment on the ball getting swiped by de's with the throwing motion orton uses. any time you put the ball out away from your body you are subject to getting stripped. this is not something that is exclusive to this type of throwing motion but maybe stats would find that it happens more with these specific types of qb's. i really don't feel like looking up that much data but if you wish to i would be happy to view them and maybe we would find they are getting stripped more often, who knows. now on to a final note... i watched favre's, brees's and hasselbach's release and to be honest i just did not see a GREAT difference in the quickness of their release compared to orton once the throwing motion begins. this is NOT, and i repeat NOT, saying every qb throws the same velocity or has the same quickness of release as this surely depends upon every individual but visually they were to me close. i also did not compare them side by side with clocks that register in the thousandths of a second as i don't have any equipment like that, but i would be willing to bet that those releases that i compared in similar dropbacks were in the same league. i disagree on keeping griese and especially for the paycheck he gets. in my opinion orton (EVEN assuming he can't cut it in camp or on the field as a starter) can surely replace griese and in my opinion do it better. that said i would also like a veteran on my FOUR QUARTERBACK roster but someone similar to (mental block, can't think of the guy in SF who won SB with ravens) at a cheap price. EVEN someone similar to testaverde or even a blake type guy to fall behind (hopefully) our qb draft picks this year. as far as mcnabb... i truely would like a mcnabb if we had a team to WIN, not just make the playoffs, a superbowl. i don't believe we do at this time and if we do pay mcnabb the kind of money and draft picks philly will want we will more likely than not win a superbowl for mcnabb's tenure in chicago. it would put us behind by too much considering we need to pay top dollar for a receiver and an offenisve lineman unless one of ours happens to be good. we also need some help on our defense with either a good free agent or first day draft pick. where would all this help come from especially with mcnabb's contract probability? *incidently if you want to read about this type of release, phil simms wrote some information on it at: http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:_0EvDt...lient=firefox-a **favre comes to mind here. favre is at times holding the ball around waist level and has a roundhouse throwing motion in many instances which IS pretty unconventional.

i agree with you on his pocket presence. in that area from what i have seen he moves around the pocket extremely well. i see no problem with his mechanics. his footwork is, in my opinion, very good. he is smooth moving back from under center in 3-5 step drops and is planting his lead foot solidly and stepping into his throws. he is also very smooth in his handoffs to our backs which is another very important trait. i am not seeing a qb with "happy feet" under pressure. i know you (and others) have said he has a windup which leads to a slow release. to be honest i don't agree with this. in my opinion he is getting the ball out quickly and with velocity. i just don't see this windup problem with orton. he also appears to be seeing the field well and not locking in on one receiver as often as one would expect considering the actual games he has played since his rookie season. he also seems to know where the pressure is coming from in blitz packages and can move about to compensate. i believe his main problem in the past has been accuracy. i have seen great improvement from orton in this aspect over the last 3 games. this is not to say he doesn't need some improvement, especially in the short to medium sideline passes, but it looks to me like he is finally "getting it". that said he HAS improved his 'touch' on dump offs and screens. i wish we could have see orton play a few more games but to me, he certainly looks like he can play in the nfl. so that leaves us where? i think he clearly has made griese obsolete. i would also consider orton as starting material who could build upon what we have seen to become a possible very good qb in chicago. he has size and arm strength and the only thing holding him back in the past was his mental aspects of the game OR this coaching staff. right now at this point in his career he is playing as good or better than harbaugh at the height of his career in chicago. this with only the rookie starts and these final three games he can now tout that ugly word... potential, to become a good to VERY good starter. not only would i keep orton but i would seriously consider him as competing for our starting job next season on a LEVEL playing field whether we keep grossman or not. also in my opinion this makes mcnabb obsolete considering what the costs would be to come to chicago. i would also, as i have stated ad nauseum, draft at least one qb and possibly two (and NOT draft qb's to be considered as backups but STARTERS), and bring in a cheap veteran to play our #2-4 qb if grossman goes. if grossman stays he will seriously have to beat out orton and not this crap we have seen in the past of anointing him as our starter. this adds to my concern of our coaching staffs ability to judge qb talent. up to the point they put him in for the last three games they considered orton an afterthought or practice squad quality qb. in my opinion they couldn't have been more wrong.

