AZ54

I believe the 4% all work for Josh McDaniels who feels he has the steal of the offseason in Kyle Orton. I just watched NFL Replay of the Dec Bears Packers game in which Orton underthrew a pass toward the endzone by about 5 yards, it turned into an INT. We saw that all season long on deep routes. Cutler won't be underthrowing anyone.

I agree, when a guys been hanging around this long it means nobody has much interest beyond what perhaps is a minimal contract. There are enough teams in the league with WR issues that if they felt he was the answer they'd have gone his direction. There is no way that any FA wants to be a FA at this point in the off-season. All teams have budgeted their money on the FAs they signed and are now worried about signing their rookies. On top of that, if you wanted Harrison at all you'd have wanted him in your OTA's. Now he'll be hoping someone decides they don't like their rookies or someone gets hurt early in camp. That the Vikings might be interested tells me there are some concerns about their WR corps. Even if it's just fan rumors off a message board like ours I still find it telling. From my perspective the Booker experience last year just further solidified JA against bringing in a vet FA WR at the end of his career. That stopgap approach didn't help Bennett at all. If guys like Knox and Iglesias have any potential we need them to get reps with Cutler now so they can improve by the end of the season and definitely be solid in year two with him. No need to delay things IMO so if we're to add a FA WR it's going to be someone we know can contribute for years, or in Burress' case is an unquestioned starter on a one year deal.

It was bad coaching (or rather a bad coaches decision) to keep Booker on the field. He did nothing in training camp or preseason to deserve the playing time he got. While Bennett might not have been ready in game one, after seeing Booker struggle early on you would think they'd have changed course with Bennett. But hey, the captain of the Titanic didn't change course either and he made history.

Seems like Turner has learned from last years mistake when he forced Bennett to learn everything before he got on the field. We need this in a big way if these rookies are going to contribute for us. I have always felt you learn best by getting on the field. Of course guys have to show something in practice but it's the coaches job to recognize talent and potential and accelerate that learning process and that means finding ways to get players involved.

Hopefully he'll surprise Rashied Davis by taking his job from him.

Interesting that Marshall is upset about either his contract, or his injury. If it's his contract, he might be pushing for a new deal now using last year's stats before he gets a season with Orton at the helm, and a new system he doesn't know so well. However, that would be an interesting position because regardless of what happens this season he'd be a FA and you have to think the open market would still treat him well. Or he's just upset about his injury and he is fully intent on rehabbing elsewhere. Stay tuned. There's no way Denver will send him to another team. To do so would be suicide for all future negotiations with players.

Thanks for posting that. It's nice to hear Thayer's thoughts on what he's seen in the OTAs so far, just more confirmation that his arm strength and acccuracy are the real deal. Also good to hear the rookie WR are picking up the plays quickly.

That's pretty impressive to play that well on the road.

You have to consider that half of his games were away from home so if your premise is right, then at home he averaged much higher than the rating shown and was lower on the road. Regardless, the road performance is in the final numbers.

We don't need Hester returning kicks because DManning does a great job of that. Keep Hester on punt returns.

The fact he can catch the football should be enough to get him on the field with our roster. We'll see how the Bears bring him along but I hope they scale it back from what they made Bennett learn last year. One thing that surprised me about Knox is that he's bigger than I thought he was. He's not a big WR by any means but when we first drafted him I had a feeling he was another one of those fast little guys like Berrian was when he first showed up. Instead he's a little taller than I anticipated and he has a bit more of an NFL ready body and that gives me some hope he'll be able to contribute this year...if he can handle the playbook.

After the Cutler deal the Bears front office is getting more publicity. Cliff has done a great job for the Bears and it's nice to see him get some national publicity recognizing that. When you step back and look around the league we standout for our ability to get draftees signed early and our own players signed to extensions early. As stated in that article the salaries we pays our players stand up over time. So why does the perception that the Bears are cheap continue to persist? Why don't we have the perception that our front office does a good job managing the cap and takes care of players who deserve it?

