jason

I'm one you won't convince. I believe the two are linked. There are plenty of teams who rely on their secondary to create coverage sacks just as often as they do from regular pressure. Further, when you have lock down corners, and rangy safeties who take great angles, it changes the abilities of the LBs to blitz and/or drop into coverage. Thought of another way...who were the world-beaters the Bears had at DE when Urlacher was displaying other-worldly range at MLB, and Mike Brown was taking great angles, and Peanut was locking down opposing #1 WRs? Look, I liked Ogun and Alex Brown, but they didn't make the secondary good. It was the other way around.

I have said the announcers were wrong on this many times. The Megatron play was still the catch. He had his back towards the end line, and his momentum was moving that way. He was still bracing for the fall after contact when the ball came out. The catch this weekend is different in that it was up to the officials, and replay, to determine when a football move began or didn't. I think it did since he got contacted, and at least made one, if not more, steps afterwards, and THEN lunged for the goal line. The lunge says to me, "completed the process, full control, making a football move."

Yeah, except for the most part, everyone considers Belichek one of the best coaches in the NFL, an innovative thinker, a master rule-bender, a great motivator, and a guarantee for the HOF when he decides to retire. Lovie? Not so much. The point you were trying to make, which is valid to some degree, would work better if you weren't comparing Lovie to one of the best of the past 10-15 years. The source was http://www.pro-football-reference.com/. I went to the years where Urlacher didn't have 16 games played, looked at the dates of the games he didn't play, then looked at the W/L record for those games.

What was Lovie's record without Urlacher? I'll save you the work. Purely from the game logs where Urlacher got a DNP, Lovie was 2-10 without a HOFer at MLB. He was 71-55 (56.3%) with Urlacher and 2-10 (16.6%) without Urlacher. It's quite probable that Lovie would have done the same, or worse, without Urlacher the past two years. Given his disdain for high scoring teams (i.e. pretty much the only way the Bears won last year), it's statistically probable - given that the average score on wins last year was 32PPG, something Lovie never did - that Lovie would have lost more games than Trestman.

Strong defense + running Lovie. Strong defense (with a future HOFer AT LB) + ignoring OL + sitting on a TD lead = Lovie Lovie got off of a sinking ship at the right time, and not by his choice. He would have made nearly no difference the past two years. Just look at TB to see what happens when he didn't have supreme talent on defense. Also, his "winning" record in Chicago is pretty damn close to .500, and boosted by a couple of meaningless end of season wins that ultimately hurt the team in the long run. Five winning seasons, three losing, and one even should have been worse if he were smart, and at the end of the day his overall record was .563. Stellar, that is.

Amen. Lovie is who he is. I wouldn't be shocked if he traded out of the first pick, and a stud QB, to get defensive players, a mid-Round QB, and late round offensive linemen. And even if he stayd still at 1, and drafts a QB, his system will neuter that guy because he is fond of running clock once he gets a TD lead.

Not a terrible start, but I'm not a big fan of Dupree.

I say F Briggs. Trestman sure as hell got it all to work in Canada. What's the difference? Maybe he had leaders in Canada? Maybe he had team players in Canada? You're less likely to get a bunch of boat-rockers when the majority of the roster knows they're probably out of football for good if they blow their chance. Not so in the NFL. Losing Urlacher gutted this team. I said it would happen when he was let go. But I thought someone would step up a little. It's less likely that Trestman's system of dealing with a team is flawed, and more likely that the personnel is flawed. Based on how bad the team sucked, I'm even more convinced of it. Here's to hoping true new staff can find some leaders.

Hilarious. I was thinking of posting something very similar. Pretty much any feasible candidate is an upgrade over Tucker.

If they do that, I sure as hell hope the Bears can get something for him. 2nd rounder?

ha! What's funny is, I think the 2nd rounder is the most realistic pick out of the group.

Pretty much...but if those guys fit in the right spots, then I dont' have a problem with multiple OL picks. I just can't stand seeing Rodgers, Brady, Manning, Romo, etc., sitting in a pocket for days, surveying the field, and then throwing to someone wide open, while there are people simultaneously ripping Cutler for poor decisions when he's under duress every other throw. Just look at Romo this year as a great example. Their offensive line is crazy (3 first rounders, 1 fourth rounder, and 1 UDFA graded as a third rounder), and he had probably his best year. Career year in completion%, TD%, Y/A, QBR, and TD to INT margin. And let's not even get into Demarco Murray coming from nowhere to dominate. Fix the OL and people will fall in love with Cutler again.

Agreed with Jameis at 7. If he's there, you pull the trigger. Or try to rob someone in a trade. But that's not happening. No way in hell he drops to 7.

