AZ54

Emery not putting up with any BS. Time to get in line or you can expect to move on.

After missing two weeks of OTAs the club is now happier with 5th Rd pick Mills and former UDFA Brown as backups over Carimi. Really surprised they pulled the trigger on this deal so soon, I expected they'd at least look at him this coming week. It was likely a guaranteed pick and after seeing the other two players for the last couple weeks they clearly felt he didn't offer more than either of them. This is either exciting news or depressing news. Depresssing because another 1st Rd pick was wasted. Exciting because we clearly have Oline coaches who are taking the line in a different direction, and rapidly. After years of inept performance I hope this signals what we've all been waiting for. Kromer said he does not care who you are and where you were drafted, he wants the best players. These coaches and Emery have also sent a very clear message to the rest of the roster!

Players always say good things about their new coaches (see Cutler/Martz, Cutler/Tice, Urlacher/Babich as DC, etc.) However, I was actually surprised at how he threw the previous coaching staff under the bus. You normally don't see that in the news. Lovie was reportedly well liked and a "players' coach". Of course then he recovered to say that all of his previous coaches were great too, these guys are just greater. My question is do we finally have an offense, and a coaching staff, that is able to take advantage of what a defense gives us, and willing to do so? For years under Lovie we never showed that ingenuity on offense while at the same time our defense was great but vanilla in what they did. How many times have we come into a game against the worst run defenses and then couldn't run? Or against one of the worst pass defenses and couldn't or wouldn't pass? Naturally we always came back to the fact our oline was bad and whatnot yet other teams who had bad Oline play would have more success than we did. Packers had a bad run defense and we call 7 run plays. No matter the season, no matter how weak the opposing defense, under Lovie it always seemed as if our offense was unable to create any mismatch. We might have one game early where we put up good points but after that it's as if everyone saw what we were doing, stopped it, and we never had the counterpunch. The famous "we're going to put Hester in a spot where he can make plays" line always showed up in training camp and never on the field. Partly Hester's fault to be sure, but also the coaches couldn't see that yet kept trying to force the square peg in a round hole.

Sometimes they bring in players like this to see if they would be a viable option if someone gets injured either in camp or even during the season. So yes, due diligence.

Yes, he did but there are some stone age folks like myself that don't follow Twitter.

Who?

They mentioned this on NFL Live today but i didn't see it posted anywhere. He has had a very long recovery from his hip surgery but at least he's finally cleared for full practice.

I give Emery credit for looking at all options but I am not optimistic at all about JaMarcus Russell and I wasn't even when he was coming out of college. He never read defenses well in college and was worse at it in the NFL.

It appears he's not going anywhere. http://espn.go.com/blog/chicago/bears/post...-evan-rodriguez

He was part of the record setting defense in New Orleans. His 22 solo tackles the last two years along with a total of 0.5 sacks goes a long way to explaining why nobody wants him. I am not optimistic if we go after this reclamation project. Missing in this news has been the fact that we seem to be parting ways with Idonije. Izzy is more of a DE although I know he spent some time at DT. It seems the Bears are happy with what they have at DE after the draft.

I'm on the side of second chances as well. What we don't know is if there are other transgressions Rodriguez has made regarding his behavior on the team, locker room etc. We just don't know what our new coaches and front office think of him at this point and so I think it's a real possibility he gets cut or at least someone else is brought in for a serious competition at that position.

Why is he still out on the market? Has he been recovering from an injury? Or is he just part of the unwanted veteran FA group?

It's clear now that nobody wants Tebow as a QB in this league. The market for competition for backup QBs is always strong, at least strong enough for a player with some capability to be allowed into camp to compete for a job as a backup. Not for Tebow anymore! I'd say the circus that comes to town with him hurst his chances too because between his ego and the media's demand for him to play he won't accept a true backup role. Now if he were to change his mind and decide he prefers to stay in the league even if it means changing to a new position would there be interest? I'm going this way because I've felt that Tebow can be a productive H-back in this league, maybe a true TE albeit one who is less inline blocker. Lots of if's here but I just want to see which way the wind is blowing. IF Tebow were to come out and be willing to play H-back, and if we decide to move on from Rodriguez, would anyone be interested in signing Tebow? I'm interested myself however I find it difficult to commit to the guy so IMO we'd have to sign two players and let them compete. Tebow and the rest of the world would have to know he's fighting for a job so the media and his circus would tone down the hype. No guarantees for him. I can't see that he'd accept that right now.

I could be wrong but I believe one of them has a job in the NFL. Now I'm going over to the Rodriguez thread and request thoughts on signing Tebow as our new H-back.

Realizing the error of his ways, but it could be too late. http://espn.go.com/chicago/nfl/story/_/id/...izes-dui-arrest

Technically they got schooled by trading back too far to get the talent they wanted and ended up reaching for the last guy (talking Oline here) left on their board with a 2nd Rd grade. Classic Jerry Angelo move. This board makes no sense if, as stated, they only included players they were interested in, then why were there 3 QBs listed in Rd 2? Were they really going to take a QB in Rd 2 after paying Romo all that cash?