this is in regards to comparing DT's. yes, the DE's play effects the DT's. it also effects every player on the entire field! i do agree that all-pro players playing next to you will elevate your play to a certain degree but the difference can't make a bad player into a good one no matter how you look at it. it would be nearly impossible to judge the talent of any single player in the nfl if you held this standard. you seem to believe that the process to determine the value of a DT should correlate directly to the DE's playing next to him. this is incorrect. for instance... if that were the case when discussing safeties or corners you would lump them into one catagory, defensive backs, to determine the quality of a player not even playing the same position. i'm sorry but that is wrong. you base the value of a player by what he accomplishes at HIS designated position. that is the only way it could possibly work. if he is average then what do you consider the replacements angie has put on our roster? which tackles in the league are above average that you think we could get? who are all those "who feel his loss was so tragic to this team"? what are you talking about? he is average because you didn't make a big deal about it or the fans aren't diving into the stands with pitchforks and torches? have you heard any of the fans upset at how pathetic our run defense is? any pundits or analysts? anyone at all?? are YOU happy with it? so yea, you wanted to cut him a long time ago, and replace him with WHO to make this team better? here are some stats to ponder... bear defense 2004 ian scott - RDT - 13 GS al boone - RDT - 2 GS tank - RDT - 1 GS tommy harris - 16 GS rank against the run: rushing attempts - 27th; yds - 2050 - 25th; TD - 9 - 8th; yds per att - 4.1 - 16th 2005 ian scott - RDT - 13 GS al boone - RDT - 1 GS tank - RDT - 4 GS tommy harris - 16 GS rank against the run: rushing attempts - 18th; yds - 1637 - 4th; TD - 9 - 4th; yds per att - 3.7 - 9th 2006 ian scott - RDT - 7 GS al boone - RDT - 4 GS tank - RDT - 10 GS tommy harris - 11 GS rank against the run: rushing attempts - 5th; yds - 1590 - 6th; TD - 7 - 2nd; yds per att - 4.0 - 11th 2007 - the stats below are over a 14 game span. the player info is 15 games. anthony adams - RDT - 8 GS - .5 sacks - 21 solo darwin walker - RDT - 7 GS - 1 sacks - 12 solo mat toeaina - RDT - 0 GS - 0 sacks - 2 solo jimmy kennedy - RDT - 0 GS - 0 sacks - 0 solo tank - GONE tommy harris - 14 GS rank against the run: rushing attempts - 26th; yds - 1737 - 25th; TD - 16 - 29th; yds per att - 4.2 - 22nd do you see any difference from the 2007 league defensive standings and the 2006 or 2005? all combined in 2007, our right tackles have a total of 1.5 sacks. also most of the large running gains were over the RDT and RDE position. say what you want, the stats don't lie. our defense against the run dropped like a lead balloon since tank has been gone. our sacks by our RDT's have declined by over 150%, from 4 to 1.5. coincidence? tanks statistics are comparable to 2006 pro-bowl tackles so just to set the record straight, if tank is "average" and "over-rated" just what do you think a good to very good defensive tackles numbers should look like? i really would like an answer to this. maybe we both are a little confused. i could only have logically assumed that you were talking about a player in his 3rd year and NOT his 3rd year as a "starter". otherwise what sense does it make? tank has been in the NFL for only 3 years (prior to this one) and has had only ONE year as a designated starter and that was 2006!! are you serious? what reasons in the first place were those? the biggest bitch was about his DOGS barking. does THAT require a 6 week investigation to you? you think they might have knocked on his door and asked him? i agree. discharging a firearm nearly 2 months before, near halloween, would be kind of hard to prove. in fact it would be impossible to prove it even WAS a firearm and not fireworks. but then i guess it wasn't important enough for the police to bother showing up, when they were allegedly called, to find out. you stated on numerous occasions the police were called with reports of gunfire. if what you say is true where did you read this and please post a link. even IF that is the case, nobody knows who was shooting and who wasn't. did the police investigate any of these alleged multiple gunshot filings? you also stated "Tank was out back shooting his guns". there is no possible way you could know this and it is purely speculation on your part. you also infer a couple of ounces of weed was involved but claimed by posey. end of that story don't ya think? on any item or combined items that were listed by these cops did ANY warrant a 6 week investigation, a police armoured vehicle, a swat team, and flash grenades while children were in the residence???? that is plain insane. i guess i am not so afraid of my neighbors that i wouldn't talk to them about something like this if it happened and it bothered me enough to call the cops. one final note on tank. however you spin it he was not charged with anything on his DUI. he was under the limit for DUI in arizona and probably anywhere in the US. that states there is no crime committed. that other bogus crap arizona wants to use is just a semi legal way to harass anyone they feel like and bust anyone they want to garner fines. so he was let go for no reason other than a traffic violation and i'm not even sure they proceeded with that. it's not a question of what i think. it's a point of reality. i am going on what url has stated himself that he has a spinal arthritic condition. spinal problems are the beginning of the end of an athletes career especially one in a high contact sport. it only stands to reason if you have spinal damage you won't be lifting to your max and lose body mass and muscle tissue not to mention the effect it has on your ability to run or use your legs at a pace you were accustomed to before. can he stay around a while? probably. but to think his abilities won't erode significantly over a short span of years, if what he states is true, is just wishful thinking. is just getting into the playoffs (which in reality could be 8-8 in any given season) where the bar is set for achievment for this franchise? although management has seemed to think so over the last 50 years it is not enough by far. your statement of needs to address is a complete blowup of a team. your goal set IS a rebuilding mode. 2-3 years to develop a line along with FA aquisitions including WR's is certainly not tweaking. you talk about adding the top guard in FA but at what cost? he alone will eat up any and all cap room almost immediately. where would you even possibly find the money mcnabb would want and fit it under our cap especially if we pick high in the draft to get the players you hope for? to think we can build a team to beat ACTUAL superbowl contenders with the roster we have now in one season is ludicous unless some help comes from unlooked for places. like existing young linemen already on our squad or orton developing OR really gambling the on grossman by offering him an extension and if you lose that gamble you are done for at least 5 years. we have absolutely no key players on offense at this point... none!! the whole crux of this problem rests squarely on angelo's shoulders by not drafting quality first day players over the last 5 years!! i see it as taking us a minimum of 2-3 years again if all goes well to be a SB contender with teeth.

