AZ54

Hey we ran that WR bubble screen for a total of -15 yards today!

If Turner stays at least fire the Oline coach. I gotta get some satisfaction (i.e accountability) out of this horrible offensive play this year.

Drafting Peyton Manning would make a lot of GMs look pretty good.

I'd rather fire Heistand before Turner, perhaps first half. Then in the 4th quarter go after Turner.

I agree Wiliams doesn't have enough speed to cover the deep middle anywhere close to what Urlacher can but you have to look at the net gain or loss. If Urlacher on the outside is as effective as Briggs (or better) and Williams is a better run defender in the middle than Urlacher then the dropoff in coverage might be more tolerable. The biggest problem I'd have with this is the fact our safety play has been very spotty this season. If we had great safeties behind the MLB then this would be an easy call but if we pull Urlacher out of there our pass defense in the middle is going to be worse than it was this year. That's a scary thought.

Forgot Berrian against San Diego in the opening game. Dropped a sure TD from Grossman when he was wide open on the left sideline.

I only got to see Woodson once this year and he looked like he has trouble reading defenses or was otherwise just clueless and inaccurate on some plays. Could have been just one bad game but based on that I'd be very disappointed if we spent such a high first round pick on him. I'm curious to hear what others who got to see more of him think of his skills.

Maybe we can give Moose one of Lovie's "veteran days off" this Sunday and get Hass onto the field?

That's what teams did to us all year long and still folks railed on Ced. I realize Ryan Leaf's little brother sucks as a QB but I also know that Stewart didn't show much burst when he did have holes and ran tentatively in the hole. He wasn't much good fighting for yards after contact either. He did look good with Dixon in when he had huge holes to run through. We already have 3 RBs on the roster who can do that.

I'm ok with dumping Moose and replacing him with Bryant but if you think Bryant is much better than Berrian you'll be disappointed. If we lose Berrian we'll have no choice but to go after Bryant. I watched a lot of Oregon football this season and Jonathan Stewart just doesn't impress me that much. He's a good RB but I didn't see him do anything any different than Ced did this year. Once Oregon lost Dixon, Stewart became invisible. No way I'd take him before any Rd 1 or Rd 2 Oline talent.

Regarding the defense; it seems we've finally learned that it's ok to scheme and take away something from the other team. Against Minn we stacked the box, 8 and 9 guys in there to shutdown the run and it worked. Against GB we played a little closer to the LOS with our DBs to take away the quick slants, we also dropped guys into coverage (Alex Brown) to further confuse Favre's reads. With Babich on the hotseat is he finally learning to adapt instead of just sitting back and running the same basic system? Against Minn it was nice to have Vasher back but he was out against GB and still we played well on D. OTOH we didn't have Briggs against GB and we still played well. We're also using DTs that came off the street. So the improvement can't be assigned to just having a starter back on the field.

He loses value in the open market if Jamar Williams plays well in his place because teams will start to think his numbers are more based on the system he plays in rather than his individual skill. He's still going to get a big paycheck no matter what. I'd rather see Williams play so we know what we have to do in the offseason...try to sign Briggs or stay pat and save the money.

I didn't say you can have an inept offense with a great defense (see Chicago Bears '05). The point was it's tough to pay the big bucks on both sides of the ball and typically, depending on what falls to you in the draft (or if your GM knows how to pick talent), you tend to have more dominant players on one side or the other. How often does a team have top 5 offense and top 5 defense? Usually it's one side that's top 5 and the other is middle of the road. This year we have two teams with both sides ranked top 5: New England and Indy. One of them is about to make history.

I agree, we have two solid CBs and it's not worth it to mess that up. McBride looks like our future nickel CB. We can all speculate that Tillman would be good at safety but there's only one way to find out and if we put him there and we're wrong, we just created two holes. I do think Manning is playing better at FS but he still not reading pass plays early enough to break up enough passes. His run support has been better with bigger hits but at times he takes poor angles. He gave up the big run the Packers had today by diving into the left side for some reason. There's been improvement over last year, yes, but hopefully he can improve again next year. The coaches should have never put him at CB, that practice time in camp when we was practicing both positions didn't help. At the time I agreed it seemed like a good idea because it was hard to rely on McBride or Graham but hindsight's 20:20. I'd like to see Graham at CB next week but I'd also like to win so that probably won't happen.

