AZ54

Hell no. With his miserable season Cutler threw for 3666 yds and 27 TDs and of course a lot of INTs. That was done with a weak supporting cast and weak OC. I see no reason we can't improve from there even if we did nothing but keep everyone together in the same system (thankfully we aren't).

I hate to say this but given our situation and limited options I think we should sit with what we have and perhaps throw a few darts at the situation with some late Rd picks. We need a new DC and I think between him and Marinelli we'll try to work this out with the existing roster. In other words, I think our best option for winning games next year is to focus on the offensive line.

I've been waiting for a thread to popup with complaints about Kreutz hiring Tice.

I have watched nearly every AZ game this season and there is one OC and his name is Whisenhunt. That's exactly what he said he was going to do after Haley left last year. Yes, he has two guys who "coordinate" the run game or the pass game but Whisenhunt is calling the plays and the shots on offense. Saying AZ has two OCs would be like saying they had two head coaches because Grimm also has the title of Asst Head Coach. Then again, Rod Marinelli is our Asst Head Coach whatever that's worth. In neither case does this alter my feeling that there must be one person in charge at the top a clear line of authority. Doesn't mean assistants can't have significant input on decisions.

Mays will drop much further than he'd have been chosen last year because his play at FS was pretty weak this year. Despite his speed he was often late in coverage. Funny how much different he looks when the front seven aren't as good as they were the year before. I guess that QB pressure makes a big difference to DBs. There's no doubt his athletic ability makes him a first round pick but his coverage skills don't.

It's not the time it takes us to hire someone that bothers me, it's the refusal of some to interview that worries me. The longer this process drags out the more tainted it appears. That could dissuade some good candidates from interviewing. This is an uphill battle hiring coaches when the head coach might be gone next year. Now if JA has the authority I believe he has if Lovie leaves next year he could very well force the new head coach to keep certain assistant coaches he likes. The flipside of this one year experiment is that you get some former head coaches like Tice who might see this as potentially leading to another shot at being a head coach.

See Ron Turner and Harry Heistad

Big difference between thinking we'll still be losing by keeping Lovie around and wanting to lose because he's around. I have no problem if Lovie takes us to the Superbowl next year and I was one of the proponents of firing him. I'll say this about the Bears: we have returned to the organization that put us into the Superbowl. Angelo built that team (I know some players were around from prior years) and staff. It was Angelo that hired Rivera, not Lovie. It was Angelo that hired Shea but it was Angelo that fired him and then worked to bring in Turner. I know Lovie had input into all those decisions as well but I believe Angelo had final approval on them. Then we won the Superbowl and Lovie got himself some personnel authority and this team went downhill, fast. Personnel decisions as well as coaching decisions haven't worked well for the last few years. I know there are all sorts of variables that went into this as well including player injuries so don't mistake my statements as a vote of confidence in JA because I have my doubts. I'm just stating that from an organizational standpoint we have gone back to what built the NFC Championship team and that had JA giving final approval to all personnel decisions related to the football team. The hiring of Tice as Oline coach tells me we're back to that because in no way do I think Lovie would step on the toes of his new OC by forcing him to work with someone he didn't hire but we all know JA has done that in the past. I think trying to revamp coordinators with a coach on a one-year hotseat is a big gamble by the Bears. I hope it works but I'm not very confident it will. As far as Cutler having some input on who he works with: When we gave up all those picks for him we made him the centerpiece of the team. There is no point in hiring an OC, or a scheme, he is not comfortable with. At my job we involve our supervisors when we interview to fill a supervisor position and the supervisors know they aren't making the final decision. I think it's the right move having him involved in the process but nobody should think he's making the decision. I guarantee you JA is asking all the OC candidates how they will handle Cutler when he makes mistakes. Do you think Cutler is asking the same question? Point is they are approaching the interviews from different perspectives.

