Lucky Luciano

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?

was on the first page of the old bear report bear forum when it started in '96 in sun prairie, wi as choad and had a double moniker - Lucky Luciano also. once they moved to their west coast site i left and dropped into the bearshrine, around 2000, and stayed, occasionally visiting the bear report site till they went pay to play. was there when it went to bearstalk and finally dropped in here to the final move (hopefully).

thanks for the headsup about the new site on the other board LT. i have changed my moniker on here from choad to Lucky Luciano. so it goes.