how can you possibly compare talent/play between tackles and ends?? that is totally unrealistic. too low expectations? i think not. my expectation from a 2nd round pick is 'realistically' a good to very good player... a starter. if you pick a pro-bowl/HOF player in the second that is above and beyond the expectations but certainly a bonus. to miss at picking a starting player in round 2 is a failure of that pick. this ALSO holds true if you are picking in the bottom half of the 1st round, but.... if you pick in the top 10 of the draft, that player better be something more than good and at the least, very good to EXCELLENT!!! is it going to happen every time? no of course not but when it doesn't the rule STILL holds true as to failure or success of your decision to pick that guy. first... here is what you stated: "First, I personally always felt Tank was over-rated. He played on a DL loaded w/ talent, and I simply never felt he produced near to the level he was expected to." well then what did you mean by saying "Tank was over-rated"? if he wasn't getting "pushed around" or bottled up why do you say he was over rated? over rated by whom? who ever said tank was the best tackle in the nfl? every defensive tackle HAS to be able to stop the run. i understand you saying he isn't a budah but isn't that the point of his talents? he can stop the run AND push in the pocket to get to a qb and use his 300 lb quickness and speed to his advantage. you can't be serious... 2006 PRO BOWL richard seymour - pats - 4 sacks - solo 22 marcus stroud - jags - 2.5 sacks - solo 19 Jamal Williams - bolts - 2 sacks - solo 49 rod coleman - falcons - 6 sacks - solo 20 shaun rogers - lions - 3 sacks - solo 19 tommy harris - bears - 5 sacks - 22 solo =============== tank johnson - 4 sacks - 22 solo tackles am i saying he is a pro-bowl player? not neccessarily but please don't give me he is just a below average over rated player. pulhease. if you want to go tit for tat then fine. the truth of the matter is he was far removed from being a top pick in the draft. again, if you had read my post even reasonably carefully, i NEVER compared player to player quality. only, and let me repeat this, ONLY, did i compare the two between the shadow hampton cast over mcmichel who was a very good player in his right to the shadow and hype harris (deservedly so) cast over tank in chicago. by the way, you don't even have your facts straight. mcmichael only had 2.5 sacks in his 3rd year, and played in NINE games while starting ZERO. first: the entire raid on his house was a trumped up bogus load of horse $%!#. to bring in an armoured vehicle, use flash grenades WITH children in the house, for the crap they hoped to find is beyond ridiculous. in any event under those circumstances any responsible law enforcement personel could have defused this entire mess by 1. stopping in and talking to him at his home. 2. if that failed or they decided on another tac, pick him up at work and bring him home with a search warrant. you think they couldn't figure out where he worked??? add to this his HUGE criminal results ended up charging him with untagged guns that were registered in arizona (where they should be since this was his home state). are you kidding me? they were in his freakin chicago home. he wasn't packed running around the town. those stupid cops and the idiot media made it sound like they just busted up a terrorist cell. also i am amazed at your take "Likely thanks to his refusing to take the breathalizer and waiting hours later for a blood sample, he did not register over the legal limit, but at the same time, there was no question he had been out drinking, and then got behind the wheel of a car.", aren't you a lawyer? where i came from there is a huge difference between "likely" and proven facts. no question he had a drink? so what if he did as long as he wasn't drunk driving. the amount in his system was like a single drink hours before if i'm not mistaken (and well could be). so on this other BS charge that was dropped, angie says i can't take it anymore? this after he keeps this manning jr. thug who beats the $%!& out of some geek with two or three other athletes???? are you kidding me? when this happened, tank is suspended or going to be suspended by the nfl. he is not subject to work at this time, he is in his home state, has not done ANYTHING illegal other than drive late at night. so freakin what? i drive whenever i dammed well want to whether it's 3 p.m. or 3 a.m. he is fired by angie before they even know the facts. what does this sound like to you? i have stated and believe briggs is not a luxery but a serious need. with url's age and injury catching up to him, where do we go? would you feel great with hilly at MLB along with williams on the outside and some mystery backer on the other side? we would seriously get killed. if you don't believe that look at the bengles. they can't keep up with their offense without good backers. you think we could? "a) IMHO, if we sign him, it will take away from our ability to help other areas. I believe you are VERY high on fixing the OL. Well, that is going to cost both money and draft picks, and if we give Briggs greater than $20m guaranteed, I think it unlikely we will spend big on the OL." there is so much wrong with this team right now i don't see us even in the hunt for a superbowl next season. you could reasonably say we are rebuilding yet again, thanks to angie. count the holes and tell me where 1 or 2 FA's will make us a team to beat the pats. if we had THREE first round picks we couldn't get this team on an even keal to do that. can you even tell me who the qb will be?? is it possible to come out of this tail spin? yes but the odds are you are going to crash and burn first. "I think it far from a fact Urlacher is on his way out, and his MNF performance would seem to be evidence to the opposite" you are whistling past the graveyard. if he has an arthritic back he is on the serious downward slope. unless this is some minor crap he is spouting, he can't lift to keep strength, he can't even run normally and it's going to get worse quickly. he could coast for a few more years with good talent around him, but if he is paired with rookies and average linebackers don't count on him overcompensating for poorer talent anymore. if you think hilly can replace url, you are in for a serious surprise if that happens. briggs could possibly do it if we change our scheme to match what player we have if needed. as far as your reference to "Holdman", anyone could have replaced that bum. so what is the point on that? also if angie is worth spit he can find the money NEXT season to sign harris.