I find this move interesting in that we're bringing in an Oline coach before we hire our OC. You would think that whoever the OC is he'd want control, or at least input, into who he has to work with. This certainly doesn't seem like a Lovie Smith way of doing things, more like Angelo, especially with the change in technique from what we were doing. Heck I doubt Lovie even knew the details of what our Oline were trying to do. Why would an Oline take a step back on a running play when the idea is to go forward? Aside from the loss of momentum it also takes away the advantage you have of knowing the snap count. I'll puzzle over that one all summer long. It does bring up an interesting question: Is this why Omiyale had so much trouble coming off the LOS? If Omiyale has always been firing off the line at the snap and then suddenly along comes some brilliant line coach who says, hey buddy, step backwards before you go forward. I'm sure that brought up more than a few WTFs.

Two-headed monsters never work in any business. Hire someone to be the OC, if he wants an assistant to help more on one aspect of the game then that is the OCs decision...period.

I know he went to USC with his son but even so, why would Monte want to work for a year with Lovie? We're not going to get a big name to come in and rescue Lovie off the scrap heap of NFL coaches, on either side of the ball.

Remaining playoff teams and their QB Dallas - Romo New Orleans - Brees Arizona - Warner Minn - Favre Ravens - Flacco (meh) Colts - Manning San Diego - Rivers Jets - Sanchez (meh meh) If you want to add round one losers: Eagles - McNabb Green Bay - Rogers New England - Brady Bengals - Palmer Quite simply the odds are that if you have one of the better QBs you will make the playoffs. It's not always true and you usually have some elite defense in the mix too (Jets this year). We've had threads on this topic before but despite how we finished this season I still feel it was worth it to have a young talented QB on our team.

Interviewed for OC and I agree that we don't want him. Regardless of how well he runs an offense it's the way he runs the locker room that I don't want around our team, especially our young WR.

It does give us one thing that you rarely get to see in the NFL: How much a difference coaching can make on the field with the same players. Of course it can go either way, we can be better or worse.

Yep, you certainly don't want a Todd Haley type becoming your OC. Of course he being our WR coach a few years back and then went on to be an OC for the Cards helping them get to the Superbowl. He is now a head coach in KC, time will tell how he fits that role. I don't mean to be a smart ass but the point is there are talented coaches out there ready to take the next step. The key is finding them, but good teams do that. Look at Pittsburgh with Tomlin, he came out of nowhere. This guys resume has a lot of good experience albeit without the true OC title. He has never called plays but it doesn't mean he isn't ready to. I'm not saying I support him for the job because I know nothing about him. This job, with Lovie on the hot seat, is not necessarily one that is going to get the attention of proven OCs, outside of a few guys like Martz who want to get back into the league. I still feel we'll end up giving a guy his first shot at OC I just don't trust Lovie to make a good decision.

I thought teams couldn't restrict a guy if it was an interview for a promotion?

While I understand your thoughts about the "Lovie connection" the fact is we don't really know Fewell and what role he'll demand as the DC. From reading about him he appears to be a fairly strong-willed individual. The fact Fewell worked for Lovie a while back doesn't mean that with all his experience since that time Fewell is more confident to come in and run his own scheme instead of being a yes man. In fact, if Lovie were going out to get someone with limited experience calling a defense I'd say we're more likely to get the "yes-man" you fear with Fewell. Perhaps it could work the other way around, whereby Lovie knows Fewell and will trust him more and allow him the independence to run the defense.

Yes, there's a difference between net worth, revenues, and income. Most people don't realize how modest a life Virginia leads.

Sounds like Carroll put out some misinformation so teams would stay away from Bates.

Seeing as Lovie usually says nothing about nothing it's highly unusual for him to say something.

