AZ54

I know we need help at Safety but there is little talent in the draft this year. In other words I'm not subscribing to the Lovie/Angelo theory that you must draft a safety every year. If we don't trade down and grab one early (i.e. Collins), or one of the other mid-round talents, I really don't care that we draft a safety on day 3 just to fill a hole. I prefer to just stick with BPA and grab whatever talent falls to that round that fits our needs. If it happens to be a safety so be it but if not, I can live with another vet FA filling the backup role as a stop gap for 1 year. I don't think the depth on the roster would be any worse and might be better having someone with experience. We'll still have Vereen on the roster so there will still be one young player to develop. I'm sure there will be some other vet backups cut after the draft too.

I still don't like either of Petty and Hundley. Even in his Pro Day workout you can Petty's passes falling short and I don't like that lack of arm strength. His arm may be strong enough for the NFL but too often he throws the football 20 yards as if it only needs to go 20 yards so most of his passes tend not to have the velocity you need to see when coverage is tight. Hundley… If he reads NFL defenses like he reads college defense (Pac 12 isn't that stout of a defensive league either) then he'll fail.

Excellent post. Interesting point on the NT position. The question I haven't seen answered in the media (maybe I missed it on the board) is with the smaller NTs does that mean Fangio runs more of a 1-gap 3-4 as opposed to the traditional 2-gap setup with bigger Dline players? He did say he'll have a 4-3 alignment about 60% of the time (passing defense) so that might also be why he doesn't value the 2-gap NT. I think your point about Borland is valid as it relates to Perryman and Dawson although I think both those guys will be available in the 3rd Rd and there's no reason not to grab a higher rated player in Rd 2. Dawson wasn't in shape at the combine and has a lot of character questions. I like Perryman to fit in our 3-4 alignment and he can come off the field when we go 4-3. Fangio had a Hall of Fame caliber player in the middle of that D. We don't. We all know how our D looked when Urlacher was on/off the field. That type of LB

I'm not a fan of Scherff in the top 10. I do think our draft may be balanced between offense and defense but something we all should be considering is Kyle Long moving to LT. That puts Bushrod at RT where he should be more effective and leaves a big hole inside.

With a defense like ours having so many holes there are many ways you can go about fixing the defense. Obviously safety is going to be an issue for at least another year but hopefully it's serviceable this season. I think Fuller will be better this season than last and I've read where he's much better in press coverage than in zone (i.e. cover 2). Knowing that and adding another CB who is good in press coverage gives you two guys who can take away the outside, at least for a few seconds. That means the rest of the defense focuses on the inside game, including the safeties, and that should open up all sorts of options for zone blitzes. That reduces the need for an elite pass rusher off the edge. So I can see the argument for this but OTOH there is no Revis in this draft, quite the opposite actually to where some CBs might get drafter earlier than they should. My preference is still to grab one of the top edge rushers in the draft with #7 because those guys are more of a game changer than a CB. After that it's BPA and with all of our needs that could be NT, DE, CB, ILB. Among those positions at least one, if not two, are going to be left for next year to address, and we'll grab one of the FAs still hanging around as a stop gap. I can't rule out us taking a WR among the 1st four rounds and possibly a RB, and dare I say a RT. The Bears community has been silent on Mills this offseason but he was far from effective last year and there's no guarantee his foot holds up as those injuries can linger. We need more action in FA to address some of these needs.

YYEEESSS! I always had faith Pace could pull off this deal.

I was surprised at how little guaranteed money we gave McPhee relative the size of the overall contract. Pace may be trying to keep the guarantees lower but annual salaries higher so he has more flexibility in the future. OTOH Royal's contract went the other way.

First off, everyone is created differently and some can handle the rigors of a physical game like football. Borland could not for whatever reason, sometimes physical and sometimes it's more the mental aspect. It's not that uncommon for players to quit in their prime although most certainly go more than 1 year in the NFL before calling it quits.

Football is not a game you can play if your heart is not 100% into it. He apparently hasn't suffered many concussions but he has a fear of them and perhaps for a good reason. However, after he says all that he now wants to get into sports management. This is a big blow to the 49ers after losing Willis. For them the hits just keep on coming after Harbaugh left.

A former bust or a current bust? I had to look up who he was. Anyway I see this just as adding competition for the last roster spot, and at best someone who might replace Eben Britton or Ola on the roster.

I'm with you on this one. I think it's very important to shore up the ILB position before the draft. I can't watch another season of Bostic over-running plays.

