AZ54

I hope the "Prescott" mentioned in this thread is not Dak Prescott of Mississippi State. He's horrible throwing the ball, very inaccurate on anything longer than 10 yards. I'll be amazed if anyone drafts him but then again this is the NFL and someone will think "he can run" let's take him. I haven't seen Goff play this year but he's shown some promise in years past. Definitely worth keeping an eye on him.

Looking ahead to this week's matchup against Arizona I think we have a shot to win. It's always hard to say what you have on a team (theirs or ours) after week 1 but I think we matchup better here for one simple reason: Carson Palmer is more Jay Cutler than he is Aaron Rodgers. Despite all the media hype and love of Palmer I've seen him have equally bad games as Cutler, often worse. He can make equally nice throws into coverage too so you just don't know what you'll get. He is a stationary target and that will help our pass rushers quite a bit, especially if we can get some pressure up the middle. Larry Fitzgerald: He's not as quick or as fast as he used to be so he is typically very well covered and often doesn't get passes thrown his way. Somehow he had 6 receptions last week. He still has great hands and can make tough catches in traffic. I'm not worried about him coming into the game. More often than not I see him making plays on crossing routes underneath the coverage. Michael Floyd: Another big body WR who can go up and get the ball. He can disappear at times and then show up and hurt you. Not sure how well he looks this year but he's more of a concern than Fitzgerald at this point. John Brown: Small, fast WR. He is the threat that can really take the top off the defense. Cards Oline: They have questions just like we do. Hard to say if we'll be able to take advantage of their weaknesses but I expect guys like McPhee are going to win some battles on the edge and get pressure. They have a backup filling in for Iupati again this week. They played the Saints (weak defense) in week 1 so there isn't much to gain from how they performed. Can we take advantage? RB: Ellington is the guy who worried me the most but he injured his knee last week and won't be playing. That leaves Chris Johnson who was signed late in preseason and then injured his hamstring. Johnson played last week but his conditioning and experience in the offense is questionable. The Cards 3rd string RB is a rookie from Northern Iowa. Big man with some speed but not a lot of shiftiness. I assume he wasn't picking things up very well in preseason because the Cards made the late decision to bring in C.J. but his one reception last week went for 55 yards and a TD. Defense: One thing that will help as we prepare for this week is the Cards use a similar scheme as Green Bay. This should help guys like Kyle Long settle in. One big difference is their Mr. Everywhere is FS Tyrann Mathieu who closes on plays aggressively and takes some liberties to drop off his coverage n attempts to make plays undercutting routes. Cutler needs to know where he is at all times. Dline: This has been the strength of the defense in years past with guys like Calais Campbell often getting into the backfield. Fortunately he should be lined up opposite Slausson and not Ducasse. Their starting NT is out for the season so it'll be a backup at NT. LB: Their ILB don't have the range our guys have but I don't know how well this group of ILB/OLB are playing this season. CB: Patrick Peterson will stay with anyone on our roster. In years past he's been soft on his technique giving up some plays but this year he's improved. We should look the other way first. Looking at what Brees did against the Cards he used Ingram out of the backfield for almost 100 receiving yards. They didn't gain much rushing but if we can get the running game going a bit then we should be able to take advantage of Forte out of the backfield. I look for Martellus to have a big game. This is a well coached team and they aren't going to quit without a fight but they have more weaknesses than Green Bay. Hopefully we can take advantage of the home field and grab a big win. forgot to include this link http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap300000051...ggles-on-palmer

That makes sense given the loss of Washington. Of the two I'd say Dunn gets the call.

I assume he'll end up on the practice squad. Who will take his spot on the 53?

Bridgewater looked horrible on any pass longer than 10-15 yards. If that continues you will only have to cover anything deep against this team.

It's good but it will also take time for our players to learn how to make all this schemes work. 3 of 4 Dline are 2nd year or rookie.

I'm glad to have Acho back as his speed at OLB will help. I didn't think Washington's injury was that serious. I think this is a way to keep Washington around for another year and give him time to adjust to the weight gain, maybe even add another 5-10lbs, for his new position at DE. He showed some potential at times. The bigger question is how are we going to fare with just 4 Dlinemen: Ego, Sutton, Goldman, Jenkins. Ratliff won't be back for 2 more games.

Far from the biggest issue we need to fix. Any draft pick dedicated to finding a return guy should go toward another shot at fixing any of a number of issues on this roster from Oline, Dline, safety, OLB to improve the pass rush, even QB.

Tough game and surprisingly competitive, far more competitive than I thought it was going to be. IMO the defense was actually ok considering all the new pieces and scheme. Ok is not good, but it was not the disaster I've been watching the last two seasons. It's impossible to go from 31st to top 10 in week 1 so I'll accept that as progress and see if we move forward next week. The achilles heel though is the lack of pressure on passing downs. Jared Allen does not have the burst to get to the edge like he used to nor can he bend back in against an OT when he does get a little leverage. Maybe Willie Young can provide some of this edge pressure for us once he gets healthy. Goldman looked very good at times in the 2nd half and I think his presence really helped the run defense later in the game. CBs were in position on majority of plays there were just some great passes and some great catches by the Packers. There had to be a reason Rodgers tucked the ball down and ran so often (aside from the open lanes the Dline gave him) and it seemed he usually had to go to his 2nd or 3rd read. Next week agains the Cards will tell us a lot about which direction the D is headed. Offense ran the ball early and often, and effectively. Clearly Forte is going to be the man inside the redone. Jeffrey looked like a man who hasn't run much in the past month. If he comes out the game healthy he should be getting after it in practice this week and I think we'll see a bit more burst against the Cards. I thought Cutler did a great job at the LOS reading the defense and getting into the right plays, protection. We consistently got the LOS with plenty of time to survey the field. Cards lost Ellignton today with a PCL injury to his knee. OTOH we seem to be getting healthier as long as our WRs can practice this week.