We have seen ERod in the position he was drafted for. He was a TE in college and was drafted by the Bears to play H-back, which he did. At the moment it appears he going to continue to play that role. I'm not against giving ERod a shot at the TE position because I agree he could give the added versatility we need. I doubt he'll be worse as an inline blocker than Onobun. Regarding Onobun...I think everyone is on board with hoping he can fill a role this year but many of us (including me) need to see it in a real game, or at least let's see what he does in the preseason. For now he'll continue to be the next Frank Murphy for me. It's nice to hear we have a young player with some potential. His reality, on his 5th NFL roster in 3 years, is that he is equally close to being out of the league in Sep and he is making the roster. This is not the kind of football resume that gets me too excited.

I've seen all the quotes from Steve Young, Gannon, and others about how great a role Trestman played in their development. Those were all good to hear in terms of QB development. But this quote from Jim Harbaugh really gives me a good feeling we have the right coach. http://espn.go.com/blog/chicago/bears/post...t-me-everything ----------------------------------------- San Francisco 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh said Friday that new Chicago Bears coach Marc Trestman "taught me everything" when they were on the Oakland Raiders coaching staff, and he still uses many of Trestman's techniques. "Everything wouldn't be an overstatement," Harbaugh said Friday on "The Waddle & Silvy Show" on ESPN Chicago 1000. "We use his system still of calling plays and the way he taught us those concepts and techniques. I've used (those) since I coached with the Raiders, the University of San Diego, Stanford and the 49ers. ----------------------------------------- Those who've been here on the board for years might recall that I was very high on Jim Harbaugh early in his career at Stanford. I actually wanted him as our next coach when Lovie was fired (we waited too long). I saw a coach who managed to take a bad team with less talent and athletic ability and get them competitive in the Pac 12 very quickly. From there it just got better. Looking at how much success he has had turning around the 49ers and keeping them at the top last year just backs it up. To hear Harbaugh give that much credit on his coaching ability to Trestman, and that to this day most of what he does is based off what learned from him gives me reason to be very optimistic that our offense will finally turn the corner. As far as the defense, I like what I hear from Mel Tucker so far, but I think we'll always need a defensive guru as our DC. Hopefully Trestman got this hire right the first time. How many OCs did Lovie hire/fire?.

Jason, did you read any of the blog posts on Bentley's site? I read some of his posts and his thoughts on blocking techniques, effective weight lifting for oline, etc. and found it interesting considering Carimi's biggest weakness was that he couldn't hold his ground against the bull rush. While I have no idea if Bentley's coaching/training works he is right on topic for what Carimi needs IMO.

At this point the guy is just trying to make the roster let alone deserving of the #2 TE role. It's May and nobody is getting hit so I'll take this as a positive note that we have some good raw talent that might be worth keeping around. This puts a lot of pressure on Kyle Adams IMO. Now from a front office perspective I'd say the team did well finding this prospect when others (myself included) were thinking it would be worthwhile to sign Jared Cook as a FA for millions/yr. Cook can run and catch but he can't block. That's exactly what Fendi can do, or at least he can do it without the pads on, and if he makes the roster he'll be doing it for a lot less money. At the end we have Bennett and Onobun for less than Cook. Looking forward to seeing him in preseason games.

He'll be back but he won't be lifting weights between now and then. At least not for the next month. That's going to hurt his ability to keep his weight up, and strength. He bulked up for the combine but never played that heavy. That's not how he wants to enter what figures to be the longest football season he's ever endured.

I looked up Bentley's website and read some of his blog posts. Here's the link in case anyone else is interested (or bored). Some of his comments are a bit odd but he does share thoughts on o-line technique. http://www.o-lineworld.com/profiles/blog/list

I didn't read it that way although for sure Bentley has an investment in seeing Carimi succeed. I didn't see any quote on Carimi saying he wanted to be a starter but I agree that should be his goal. Bentley stated clearly that Carimi must return to the Bears as a better player than he's ever been and it's all on him to put the work in to get there. He also said Carimi may not be with the Bears this season. Carimi recognized that himself and he's working to improve. I would prefer it be at the OTAs but it seems he knew he needed some different training to get his technique in order. I have said I think the organization is moving away from Carimi and I still believe that is true. I have also said I'd love to see Carimi earn a starting role. I still feel that way too because if he does come back and do that then our Oline just got better.

He focused on him too much. I still remember him throwing over a wide-open at the 10 yard line to force a pass to Marshall who was in triple coverage. Would Rodriguez have scored? No, but he could have had the first down.

Next I'd like to see Melton sign a long term deal. I wouldn't mind adding a DT to the mix but we'll have to see what is available in a couple weeks.