If Briggs departs via FA don't we get a compensatory pick based on how high his salary is?

IMO the future is more about discovering if our current players on the depth chart can win in this league. Losing means you get a better draft pick but it also means you have more holes to fill. Holes can also be filled by FA and that has nothing to do with losing. In fact, if you want to be more attractive to a FA it's better to be a team that they know is just a few players away from competing for the Superbowl.

A guy plays his position with all of two games of experience and what exactly was the dropoff from the "best WILL in the league"? I'm not saying Williams played as well as Briggs but it's logical to think that with a few more games experience he won't be that far behind. I didn't see enough of a dropoff today to warrant giving Briggs the big money that we can use to fix the Oline.

Jamar Williams was in most of the time if not the entire game while Briggs was inactive. I didn't.

More good news. There was one play this game that made me think Turner has improved and that was the TD play where we brought a TE in motion and he stopped in the backfield leaving a TE, FB, RB behind the QB then we play action fake and pass to Clark in the back corner of the endzone. Then it made me wonder where that play was in the first quarter when we had first and goal and went 4 and out. It's time for a new OC.

What's great to see is our D is returning to form. If not for DManning's mistake in the first half where he overran a play and gave up the TD they were solid. DBs, LBs all had their hands on teh ball throughout the game, just couldn't hang on and there were some decent hits.

You can cut Moose now as far as I'm concerned. Dropping passes like that mean he has no business being our starter and for the money he's making I don't need him as a backup. I don't care what Buffone says about the league being all about scoring points. This is just the lastest fad. Great offenses come and go (see StL). Great defenses come and go too. The Ravens and Bears have had a lot of success with their great defenses and average offense. Maybe if we had Tommie Harris on the field in the Superbowl we might have won that game. I'm content to continue with the great defense and work on building a good offense to complement them. Add in great special teams, which we have, and we're giving ourselves a great chance to beat anyone. That's the way our team has been setup with Urlacher and Harris being our two best players. The Colts setup their offense first and defense second because of Manning. You go with what you got and right now it's the D.

I have no problem with the trade because I felt at the time, and still do, that Payne is a better player than Harris. McGowan had shown some decent instincts inside the box as well and played better on special teams than Harris. We need that out of our 5th safety. Sometimes the dice don't roll your way even though the odds are in your favor. Now making the assumption that Arch would be better, I'm guilty of that as well.

I said it way back at the beginning of the season that with the poor oline play it was obvious something (or somebody) had to change. The fact nobody was doing anything meant we had coaches willing to go down with their buddies (won't pull the vets) or really bad depth. After finding out the coaches let Ruben Brown play with one arm for half the season and allowed Miller to continue his record setting pace (penalties) shows it was a little of both. I'm still pissed about the comments from Hiestand when he said the fans know nothing about Oline play. Last time I checked the job was to block the guy on the other side and it's not hard to figure out who can't do that when you watch replays on the DVR. We have game film too! It's pretty obvious his group is one of the worst in the NFL and I'm not sure what statistic he'd pull out of his backside to prove otherwise. He needs to be the first to go and he can take Metcalf with him.