For some reason I can't recall any defense Tucker called in the last 2 years.

I have no idea what to expect in this game other than to say I expect we'll lose. I just don't know by how much. Things I'd like to see: 1) Cutler stay within the offense and avoid the big turnover. He showed signs of this throughout the preseason. I'd like to see that continue when it matters, at home where fans love to boo him, and against our biggest rival who is likely to put a lot of pressure on the offense to score points. 2) Kyle Long stopping Peppers cold, and anyone else that comes his way at RT. 3) Defense getting better as the game progresses. New players, very young ones at that, and a new scheme so we all know there will be mistakes made. Can they learn and adjust as the game progresses? 4) Defense making some big plays behind the LOS. Might sound odd to follow #3 with this but I'd like to occasionally see signs that our blitzes, scheme, and/or players occasionally see it and get after it to make the big play. Can anyone get pressure off the edge? Up the middle? 5) Cutler handing off. Cutler handing off. Etc. Might as well start sorting out the running game in week 1. If it's going to be anywhere near respectability that is what will carry this offense this year. 6) Langford running up the middle. He made a good impression on me in the preseason running with more strength than I expected and using that burst to get to the 2nd or 3rd levels quickly. Seeing this will also mean seeing less of Matt Forte. While that might sound like a bad thing I really want the coaches to keep Forte's carries to a reasonable level so we have him available and productive throughout the season. I know Rodgers is #2 but let's give this rookie a few carries too because he could really help us later in the season once he gets acclimated.

I worry too much for his health to put him on the field again.

And the league conspired to cover up just how long they did it and how many games it affected. It is amazing how well they knew some things that other teams had never done on offense except in practice. Takes a bit of the genius out of it.

The NY media will never pick up on this.

I saw an article that listed the average age of our 2014 roster as 27.0x but I can't find the link. Reportedly we are now around 26 as you calculate. The average is not a big difference, standard deviation or median would provide more insight because we have rid ourselves of most of the players over 30.

The winds of change just blew into town but for now they think he's "quality depth".

I wouldn't necessarily walk away from Fabuluje as our future starting RT, or RG. I can see Bushrod moving over to RT next year and giving another season to Tayo to develop but I can also see that back injury ending Bushrod's career with the Bears in 2016. Something had to start clicking with Tayo later in the preseason because he made the final roster, and these coaches will cut anyone not performing. From the outside it seemed Tayo was at best just a practice squad candidate.

I wasn't sure if I was reading Barrow's draft profile or John Bostic's. http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/draft/players...60/lamin-barrow But physical ability is there and worth a practice squad look to see if he can learn to play with better instincts.

All we really know is that Alshon wasn't on the field for the 20min of practice that was open to the media. Nobody knows what he did prior to that. For comparison it is clear to the media that Bushrod did not practice. Why that is less of a secret I don't know. There is no depth chart posted on the Bears website. No news about who is starting at RT. No news about who our starting CBs are. No news about starting OLB other than the obvious McPhee. Starting Dline? We only have 5 of them so we have to figure they are all going to play. Fox is keeping his cards close to the vest.

Really this is the model every NFL franchise is operating under. I'm not sure why everyone is so enamored with Green Bay's drafting when other clubs like Seattle have done far better in recent years. For sure they have found some talent in the draft at times but they've also missed on a few high picks. Julius Peppers has a $12mil cap hit for them this year and they had to do that in FA because they failed at drafting DE/OLB for several years. Anchor any team with a future Hall of Fame QB in this modern-rules league and you are almost a lock to make the playoffs each year. That makes all those other issues fade into the background.

I'm in agreement here. First Jennings, then Foster who was expected to contest for a starting spot or at least be a good backup, now Mills. Out of all this SMC is a starter at ILB.

I didn't even know there was a guy named Bryce Callahan on the roster. Keeping 11 DBs is a surprise to me, 6 CB, 5 S. Seems like we're throwing a lot of darts at the board hoping to hit on a few. OTOH we only have 5 Dline and one of them is C. Washington who is in transition to a new role inside. I don't expect much from him this year and figure he flashed some potential there especially in pass rush but made the roster more off his special teams ability. So we're just running with 4 experienced Dlinemen unless Fangio considers moving guys like Houston/McPhee inside as part of the rotation. Ratliff is on the reserve/suspended list so I guess he does not count toward the 53.

I will update my thoughts... Tayo sticking around likely means there is a lot of concern about Bushrod's back and of course our other OTs are not playing well. Leno returned to backup LT and I think the experiment with him at RT is over. With Mills making the final cut I expect he will start at RT in Week 1. Is Tayo kept around as insurance at OT, or are we working him into the backup OG slot since Ducasse hasn't played well?

Wow Tayo made the final cut. We'll see if that holds or if Bears try to move him to practice squad as they shuffle the bottom end of the roster this weekend. At WR keeping both Meredith and Bellamy. Have to figure Meredith heads to practice squad once (or if) all the WRs are healthy.

I'm right there with you. He'd be a great addition to the defense and while I'd give him the big contract I don't want to give up too much in future picks to get him.