AZ54

Jeffrey and Royal inactive, as is Bushrod and Omameh. I think we'll see Forte split out quite a bit with either Rodgers or Langford in the backfield. This would be a good day for the rookie RB to have a coming out party behind our rookie C. Likely need a TD by the defense to pull off this win.

Poor decisions and bad mechanics under pressure are what showed up on his film earlier in the season. There's no doubt he has the accuracy you need in the NFL when he has time to throw, but it's concerning that he still has these issues mid-season. I didn't see the game but just watching that highlight of him throwing an INT to a Dline player when there really is nothing there at all is enough. I'm moving off the Goff 1st Rd bus and will keep an eye on Cardale Jones.

The outside LBs of the Chiefs are the strength of their Dline: Houston and Tamba Hali. I'm not that worried about Houston against Long, and really not too worried about Hali against Leno. I might be crazy but Leno did ok last week against a speed rusher although Hali brings a lot more power to the game than what he saw last week. It is the stunts or other lineups with guys blitzing inside that worries me the most. Grasu is going to get challenged at the line a lot with inside-blitz fakes pre-snap. If the protection can hold up I think Cutler will find open receivers. The Chiefs defense is not ranked that highly so far. They've played the Texans, Broncos, Packers, and Bengals. In scoring defense they are dead last ...even with Chicago. But in yards/game they are 28th giving up almost 400yds/gm while we are ranked 7th giving up 309 yds/gm. It is hard to say how our running game will go with so many backups on the Oline and WR. If we can find some confidence early we might be able to make some things happen.

Omameh not practicing because of a bad ankle so right now it appears Grasu is going to get his shot. It won't be perfect and my biggest concern is our QB behind him is not able to run. Hopefully Cutler is a more mobile this week than last. I don't know where we sit on the injury rankings among the league but we have to be among the hardest hit teams. We're going to learn a lot about Adam Gase this weekend.

You compared their pre-draft abilities. I just added some context that I think is relevant. If you want to move their pro careers, DHB has averaged 13.9 yards per catch, Kevin White 0.

Kreutz didn't start his first season and he turned out just fine. We can find other players who struggled their first season with the transition to NFL speed/power in guys like Urlacher. It takes many players a year to get the adjustment in technique, strength, and scheme. Maybe we could have found someone more prepared to help this year at Center but that doesn't mean that player would be better for our team long term. In the preseason Grasu was getting pushed all over the field. He has been told to hit the weight room and get stronger and work on his technique. All indications are that he's doing just that and has added 10lbs. He says he is getting quite a bit stronger. I'm pretty sure his friend Kyle Long has given him a good indication of what is needed to succeed at the NFL level and the type of work a guy like Garza put in. He needs to be competitive for the starting job next year in camp and should win it over a journeyman like Montgomery (should we bring him back). If that doesn't happen then we can start worrying. I still think we'll see Grasu this season as Fox indicated. I don't think they want him getting out of this season without experience and some idea if he is capable of being a starter. I'm not sure if that will be sooner (within the next few weeks) or late in the season.

I don't think Heyward-Bey and White are anywhere close to the same player coming out of college. DHB http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/draft/players/historical/564881 Positives: Exceptional straight-line speed. Opponents must account for his deep speed on every play. Too fast off the snap for most defenders to challenge him in press coverage. Long, lean athlete with long arms and strong hands. Has the agility to make plays in space. Reads the field and can follow his blocks to generate yards after the catch. Can snatch the ball out of the air. Learning to better use his height as an advantage. Good leaping ability and has become more consistent in timing his leaps. Negatives: Bit of a one trick pony at this time. Might be the draft's most dangerous vertical threat, but offers little else. Long-legged and struggles to generate consistent separation out of his cuts. Not as consistently effective on jump balls as he should be, considering his natural size advantage. Too often double-clutches the ball. Questionable toughness running across the middle. Lacks strength and consistent effort as a downfield blocker. White (hit the link if you want to read the full profile it is pretty long) http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/draft/players...558/kevin-white IN OUR VIEW: The best receiver in this draft class at attacking the ball, White is never truly covered with his ability in jump-ball situations to track and highpoint - high success rate in contested situations. He is a much improved route runner with an understanding of how to stack defenders and work back to the ball with excellent coordination. White lacked polish in 2013, but his light bulb is now at full glow - although his timed speed doesn't always translate to the field, the game doesn't move too fast for him. He doesn't have the sudden burst to instantly create separation when he wants, but White has the instincts, ballskills and competitive nature needed to be a No. 1 target in a NFL offense - one of the top-seven players in the 2015 NFL Draft.