I agree with most of your suggestions: 1) Briggs, cost too high for what we'd get in return and for what we'd lose in opportunity cost. Williams made some mistakes in the last game but I still think with a bit more experience he'll be fine replacing Briggs. We have Okwo too. Better to keep Briggs money and spend elsewhere, lose a little at LB to gain a lot elsewhere like Oline. 2) No way do we trade Dez Clark. If we had an OC with both sides of his brain operating we'd be using more 2 TE sets and creating mismatches on the field. Despite Turner's shortcomings TE is the most injured position in the league and it makes sense to have two very good players at this position. We won't get much in return for Clark, maybe a 4th rd pick at best and the player we pickup to replace him won't be as good, at least not in his first year on the team. 3) Alex Brown should have been starting back in the middle of the season. He stays and Anderson competes with him to start next year. Nobody knows what Bazuin can do but regardless we need a solid 4-man crew at DE or the cover 2 concept breaksdown bigtime. 4) Miller gone makes too much sense but depending on what Ruben does in his rehab and depending on what we do in FA I'm open to resigning him. I don't think he'll cost much but with his experience having him come off the bench is better than Metcalf. CUT METCALF The position I'd most like to draft with our first round pick is LT assuming the guy is worthy. Draft him to be a starter (we have two good TEs to help block), move Tait back to RT, sign Faneca LG his experience can help the rookie at LT, keep Kreutz, let Beekman compete with Garza at RG with. Then we can either draft another OG in Rd 3 or an OT to groom to replace Tait depending on best available. 5) Kreutz is not that bad, this isn't his best year but I think he'll work hard this offseason and return to form. He's certainly not bad enough to cut or even trade as the net loss would be too much. Getting rid of him just opens another hole on the Oline. 6) Moose has to restructure if he wants to stay around. For all his faults I strongly prefer to keep Berrian as I think he'll continue to get better but if he proves too expensive we might have to move on. He's really all we've got at the position right now and losing him puts too much focus on Moose and a bunch of unproven WRs like Bradley. Hester is not going to be a full time starter at WR but he should be better next year. Like it or not we need Berrian more than he needs us. I expect Hester to be our #3 WR. RB...I wouldn't go after Turner, too much money but we need to get some competition in camp. Benson I think is back no matter what and I think mighty mouse Wolfe is too that puts Adrian Peterson on the bubble. He's a good special teams player but just an average back IMO and we need someone to really compete for the starting job with Benson. Another option I'll throw out there is to find a FB type who can really run with the ball and can catch coming out of the backfield. This is a FB who is capable of making the first guy miss a tackle. The added versatility (If Ron Turner knows how to use it) would make the current RBs more productive, along with improved Oline play. QB...there's no way I'm sitting pat with the same 3 QBs. I'd like Rex back to compete for the starting role, give him a 2 or 3 year deal with good incentives. Orton or Griese will be gone but unless Orton totally flops I'm leaning toward Griese so I can free up more cash. I'm most interested in getting McNabb but that might prove too costly so I expect we keep our picks and go to the draft. Since my first round pick went to LT the second Rd is where I look for my QB and I'm targeting Brennan or Ryan. I expect Brennan will be more of a late 2nd Rd pick so ideally I can trade down in Rd 2 and pick up 4th Rd pick. I like Brennan for his quick release and his accuracy and he has good mobility. Sidearm release will be a question mark but like in basketball nobody cares how you shoot if it goes in. On Defense we need to cut RMJ to free up some cash. McBride moves into the nickel role, his quickness in covering guys makes him a good fit here. Graham needs to see the field at CB in the next two games but he's our #4 CB next year (he needs Berrian's weightlifting program). I'm cutting Mike Brown and Arch and I'm using the cash to get Bob Sanders for SS. I think Indy will put their cap space toward Dallas Clark. Danieal Manning stays at FS for us. I think he's improving in the second half of the season in run support but I'd still like to see more INTs and pass breakups from him. Kevin Payne becomes our #3 safety and I let him compete with Manning at FS. McGowan stays #4. That's 3 FAs signed... Berrian, Faneca, Sanders. Cuts include Metcalf, Ruben Brown, RMJ, Mike Brown, Arch, Fred Miller, Griese. Maybe LT2 can give us an idea how much cap space but it's should be 10-15mil. Draft Lt, QB, OG, RB, DB in that order.

Yes and I think I'm the only one who saw Travaris Jackson stop at teh sideline and turn back toward the field just before he got mowed over by Harris and Tillman. If a QB wants the safety of running out of bounds they need to run straight out of bounds. Once the guy stops as if he's going to turn upfield or throw the ball he's fair game. I watched it several times on via the DVR and it's always the same, even as ESPN replayed it and the announcers called it a stupid foul you could still see both of his feet in bounds as he got hit. Ranks up the there with the BS call on Urlacher against the Seahawks. IMO the entire thing about protecting the QB has gone way too far. A QB can throw but if a pass rusher reaches up for the ball as he throws and even slightly touches his head it's 15 yards.