adam

1 - SUN, September 13 12:00 p.m. at Panthers/Young - WIN 2 - SUN, September 20 12:00 p.m. Vikings/McCarthy-Murray - WIN 3 - MON, September 28 7:20 p.m. Eagles/Hurts (MNF) - WIN 4 - SUN, October 4 12:00 p.m. Jets/Smith - WIN 5 - SUN, October 11 3:25 p.m. at Packers/Love - LOSS (Parsons-dependent) 6 - SUN, October 18 12:00 p.m. at Falcons/Penix-Tua - WIN 7 - THU, October 22 7:15 p.m. Patriots/Maye (TNF) - WIN 8 - MON, November 2 7:20 p.m. at Seahawks/Darnold (MNF) - LOSS 9 - SUN, November 8 7:20 p.m. Buccaneers/Mayfield - WIN 10 - Bye (7-2) 11 - SUN, November 22 12:00 p.m. Saints/Shough - WIN 12 - THU, November 26 12:00 p.m. at Lions/Goff (TNF) - LOSS 13 - SUN, December 6 12:00 p.m. Jaguars/Lawrence - WIN 14 - SUN, December 13 12:00 p.m. at Dolphins/Willis - WIN 15 - SAT, December 19 7:20 p.m. at Bills/Allen (SAT) - LOSS, I would not be surprised if players get sick from going from the heat in Miami to Buffalo in short order. 16 - FRI, December 25 12:00 p.m. Packers/Love (FRI) - WIN 17 - SUN, January 3 3:25 p.m. Lions/Goff - WIN 18 - TBD, January 10 TBD at Vikings/McCarthy-Murray - WIN 13-4 based on a 4-2 division record?

The worst stretch is NE at home on TNF on short rest to then go to SEA the following week. At least that is MNF and they will have extra rest for that game. Pre-bye 9 games, at worst 5-4, probably 6-3 or better. Post bye 8 games, at worst 4-4, probably 5-3, for an 11-6 record, give or take a win or two. A lot has to go wrong to finish 9-8. Play to expectation, seems like 11-12 wins. 3-3 in the Division (at worst), CAR, NYJ, ATL, NO, MIA seems like 8 wins. Then PHI, NE, SEA, TB, JAX and BUF. It feels like a split with those at 3-3 is 11 wins without a reach. Am I missing something? I could see the Bears sweeping MIN, splitting with GB/DET for a 4-2 record, which would push the wins to 12. PHI, NE, TB, JAX are all at home. BUF and SEA are the really tough road games.

Opening up against CAR, MIN, PHI, and NYJ before going to GB. Should be at least 3-1 heading to GB. Will Parsons be 100% on Oct 11th? He tore his ACL on December 14th and didn't have surgery until the 29th. October 11th would be 9 months and 13 days post surgery. 9-12 months is the typical recovery time. So there is a good chance he is not ready to play in Week 5. Then after GB, they play ATL, but then turn around and play NE at home on TNF. So the Bears will be traveling back from ATL while NE is traveling from home to Chicago. The Bears get a mini-bye and play their next game in SEA. They are the only team in the NFL to play the Super Bowl teams in back to back weeks. Fun. Interestingly, the Bears get a huge chunk of time at home, because they then play TB at home, they have their bye week, and come out of their bye to play NO at home. They then go on short rest to DET for Thanksgiving, come back home on long rest to play JAX in Chicago in December, then travel back to back to MIA, then BUF. The temperature difference is going to be crazy. Chi to Mia to Buf in 3 weeks. BUF is also on Saturday, so a short week traveling from a road game to a road game kind sucks. They then return home on another short rest and play on Friday for Christmas at home against GB. They end the season with 3 straight division games, playing DET, then MIN at MIN for Week 18. I wish the bye was more useful, leading into a short week or a road game would've been better. 6 short week games. 2x THU games, 1 FRI, 1 SAT, and 2 games after MNF. However, I do like the more balanced BYE at Week 10. The last 4 years they have either had super early or super late byes in Week 5, 7, 13, and 14. 9-11 is the sweet spot. They play 9 games before the bye and 8 after. They have 4 home and away games after the bye. 3 times they play at least back to back home games, and only twice are they on the road for back to back games.

and this move to more 13-personnel would reduce the overall snap count of the WR group. Thus making Moore even more expendable. Even 12 personnel can cut down on WR snaps, but 13-personnel brings it down to 1x WR, so even Burden or Odunze will be off the field for those plays.

Week 1 - @CAR Week 7 TNF - NE Week 12 - Thanksgiving - @DET

It basically forces teams to use 3 LBs. Looking at LB coverage grades, I was surprised to see D'Marco Jackson as the 2nd highest rated LB in coverage, only behind Fred Warner. 4th was a guy named Devin Bush who played in CLE last year. 18th was TJ Edwards. So the Bears have 3 of the top 18 coverage LBs in the NFL. On the flip side, there are a few others from the division, Cooper from GB was 9th and Campbell from DET was 12th. So the Bears may have gotten ahead of this trend on both offense and defense.

It seems that we finally have one benefit, the 3rd least amount of travel: and if the Bears open the season in Seattle on Wednesday, they would have 3,432 miles already out of the way and have the least amount of travel for the remainder of the season by a huge margin. Panthers are the least with 8,740, but if the Bears got that 3400 out of the way before Carolina even played, the Bears would only have about 7,244 left (the least by 1500 miles). Teams like SF and LAR will spend over 4 days worth of time on airplanes during the season.