I want to see Goff throw with better technique when under pressure before throwing away a top 5 pick on a QB.

On Timu....maybe they are keeping all the LBs worth a damn? I suspect he'll be back on the practice squad if he's available. In the meantime our defense is improving each week so I'll trust the coaches know what they need on the field to keep the progress moving forward. Barrett Jones seems like a good pickup but I was wondering why he was available. Looks like he's had a couple injury plagued seasons so far including a back surgery last year. That's never good for anyone let alone an NFL player. I would have expected he'd stick on the Steelers practice squad but maybe that is all devoted to kickers now. If he makes it that far, next offseason we'll see if this is a case of the Bears grabbing a guy they think can contribute next year. I doubt he's ready to contribute this year.

Our WR just ran his route to the corner but yes I know if you just go out and run into a CB to set a pick it can be called.

Two of those penalties were bad calls. Royal dropped the ball after a catch and got flagged for spiking it One of the CBs had his hand barely graze a face mask, maybe one finger nail touched it, and they flagged him for hands to the face.

That is funny.

I think we all assumed this would be the case when we heard he had a broken leg. http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/footb...1005-story.html With Bushrod nursing a back issue, likely for the entire season, I expect we'll be signing someone off the street. That is unless they are starting to get some confidence in Fabuluje. I think we kept 9 Oline at the start of the season so we might decide to go with 8 and keep that extra slot open on the bottom of the roster to help special teams.

Rumor is that Slausson will start at Center. http://www.csnchicago.com/bears/expect-bea...enter-vs-chiefs I have a feeling Grasu is going to get his chance soon but Fox isn't comfortable with him starting and making the calls on the road against KC. That's a tough place to play with all the crowd noise, and they still have a strong Dline. Omameh has been around a few years so I guess they were ok with what he did and prefer to have his experience on the field. We have a bye in two weeks so if they want to shake it up and get the rookie in there that would be a good time to get him ready. I expect Grasu will be active for this game.

Except for Tracy Porter...to my surprise.

I agree on his improvement. He is starting to show up at the right spot and on the underneath stuff he closes on the ball very quickly. The drop off from his speed to Rolle's is noticeable such as on Amari Cooper's TD catch. If that was Conte on the deep coverage instead of Rolle we'd have two threads dedicated to blasting his "late as usual" coverage skills.

I agree with this. On a long term basis having Kevin White be productive running all types of routes is a good goal. In the short term having his physical presence out there makes a difference. Even if his route tree is limited you still have to worry about covering him deep. DeSean Jackson did quite well affecting how defenses played when he just ran routes on the outside. Not putting White in that same category of deep threat, but on the other hand White has attributes for making contested catches that Jackson can only dream about. The reason I liked White a little bit better than Cooper in the draft is that he's an excellent run blocker. Not only for running plays but hustling to block for other WRs after they make the catch. It might take him a bit to get used to the game speed of the NFL but this will show up early. If you happen to have seen Marquess Wilson attempting to block someone you already know what we're missing.