How many RBs did John Lynch light up in his career? He was a safety but was also famous for his hard hits, and he was considered slow. I know what the ideal measurables are for SLBs but there have been players who were successful in this league that never fit the "numbers". London Fletcher stuck around for a long time as a MLB and he was never that big IIRC. http://deadspin.com/5113135/ I really don't know a thing about Pisa's ability since I can't recall ever watching him but it seems he's played most of his career on the lighter side and been successful. I listened to his interview on the Bears' website and he seems to be comfortable with who and what he is as a player. He knows he doesn't fit the traditional mold but he said he knows how to get his job done despite that and he doesn't try to do the things he can't do. I interpret that to mean if you know you can't take on a pulling guard don't do it, just use your speed to get around him to make the play. While he might not have the ideal weight, keep in mind weight doesn't necessarily translate into strength. When considering tackling force, strength and leverage come into play but so does momentum and momentum is a factor of weight and speed. If Pisa plays faster at 225lbs maybe he can make up for the lack of weight. Maybe he will give up a bit in the running game due to this but maybe he gains that back and more in coverage. For me, it appears Pisa has been successful in the league at this weight. When drafted he was listed at 230 but this is one of the links I found that said he was 10lb lighter than that: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/football/...yers/16881.html Why does that matter? He had a pretty good year as a rookie in Lovie's scheme. Interestingly, the Bears' website lists him as being 240lbs.

Every reported is dying for the scoop that confirms the Bears were one of those 3 teams. It's kinda comical how often the reporters are throwing the "believed to be" line out there.

The more players in the pool the more likely one steps up....it's true to a point but if there are so many players in that pool sharing the reps then perhaps none get enough reps to really step up. At some point you have to commit to some guys and get them fully engaged to see what they've got. As far as the 4 TEs, I agree somewhat with your assessment however, Greg Olsen can and does fill in as our H-back type TE and thus be the 4th WR on the field. He can also be split out on some plays although the motion from the H-back set makes more sense to me. It seems Gaines also has the ability to play FB on short yardage play if we once again use our 3 OT front like we did with Williams at the end of the season. Point is these two players give us some roster flexibility. I'll agree that Olsen, Clark, Gaines are locks for the final roster. That puts Kellen Davis competing against the 6th WR for a roster spot. You typically make the team based on how well you play your primary position but clearly this battle has a strong element of special teams play. I'm not that enamored with Rideau nor Davis and I've already stated that I can see the team shopping him for a conditional late round pick during training camp. Yet, to compete against Rideau I have to say he has a reasonable shot at making the final roster because of the flexibility Olsen brings to the team. I'll toss in one more item: TE is one of the most injured positions in the league. Add a good vet WR to the mix and you might as well push the eject button on K. Davis.

Cutler has been in the league a mere 3 years and people point out his faults and forget that he's still got the arrow pointing up. They talk about him as if he should compare to Peyton Manning or other QBs with 10 years experience. I don't expect he'll be great for us right away but he will change our offense and open up the entire field immediately. Toward the end of the season we should have a good idea what he can do in this offense.

I just question the wisdom of keeping so many rookies/unproven players at one position. If we add a vet WR then I can clearly see keeping 6 with the 3 top young players on the roster. Before keeping 4 inexperienced WR I'd rather see us keep the 4 TEs and use more heavy sets if need be.

I say someone has to get injured for him to make the team. Not wishing it upon anyone especially as I view other WR as being better players but that's just the way I see it. It might not be a season ending injury but if someone like Knox gets hurt during preseason he'll miss enough practices to put him too far behind to catch up with the playbook. I don't anticipate us keeping 6 WRs.

Nobody has asked Hester if he can out-run Cutler's arm, nobody has asked Cutler if he thinks Hester can out-run his passes. That's really a nonsense statement but I put it down just to make the point that we saw that quite a bit last year from Orton. So far in the OTA's nobody has indicated any issues like that at all. This is going to be a huge boost to our offense and I can't wait to see the first deep pass go for a TD.

That didn't take long at all.

I'm not even worried about stuff like this. I don't live the life of someone who is famous but I can imagine it would be annoying as hell to have people harassing you for autographs whenever you go out in public.

I do consider Harris a young Dline player but I don't consider him as ever getting back to the player we once knew. Like I said, I don't see a guy who can't practice much ever making a huge impact on a season. Doesn't mean he won't have impact plays for us, he will but we need another body to step up and pick the slack when he's off the field.

For us to be a top 5 defense then some young Dline player is going to have to step up in a big way. I don't have much confidence we'll see that and I'm not sure Harris will ever be 100% again since he couldn't even get healthy enough to work out in minicamp. Overall we'll have a strong front seven with the addition of Pisa but I think our D will be top 10 not top 5.

The last time my daughter talked to Deuce Lutui she mentioned Boldin. Deuce said he likes the way he plays on the field but he isn't real thrilled with Boldin's selfish antics. I don't think he's the only one as it was very clear during the Superbowl run that Boldin wasn't getting a really warm reception among teammates in the locker room.

Hester needs to quit listening to Deion Sanders who seems to do nothing more than tell him how great he is and how bad his teammates are at blocking, and how bad the Bears management is. Get rid of Deion and get back to hard work and doing what he instinctively did and Hester will be ok.