Two things are clear: 1) They didn't like what they saw from Garza and 2) they didn't like what they saw from DeLaPuente. DLP was let go by Pace and Co. back when he was in New Orleans so not a shocker there. I can't say if Wisniewski or Satele are better run blockers or what they provide better than Garza/DLP but they clearly want a change at OC this offseason.

I was fully prepared for the complete overhaul of our roster after we gave away Brandon Marshall for next to nothing. I expected to see Cutler traded for little to no value as well as Forte. So far all we have done is a quick signing of McPhee to play OLB and some interest in signing veteran safeties. We've shown interest in a couple other players like C Wisniewski and ILB Mason Foster. Other than that we added Eddie Royal to the WR corps. This is not a complete overhaul of the roster. Reading this article on Royal had some interesting tidbits in particular this quote about Cutler: http://chicago.suntimes.com/bears-football...rting-ryan-pace ‘‘He liked the direction that the organization was going, and that meant a lot coming from the quarterback,’’ Royal said. ‘‘I needed to hear that from him. It was a lot of good things. I’m just anxious to get going and have a good year.’’ While the GM and coaches have been indifferent toward Cutler, that gives me the indication that Cutler has been comfortable in his role within the new organization for some time. Pace and Fox are clearly working a plan but it's not the plan I was expecting. It feels like more reshaping a roster versus a complete overhaul. I don't see desperation in FA either. If they can't get the players for their price they move on to the next option. For now it seems the decision to keep Cutler occurred much earlier in the process than we were led to believe. When discussing Pace, Royal said: ‘‘And the GM, Ryan Pace, is just amazing. His vision for the team and everything he has envisioned for the organization was exactly what I thought [about] a direction a team needed to be going in. It felt right.’’ I usually dismiss such hyperbole from FA who just got a huge contract guarantee but it seems there is a shorter term plan for success not the 3+ year plan I was expecting and Cutler is part of that.

If we go WR I prefer White over Cooper. After watching a few games of each White is better on contested catches (goes up strong and fights for the ball) and he's a much better blocker on run plays. Cooper blocks like a matador but he is a better route runner and has better hands although to be fair White has some amazing catches with players hanging on him.

Way too rich for my tastes for a somewhat unproven safety. I'm glad Pace is not over-paying (too much) just to get players here.

Washington could be a good fit as our rush OLB but it's hard to know how he'll handle playing in space. He might be better in this role than he was as a DE.

It's hard for me to get too excited for signing Parker. I think he'd be a good addition but his resume is very thin for $3mil/yr. Rob Housler would be a good addition at TE. He's done some good things out here in AZ.

He certainly didn't say much positive about Clausen. Then again they haven't said much positive about Cutler.

You always over-pay in the early days of FA. It is the way it always will be with so many teams fighting to fill key spots on their rosters. I've just learned to expect it and accept it. In the late stages of FA you make up for it a bit with some good bargains like DeLaPuente was for us last year. Ideally long term we aren't so reliant on FAs to fill key positions for us.

Agreed here. Wasn't Knighton fined last year for coming to camp out of shape? If true I have to really question his motivation. He was in a contract year and playing for a team fully expected to contend for Superbowl. If that can't get you out of the kitchen and into the gym nothing can.

He said "in an ideal world you fill your needs via FA so you can always take BPA in the draft". I think Pace knows you can't have a glaring hole somewhere on the roster and ignore when the draft comes around. That said, I like what he's doing in FA this offseason as he seems to be addressing every need. We'll see if they all work out, haven't seen or heard anything about Wisniewski lately.

Due diligence IMO. Front office has already made it clear Cutler is not the long term future of this franchise. If you have a franchise QB available when you pick you always take him. The question is whether or not Mariota is that caliber of QB.

Houston I was positive on but never expected much from him in pass rush. Turned out not be much in run D either. Willie Young largely got a "who?" from the board but most agreed he would be a decent value signing for us. Mundy was mostly "I hope he's ready to start" but I can't recall anyone being optimistic about him. Jared Allen…we all thought he'd at least remember how to get to the QB more often than not but (at least for myself) felt we overpaid him.

We need more of this but it's a good start: http://chi.scout.com/story/1526237-violenc...ear-mcphee?s=25

He's got nowhere else to play. He's not big enough to be a DE although he can kick inside on pass rushing downs. Reality is signing McPhee is the beginning of the end for Houston's time here. They are too similar in styles although hopefully McPhee is far more productive. I can't see any GM building their roster with big money to both these players for one spot on the field and Pace has to be smart enough to know the same thing. The OLB opposite McPhee needs to be our speed pass rusher. Next year if he's cut Houston's contract has just $1mil in dead money and $6mil in cap savings.