First and foremost I have to say that there is something different with this coaching staff. Week to week I keep seeing improvement in the quality of play, both individual and team (i.e. being in the right position). As of right now we have the 7th ranked defense in terms of yards given up per game. That is surprising to me. The offense is way back in the low 20's but has still been productive with Cutler at the helm. Normally when you get new schemes either offense or defense there are learning curves and mistakes but there are also plays that you run that other teams aren't prepared for. Around the 4th game is when the surprise starts to wear off and teams figure out how to match up to what you are doing. I think some of that helped us against the Packers. Our team has had the growing pains with mistakes but despite teams being better prepared for what we do, we are still improving. Next week on the road in KC will give us a good idea where we are headed. Anyway, off to game thoughts. Offense: Cutler - Noticeably limited in his movement and it affected him when he felt pressure and had to move around. Late INT was a good decision followed by a bad throw with a guy right in his face. OTOH a great drive and cool under pressure to go down the field late and win the game. Overall a good game. This offense is limited inside the redone without White and Jeffrey. Nobody is worried about a fade pass to Royal or Wilson. Getting that option back on the field will help in the redzone. Oline: Charles Leno held up. It wasn't perfect, not necessarily good either, but this was not the J'Marcus-Webb-at-LT performance I was expecting. I can only remember one blatant miss where he overstepped Aldon Smith's rush. Consider also that on the first play series we lost our starting C and Slauson moves away from Leno for the rest of the game and is backfilled by Omameh who has been with the team just 4 weeks. I expected having those two guys on the left sdie protecting a QB who can't run was a recipe for disaster like in years past. Didn't happen. We gave up 3 sacks but for the most part Cutler had time to move away from his first read. Run blocking started off strong but faded later in the game. Overall a good effort and I go back to the coaches getting these guys ready to play. Nobody even talks about Kyle Long anymore because nobody is worried about him at RT. He's not perfect but he's good and that says a lot for a guy just 4 games into a position switch. WRs: Marquess Wilson finally showed up. Nothing great but his first consistent performance along with an excellent difficult catch as the sideline on the game winning drive. Hopefully he will build off this going forward. Without Jeffrey the group overall is nothing anyone will fear but they at least did enough to keep the passing game productive. Cam Meredith continues to get some snaps. TE: I still like Bennett and prefer to keep him around long term. He is the stabilizing force in our offense right now either through solid run blocking, pass protection, or as a receiver. Lee had a couple bad penalties and it would be nice to see us start spreading the ball around to guys like Miller. Defense: Overall we held Murray to just 3.1 yards per rush, meanwhile early favorite for "offensive rookie of the year" Amari Cooper was held to just 4 rec for 49 yards with 1 TD by a secondary missing two starters (Ball, and Rolle left the game early). After putting up 300+ yards against Baltimore and Cleveland, Carr had just 196 yards today and looked inaccurate under pressure. Find a Raiders fan who expected that coming into the game. Dline: From where we were the last two seasons to where we are now ... nobody predicted it. We're competitive now and more importantly we have guys making some plays in the backfield. I now know that Eddie Goldman can run faster than I, or Derek Carr, thought possible. Despite missing Ratliff (I don't think Sutton played either), Jenkins continues to flash the potential that had him picked in the 2nd Rd four years ago. We don't know what Ratliff will bring to the table once he gets back on the field but right now I feel pretty good about having Ratliff, Goldman, Jenkins as our starters with Ferguson and Sutton in the rotation. LBs: McPhee is the energizer for this group. He backs up his words with his play on the field and I believe it is impacting other players positively. I didn't notice Houston or Acho on a lot of plays but again the overall performance of the defense was solid and they contributed. SMC is ok. He's not the weak spot anymore as he was in years past. He's also not the strong point of the defense. He was in the right spot in coverage to force a high pass that (just barely) ended up being caught out of bounds and prevented a TD. Jones had his Bostic moment and over-ran one short pass play giving up a TD. Both ILB's support on running plays is improving. CBs: Ball was out and Porter got the start on the outside. Porter played well and we'll be seeing more of him. Fuller is improving. Holding what was a pretty good Raiders passing attack to less than 200 yards was not expected (at least by me) and we have to give these guys credit. Coverage across the board, Fuller included, has improved and is also part of what is leading to some sacks. S: Rolle left the game and we brought in the rookie Jones-Quartey who was cut by the Cardinals. I can't really say what we lost in that switch because the defense looked the same or better with JQ in there. Maybe someone else can comment on how JQ played. ----------------------------------------------- Looking ahead I think we match up well against KC if we can get Jeffrey back on the field. They haven't looked good so far this season but they will be looking to right the ship with a win at home. Their Dline can generate pressure so Oline is a concern. Do we go with Slauson/Omameh or Grasu/Slauson? The Chiefs offense has done: (summary of Chiefs vs. Bengals) Coming into the game, the Chiefs offensive line had surrendered a league-high 14 sacks on the season. On Sunday, they allowed 5 sacks and 9 quarterback hits. Travis Kelce is the real deal and so is Jamaal Charles. Keep Alex Smith nervous and he'll seek out the early dump off routes even when there isn't pressure.