That's funny. I guess we'll just stick with the term cover 0. It works (doesn't work) for me. Came across this interesting tidbit in an article about Perry Fewell: ************************************************************************* http://www.suntimes.com/sports/football/be...-bear08.article ''The person that is coming in, I would like for him to have some of the similar beliefs that I have,'' Smith said Tuesday. ''But at the same, as you evaluate what you are doing, with the new year, you want to bring in new ideas. ''That's what I am excited about, bringing in some of our new ideas, getting some of our old players back.'' ************************************************************************* This is the first indication I've seen of Lovie admitting his scheme didn't work and that while we might stick with the overall concept we need better ways to apply it. What I like about it is not so much that Smith admits he's wrong rather that this public statement means the new DC is going to be given some free reign to run the show. I think that's very important for us to have any shot at getting someone decent.

I agree on the cover 2. It's not about concept but how you apply the concept. For all the griping about the cover 2 you don't here much talk about us going to a cover 3, cover 1, or cover 0 and 4-3 versus 3-4 doesn't determine the DB coverage scheme behind the front 7. I'm far from a football analyst and really can't say much about any cover system except this; Any pass coverage should require players to stop the completion and not just to make a tackle after the catch. I don't have a problem defending the first down line on 3rd and long and forcing plays underneath and making the tackle. Lovie doesn't apply his zone scheme effectively as we drop back to far to defend the first down line. From here on out it's the Lovie 2 we don't like not necessarily the cover 2 or even the Tampa 2 (seeing as Tampa's DBs were much more effective in pass coverage back in the day). Lovie doesn't adapt his scheme to what teams are doing to defeat him (i.e. RB dumpoffs as in Minn game, slants as in Packer game). Things that are obvious to fans.

Not necessarily. I believe there was a desire to link JA and Lovie together to determine where things stand once and for all on the talent level of the roster. It was made clear that Lovie was stripped of ALL personnel authority which means they are telling JA to make the final call on the roster. Doesn't mean Lovie has no input just that he's no longer equal to JA. We have no idea who was responsible for which personnel decisions since the Superbowl but the fact Lovie was stripped of this authority means his choices have not been good. As posted in another thread the 2008 draft class was pretty good. 2007, Lovie's first with influence was bad. 2009 we went after Cutler. If JA was the one pushing that and if Love drove most of the 07 draft and JA most of the 08 perhaps the owners want to see if JA is worth keeping around. I wanted Lovie gone, still do but it's not all bad having the GM and Lovie linked together rather than JA bringing in another head coach only to find out he's not what we want as a GM. Putting money aside perhaps they just felt that JA is worth keeping around another year and that even if it's not ideal to keep Lovie around it's more logical to keep him and if necessary fire both next year and let the new GM choose his head coach. Fans may not agree with this approach but that doesn't mean this isn't how the owners and Philips feel. I agree it's not realistic to say money wasn't a factor because it always is in any business rather I think Philips means it was not the driving factor. One other factor that had to influence the decision was the collective bargaining situation. These owners remember the previous lockout and replacement teams. They have to look at this as another possibility this year, at least I do. Why bring in a new GM or head coach now only to lose a year of performance evaluation on their contract? Reality is if you have a good coach or GM you extend contracts usually with a year left. On a 4 yr deal, if there's a lockout, that would give you only two seasons to evaluate them. Not ideal. Or you give 5 yr deal up front but that's not ideal either.

Keep in mind Martz has never had a QB who could throw on the run out of the pocket the way Cutler can. The right OC can do a lot with that ability.

I'll jump in on this. In OUR situation with a weak head coach the assistants are more important to the success of the team. IF we had a head coach who was a good DC then I feel he could more effectively act as a DC or at least provide good insight and coaching into the meeting room and during the game; and in that situation a lesser skilled DC would work for us. As far as the military analogy we (officers) always knew if we had a good first sergeant the squadron would run well. In short, putting quality people in key supporting roles makes a big difference in an organization. That is the managers job, or in the Bears case, the head coaches job. I'm not a fan of Lovie anymore and wish he were gone. Now that the decision to keep him around has been made if we want success on D we need to bring in a DC who will be independent enough to run the show, even if they are nominally running his cover 2. I see other teams run a cover 2 where they actually cover WRs so it can be done...Pittsburgh won a Superbowl with the cover 2.