i strongly disagree with this statement. you state we have/had a DL loaded with talent. are you talking about interior linemen or the DL as a whole? it certainly can't be our interior line as angie let the entire squad with the exception of harris and garay, walk. tank johnson produced on the level, and more than what is expected, of a 2nd round draft pick. harris was NOT the only player getting double teamed last season in the interior line. tank has the quicks getting off the LOS which is very important with a solid push up the middle filling his hole. he was not pushed out anywhere close to what the talent angie replaced him with which is one reason our run defense this season was pathetic. tank also has some speed that can move him down the line to make the tackles out of his area and flush a qb. players like tank are the guys you HOPE turn out this good with a later first day pick. a situation similar to a steve mcmichel being overshadowed by hampton. i still have to say that what tank was charged and used to release him with was total BS. you can thank these stupid cops for the amount of publicity tank got because they had to justify a complete waste of a huge amount of taxpayers money on a personal vendetta. if you don't believe me look at the charges. the only really stupid one on tanks part is the going out after hours to get rid of his live-in friend which violated his probation for doing basically nothing. even the trumped up charge in arizona was totally bogus. believe me i am not for coddling punks and thugs in the nfl and certainly not a homer, but this crap was to the extreme in his case and in my opinion based upon his disrespect of authority in his first charge. we NEVER should have released him. agree on olsen's injury. agree that grossman CERTAINLY was pulled with reason. i am not sure of how this situation progressed throughout the season as far as who stared and who didn't. i think they kept anderson in there a lot longer than was warranted. alex brown simply was needed to stop the mess we had on the right side of our DL against running plays. there is NO excuse for seeing what we did for so long. anderson should play the part he was good at, the pass rush, and 'groomed' more before being announced as the starter to determine his worth. he needed more experience. this is on our coaching staff. we CERTAINLY do not want to trade alex brown this offseason. we have a good combo with anderson and him together. another thing i do not agree with you is briggs. (another post about trading players) if we dump briggs this offseason we are in serious trouble with our defense. he is a young probowl player no matter what anyone spins the sitation as. that is NOT over-rated for a young guy to make it multiple years as all-pro and/or pro bowl player. if anyone couldn't see the difference in play when he sits and williams plays is just not looking close enough. url is definately on his way out of the nfl with the cronic back problems. his play will suffer and that is a fact. that leaves us with an average hillenmeyer, who plays situationally, and who? williams? also if we let briggs go, who COULD play the middle if url is out, who steps in? this reverts a very good linebacking corp, which is essential to lovies crappy cover 2, to mediocre at best. now to david haugh's column: this is a BS statement. first of all jones wanted out of chicago for a bigger payday. it was impossible to keep this lockeroom animosity going another season for the good of all. that said... i DO agree that if you or your coaching staff hasn't determined if benson can fill this position alone then it's on our GM and coaching staff to cut bait (dump benson) and we have some real problems in our future with our management. totally agree with haugh's comments on the angie reaches in the draft and his lack of offensive talent over the last 5 years. in fact angie's record of first day picks over his previous 5 drafts is very, very dismal. the safety mess is a good example of bad management decisions on not only the GM but our coaching staff.

