jason

There is no way he's the best option on the team. Fox and staff have done a superb job with the team this year, but this is one area where they have severely missed the boat.

AND HE CAN'T RETURN KICKOFFS EITHER! Straight into people. Every time. Try someone else out. ANYONE else.

Is Mariani related to Fox in some way? He is horrible. No vision, no speed, bad hands, poor decision-making. W.T.F.

CUT HIS ASS NOW. AT HALFTIME. OR BEFORE THEN!

Pleeeeeease let Thompson get a roster spot and return kicks.

Ridiculous. You can tell the alternate reality past or future. You should change your screen name to Doc Brown. Based on your Lovie love, and your hatred of Cutler, it is pretty clear you won't be happy until the Bears have a caretaker QB who protects three point leads with the passion of someone buffing a floor, while throwing for 200ypg and hoping the D/ST scores once per game, while the team perpetually hovers around mediocrity with random spikes of "good but not quite good enough because no risks were taken".

Great post.

Don't get me wrong. I hate, HATE, LOATHE Mariani as a return man. But that doesn't mean he doesn't have WR abilities. That remains to be seen of course, but those two skills are different. If he's kept around as a WR, and he can prove to get out of breaks without DBs drenched all over him, then more power to him. The Bears need WRs who can get open. Period. It's why I've wanted Welker the entire year. I don't care how tall or fast someone is. All I care about is whether they can get open and catch the ball.

If someone doesn't think there was a tug, and Alshon wasn't pulled away, then that person, whoever it may be, should look at this picture over and over again. Because either Alshon got tugged, or he runs horrible routes at the top of his break.

First, I knew this thread would be catnip for you. And, second, the pull is absolutely of consequence. Are you serious? Do you hate Cutler so much that it affects your reading comprehension? What that means is, Cutler thinks Alshon got pulled inside, and that wasn't a slant or anything like that. It was a back-shoulder throw, and he believes Alshon got tugged out of the way. False. FALSE. Prove it. Please go point by point comparing how other QBs have faced the same number of shit OLs, new offensive schemes, new coaches, poor WRs, conservative coaches, injuries, etc. If you're so right, prove it. Highly doubtful. I knew you couldn't say something nice without hedging your bet. Here's to hoping you finally catch that dastardly Jay Cutler for kicking your dog and stealing your identity online.

I know what you're saying, and I don't like losses. But I also accept that often there have to be backward steps to take large forward steps. Otherwise it's just a lot of back and forth with little forward movement. It's why many didn't like Lovie's approach. It's the reason the Bears lost draft position when they won the last games in 2007 (2), 2009 (2), 2011 (1). Those wins matter because... -In 2008 we would have been a few spots higher, and might have picked Ryan Clady instead of Chris Williams. -In 2010 we might not have made the Cutler trade because they might not have thought we were one big move away. Also, maybe we would have been a few picks higher in the 7th and avoided picking Jamarcus Webb. -In 2012 we might have not picked a tweener in SMC and went in a variety of other directions. It sucks to lose, but those spots in the draft matter.

Here's some other names: Josh Cribbs - Holy hell. How is this guy not getting daily texts and calls from the Bears? Most career KO return TDs. Two KO returns of 100 yards in one game! Led the league with 32YPR on punts LAST YEAR. Donnie Avery - 4.28 forty. FOUR.TWOEIGHT. That's all I care about with him. Absolute burner. He could run forward blind-folded with that speed and do better than Mariani. Da'Rick Rogers - He's a stud athlete (dominated the combine) and would be better than Mariani on pure athleticism. Terrell Pryor - Great natural running instincts. Deceiving speed. Superb athlete.

Meh. I'd rather see Langford get 20 carries, and Carey get the rest.

What's the story about the tortoise and the hare? Langford shows the burst, and he's virtually guaranteed for 3-4 YPC. He lacks, however, the patience needed for cut-back lanes and the actual huge plays. Well, unless of course the OL blows open an Emmitt Smith hole and he can just run downhill for 50+ yards. Forte may be the tortoise in this comparison, but he's a pretty fast tortoise.

Pretty much agree. What I like about this game is that the Bears were close, but showed flaws. That sounds bad, but what I mean is they didn't win a pointless game when the team obviously needs a lot of help, but at the same time, they showed fight. The coaching helps a lot with that. More and more I'm excited about the Bears' future under Fox/Gase/Fangio, and believe getting 4 or 5 key pieces will drastically turn this team around.

Her certainly muffed two punts today, and returned two he should have kneeled down. "He's not fumbling" is not necessarily a net gain. Pointing out that he's not doing the worst possible thing he could do is not a good way to say something positive about the guy.

I read the rule. Trust me. There is nothing infallible in that one section. The contradiction of the portion I quoted is the wiggle room. There HAS to be wiggle room, otherwise any single touch - a pinky finger on the kicker's shoulder pad, for instance - would be running into the kicker. We both know that's stupid. So that obviously means the "Any contact" in the portion you quoted is not "any contact."

SD - Phillips is going to torch the Bears' secondary SF - This could be a win DET - Should be a win TB - Revenge game for Lovie, and they've been decent lately WAS - Should be a win GB - Loss DEN - Loss MIN - Bears did just about everything right this game, and still lost. Another loss. STL - Gurley might have 250yds rushing After the WAS game the Bears could conceivably be 6-6, but I just don't see them reeling off 4 straight wins. So one of those games, probably DET or TB, is a loss. 5-7. Then 4 straight losses to end the season. 5-11.

I don't know all the compensatory pick stuff, but if a probowl LT can be had for a 3rd, and that LT is someone who still has years left on his contract, you make that move 11 out of 10 times.

Agreed. But it's not like only one issue can be fixed at once. Sometimes you can mask a big problem by fixing a lot of little problems surrounding the big one.

Technically, that's not true. There is a ton of wiggle room in the rules. ARTICLE 10. ROUGHING/RUNNING INTO THE KICKER. No defensive player may run into or rough a kicker who kicks from behind the line unless such contact: ( a ) is incidental to and occurs after the defender has touched the kick in flight ( b ) is caused by the kicker’s own motions First, the word "incidental" is in 10-a. However, part b is where the true issue is. If the official judged that O'Donnell had plenty of space to come to the ground, finish out his motion, etc., then they could view that as inconsequential.

WHAT?!?! So being one of the best kickers of all time, one of the most accurate of all time, being so good that his nickname is "Good as Gould," he's 17/18 on the season, nailed a 55-yarder earlier in the game, and he misses one because of the windy condition and he's a muppet? The Bears should hold on to Gould as long as his leg lasts.

Agreed. Nobody wants the Bears to lose, but it's probably better for this team to get a year of high draft picks. We already learned the middle of the road approach every year doesn't work.

Apparently Alshon is completely uncoverable. I like it, but I'm shocked the Vikings aren't rolling over a safety his way.

I think McPhee acts a lot when he's beat. He's one of those guys who flails arms at the end of the play when he realizes he doesn't have the angle to catch the receiver/runner. He's trying to sell the call to the official.