I mostly agree with this but if the offer is really good I think he's gone. Reasoning is that Forte is still a stud but Pace's job is to project what he will be for the next 1, 2, or 3 years and then the stud player becomes more of a player that needs to split snaps. If that good offer doesn't come through, he's a core player for our offense and keeping him around this season is good too. We're not going to the playoffs, even if we did get there by some miracle we're not going far. If Pace has already decided he is not going to hand out big money to a 30yr old RB then the decision is done and it's just a question of the timing for when Forte leaves. Odd that the entire league knows Forte is up for auction yet we gave him 25 snaps today and his backups got little work. Not sure what to make of that. You already know my thoughts on any rookie QB we might draft next year: No matter who it is he should be sitting behind Cutler for his first year.

With Allen gone now I really want to keep Willie around. I think he'll round into form later in the season and if he goes we are down to just 3 OLB. Unless we trade Young for a OLB/player who fits the scheme better.

Jenkins has really impressed in the last two games, far beyond what I was expecting. McPhee has been what was advertised in the offseason and I like his versatility. He's not flashy but he is a jack-of-all-trades on the defensive front.

I like the historical perspective and appreciate Adam taking the time to post it here.

For this from a guy driving a Cadillac of an offense: 19/24 for 126 yards. 1 TD I didn't see the game but will admit Vick's stats are better than Clausen did against Seattle, but he also wasn't going against Seattle's defense. FWIW our defense is ranked 11th in yards given up per game which is better than Baltimore. Of course we're also dead last in points given up per game.

Are you sure about that because that would change everything on WR screens? We've had Jeffrey catch many passes behind the LOS and on some occasions we've been flagged for WRs blocking too early downfield. Not just us but I see it every now and then among any team running WR screens. Is it behind the LOS for the pass, or is it if the pass is backwards in which case if it's dropped it's a fumble? Or is it that if the pass is behind the LOS players are allowed to block behind the LOS? Green Bay's WRs are clearly stepping up field to block. http://operations.nfl.com/the-rules/2015-n...rd-pass,-fumble Article 2a and 2e appear to say it is interference Acts that are pass interference include, but are not limited to: a) Contact by a player who is not playing the ball that restricts the opponent’s opportunity to make the catch. Playing through the back of an opponent in an attempt to make a play on the ball. c) Grabbing an opponent’s arm(s) in such a manner that restricts his opportunity to catch a pass. d) Extending an arm across the body of an opponent, thus restricting his ability to catch a pass, and regardless of whether the player committing such act is playing the ball. e) Cutting off the path of an opponent by making contact with him, without playing the ball. Note 1: When the ball is in the air, eligible offensive and defensive receivers have the same right to the path of the ball and are subject to the same restrictions. Article 4 says it is illegal too: ARTICLE 4. OTHER PROHIBITED ACTS BY THE OFFENSE Blocking more than one yard beyond the line of scrimmage by an offensive player prior to a pass being thrown is offensive pass interference. See 8-3-1 for exception for an ineligible offensive player. Note: It is also pass interference by the offense to block a defender beyond the line while the pass is in the air, if the block occurs in the vicinity of the player to whom the pass is thrown. See 8-3-1-Note for exception for ineligible players. I don't know these rules all that well. Point me in the right direction for the downfield blocking that is allowed when a forward pass is behind the LOS.