clock management from this coaching staff has been atrocious. there is NO excuse for what we see week in week out, year in year out. as you stated, in this game there was time for the punt and probably a couple of plays to go with the return with >>15 SECONDS add to this crap is week after week i see us kneel on the ball or some idiotic run up the middle to end the first half. these instances we even have good field position and a half a minute left. it is just plain gutless to play this way when you NEED any kind of spark to ignite your offense or your team is already on the ropes for the season. it's just mindboggling!!!

speaking of intentional grounding... when the vikes qb was chased out of bounds he just lobbed the ball out and never even tried to throw it upfield. maybe i'm wrong, they change the rules every 5 mins) but that is an intentional grounding if the ball doesn't reach or is attempted to reach the LOS the last i heard. and holding? the vikes were grabbing onto guys arms and jerseys all night long, BLATANTLY. this new way the league has of letting guys hold on every down is terrible. that means it is almost always a judgment call for the refs.

i absolutely would have kept johnson. it was stupid to dump a guy like that for the nothing crap he got busted for. and another team is dealing with that mess... the freakin cowboys!! again... LOOKED like an excellent setup, especially on paper. how can you or anyone else say dusty is a "nightmare" for other teams? we know absolutely nothing about him. we had a very good interior line last season. they proved it through fire. so what does angie do? he dumps the entire line with the exception of harris!! he turned one of the strongest points on this team into an unknown and the results are what you see now.

i think releasing our string of DT's has had a huge impact on or d-line and especially tank johnson. tank was a superb compliment to harris and had good quickness and speed for a DT. if they doubled up harris tank had a lot of push up the middle. he also was decent at stopping the run. if they doubled up tank, harris was a force up the middle. i didn't like releasing tank at the time and after watching this defense i like it even LESS!! add to this mess called our interior d-line, you got rid of boone who was actually starting to play a LOT better than he had in the past and ian scott. both would have been very reasonable to sign. go figure, boone starts to play very good as a rotational tackle so angie dumps him. i put this all on angelo.

Clenched_CLAW - "his assertion to draft 2 QBs annually until a HoF QB is on the roster" i strongly believe that this team needs to carry 4 qb's on the active roster and at least one on the practice squad every season until they can find legitimate qb's to play in the nfl. notice i said multiple. if other teams can keep producing a quality starters AND produce lower round backups that are sought after in the nfl when their contracts are up as starters, i see no reason the bears can't either. a prime example was green bay. look at how many qb's behind favre went on to become starters in the nfl or at the least quality backups. this is one viable way where you can make trades with another franchise to get either more draft picks or a special player you are after. it just takes a commitment by this franchise to hire (and PAY them good money) key personnel that will be able to tell the difference between real gold and fools gold and groom those said qb's into very real pro prospects. otherwise without some real talent evaluator we would be hanging onto guys that are no better than quinn type players and defeating the whole process and go on as we have over 4 decades. on a different note: i miss putting titles up on replies. is there something i am missing on how to do that in this forum?