No matter who the Bears select in the draft, they will most likely have a bad defense next year. That is almost a lock. So, what if the team just said, "Screw it. Let's try to get the young guys more playing time, coach them up, let them develop, and see what we have? Pick up a few free agents to fill in holes. In the meantime, let's improve the best part of our team, the offense." RD1 - Andrus Peat, OT, Stanford - Starts day 1. Mills rides the pine. RD2 - Hroniss Grasu, C, Oregon - Starts at C, moves Garza over to G, or the bench. RD3 - Dorial Green-Beckham, WR, Oklahoma - If he drops (lots of speculation), this is a monster steal. Great addition. RD4 - Arie Kouandijo, OG, Alabama - Sits one year, starts the next. He's got the measurables. RD6 - , QB, Colorado St. - Gotta get a backup to compete. RD7 - Project TE, someone raw with a basketball background. It'll never happen, but it sure would be fun.

My signature line remains true, even now. The Bears will never move to a really good offense until the OL problems are shored up long-term. Cutler will always get fidgety, show poor mechanics, ignore his progressions, and throw off his back foot when he's worried about getting demolished. And without the QB, the rest doesn't work as well in the passing game. The long-developing routes don't even need to get called, because there isn't time. So you are stuck with dink-and-dunk, maybe some slants and quick-throw fades. The same OL issues affect the running game.

Trade down that far? No. Draft a RB? Hell no. There are four, maybe five, positions on this team where the Bears are presently good: RB, OG, WR, TE (maybe QB). All other positions need help in some way. No way we should be drafting one of those positions unless it's a once a lifetime kind of guy like Bo Jackson or Peyton Manning. This is not a particularly strong draft, and Jameis Winston isn't lasting until 7 - much less to the end of the first - so the Bears should look for value at positions of need...which are plentiful.

No way in hell Winston is there at 7.

Honestly? You lost me when you traded Brandon Marshall (WR) and picked up Brandon Marshall (LB). I dislike that move a lot. And if you plan on keeping/coddling Cutler, that's definitely not a good move.

Just for fun I thought of it from TD's point of view (seriously, without jest): The Bears absolutely have to get rid of Cutler. Conservatively, I think the Bears can get a 4th for him. Maybe a 3rd. Let's say TN wants him. 1 - Shane Ray, DE, Missouri --or-- Randy Gregory, DE, Nebraska - Whoever they like best and fits the scheme to be run. 2 - Derron Smith, FS, Fresno St. - Best FS in the draft. Great instincts. Good angles. Awesome hands. Predicts passes and jumps routes. 3 - Bryce Petty, QB, Baylor - He's pretty much the antithesis of Cutler at QB. 4 - Deshazor Everett, CB, TX A&M - He already has a history of crushing Green Bay players. 4 - Jake Fisher, OT, Oregon - Seems like a good spot to get at least some help for whoever takes the beating at QB in 2015. 5 - Kwon Alexander, OLB, LSU - Young, athletic, a bit of an injury history, gets tackles in big games 6 - Trey Depriest, ILB, Alabama - Nothing incredible, just one of those guys who is always around the ball, getting the job done That's a defensive overhaul with tons of talent. And to be quite honest, I was thinking DE instead of Fisher in the 4th.

If Marrone is hired as GM, and Toub is hired as HC, who are the likely OC's and/or DC's?

So, subtract 3 or 4. I'm not ignoring the fumbles, just isolating the interceptions since that's where everyone critiques him. You already know I think it's more like 11 or 12 INTs, which would be even better, but 28 TDs and 14 INTs with about 4K yards, from a harsh critic like yourself, is something I think we'd all take.

And if you've looked at those videos honestly, yet still think the argument is a reach, then you're too far gone into the Cutler hatred to be reached. There is a compelling argument in each and every video link. Even if you disagree on one or two of those INTs, the rest remain iffy at best. He's not nearly as bad as people try to make him out to be. The Bears can, and should win with him, especially considering the contract. They need to draft better, fix the OL so he has time to throw, and fix the defense so the Bears can actually win time of possession or at least flip the field every once in a while.

I agree with the ideas of placing blame. But I'm not willing to place them on Jay. By all accounts he is very smart. But this year was the first year I can ever remember, for any pro team, where there were so many passes that went left where a receiver went right, or some variation like that. Problem is, nobody will throw the other under the bus, and we just don't know if the receiver ran the wrong way, or Jay threw the wrong way. But since Jay is under the pressure of 5 men the size of gorillas who are trying to kill him, and the receiver is trying to outmaneuver a 200lb DB who is barely allowed to touch him, I'm going to err on Jay's side of the equation. His decision should trump the receiver's decision on those 50/50 reads.

I completely agree with that sentiment. I didn't like his contract at all. Overpaid. However, he is far and away the best QB the Bears have had for quite some time. Maybe my lifetime.

How about instead you open your mind and actually look at what I posted? Or better yet, look at the plays in the links I provided. It's easy to forget through the course of the season how each INT happens. Of course it's revisionist history, but the fact remains that at least 5 of his INTs were garbage time, and he didn't have to throw them. And 5 others could be entirely the fault of the receiver on the play - not that we'd know because Jay won't sell them out. I am not excusing any of the other stuff you mentioned, but the stats, which are used primarily against Jay, could be a lot better through no real fault of his own. Cutler is not the main problem with the Bears. He is not Rodgers, Manning, or Brady, but he's in that next tier if the team around him doesn't suck.