Glad to see Caleb working with WRs and Loveland outside of the facility. Burden, Jahdae, Odunze, and Loveland seem to be getting extra work in which is great to see. First at USC then at Northwestern.

Then you add the lack of compensation for the Cunningham stuff and the recent scheduling, it seems that Goodell doesn't care too much for the McCaskeys. If you look at the bye weeks, the Bears have gotten shafted almost every year. They never get a favorable bye. Then when they had an international game, it was considered a home game, so they ended up with only 7 games at Soldier Field.

Another slot option.

I am not saying anyone sucks, just at this point the Bears have gotten zero return on investment for Pick 109 from the 2025 draft. BUF used that pick on Deone Walker, who is a starting DT for the Bills and would be a first round pick in a redraft. The Bears were weak at DT and Poles decided to trade out of that spot and then pick Hyppolite and Frazier with the new picks. That is a terrible exchange. The Bears scouting staff seems biased one way or another. It seems to not work more than it works. So you get Monangai in the 7th but miss on Velus, Pickens, Scott, etc in earlier rounds. I know every team misses on picks but in 5 years Poles has wasted more than an entire draft's worth of picks. That miss rate is too high. He needs to hit on this 2026 draft and all future drafts otherwise there will be a steep dropoff in talent when Caleb's new money hits.

LT is still a question mark, but a healthier Braxton is better than an injured one.

Frazier thing sucks for everyone. The Bears traded Pick #109 and drafted Hyppolite and Frazier. Got literally zero out of that pick. BUF got a productive DL with that pick btw.

For GB, they are betting on Parsons health on defense, and the health of Watson and Kraft on offense. I don't know why Kraft is getting so much love. He had 2 great games last year, but those were the 2 best games of career, and the only two games over 90 yards receiving. So to me, those were outliers, not some new trend. Those games plus 2 games where he had a TD with only 2 receptions really warped his stats per game and per reception. However, for his career, he averages 37 yds per game, which is 8 yards more than Cole Kmet.

Without considering the draft picks, which right now seem to favor the Bears, it seems like every other NFC North team got worse this offseason. GB lost 2 guys on their O-Line, plus Quay Walker, Rashan Gary, and Wicks and Doubs at WR. At some point in the last few years both Doubs and Wicks were anointed as WR1s. GB's big add, Javon Hargrave who was subpar last year in a MIN defense that was really good. They traded for Zaire Franklin, who is a less dynamic Quay Walker. They also lost Malik Willis who was arguably the best QB2 in the NFL. So to me, they will take a step back. They also lost their DC. DET lost Monty, Decker, Glasgow, Reader, and Raymond and only added Cade Mays at Center. They also added Pacheco but he does not get the dirty yards that Monty got. They seem to be taking another step back. Another team that expects to get better from within. MIN lost Greenard, Kelly, Hargrave, Allen, and Harrison Smith. That defense will not be the same, and they still have 9 at QB. Their big add was Eric Wilson at LB? What am I missing here? How are they winning 8 games? The Bears may not have gotten substantially better on paper, but they didn't get worse. Byard Brisker becomes Bryant Thieneman, which should be an overall upgrade. Edmunds to Bush is an upgrade. The two biggest losses outside of the guys already mentioned are Moore and Dalman. Dalman was literally replaced by 2 guys, and Moore's targets are going to Burden, Odunze, Loveland, Thomas, Raymond, and Roush. So not all of Moore has to be replaced by a rookie.

I think Jacas and Jones were their top 2 guys at 57, Jacas goes at 55, so you could with C#1 at 57. It does make sense. I guess the only argument you could make is trading back from 57 to get more in return than 60, but then you risk getting sniped at 58 and 59.

I do like that the Bears are finally getting with the program and understanding the college pipelines. They haven't been going with too many small school players. Zah Frazier was the only pick in the last few years from a "small" school. I would like a few more picks from top 5 schools but this is a solid group. Oregon - 13-2 (4th) Iowa - 9-4 (17th) Stanford 4-8 LSU 7-6 Texas 10-3 (12th) ASU 8-5 GT 9-4 (31st)

Probably pissed off that he had to wait to 124 to get picked when he was projected in the 3rd.

and free agency will be a thing of the past. They may sign one bigger contract per season, but they will have to make it work via trade and the draft.

That is true. Just like in previous years, I am leery about older prospects (thanks Velus) because it is hard to gauge their actual performance considering they are playing against a lot of 18 and 19 yr olds at 23 and 24.

Not that it would impact the Bears, but free agents signed now won't impact comp pick formula.

Logan Jones will be 25 in October, he is at least a year older than Loveland, Turner, Burden, Walker, Sewell, Odunze, Newman, Monangai, and Booker. Jones is only 3 years younger than Dalman.

The Bears won't be able to afford Edge, LT, DT, or CB in free agency once Caleb's contract extension hits. So the best way to offset that is to have as many players at the highest cap positions on rookie deals in 2029. So any player drafted this year after the 1st round would have one year before they would have to be resigned. I have to think that was considered. Basically every player in a high cap positional value position would be unlikely to get a 2nd contract unless they were a stud. However, lesser position guys like S, C, and TE could be resigned, because their average cap hit for that position is less. So it would make sense for the Bears to invest fully in Edge, DT, CB, and OT in the top 3 rounds of 2027, 2028, and 2029 to offset Caleb's incoming deal.

It is just starting to feel like Poles MO. Zig when the league is zagging.