selection7

We've come a long way to even be caring where Url goes years down the road. I thought it was silly at the time, but it wasn't that long ago people were talking about trading him and how he was washed up at 31 or 32.

yeah, sometimes missing the playoffs feels like a losing season but it's not the same thing, true.

"you know what, just hold on to the football and someone will tackle yoiu. I get nervous when I get the ball. I'm not going to lie." Haha. No problem Url. You're not a running back (though you did used to be the go to receiver on goal line formations in college...but whatever). What he said really explains it well though. If you go at that situation with all that trepidation, you've already lost. Mentally you have to be excited about how you're going to school that bozo and have your mind in high gear. Negative mental distractions slow you down.

It's all about how you frame the stats. A less negative way to put it is that before this season, he's only had a losing season 3 times in the last 11 years. Lovie just did that the previous 3 years in a row. Fisher has also finished with at least 10 wins half the time over the past 12 years and he's generally much better respected than Lovie by people who pay closer attention to that stuff than me.

We've still got Lovie for another year, and we learned a few months back he's getting paid as well as Belichek so I don't see McCaskey eating his salary since Lovie having a terrible season is the only thing that could justify that. Maybe Fisher will want a year off (not a bad idea) and JA could tell him the job is his if he wants it in 2011. I can't see any of our other coaches turning their nose up at Jeff Fisher (though one or two of them could be gone by then anyway) and I think Jeff would surely feel like he'd have a better situation here than where he came from. He got started young so he's still not that old. We'd have a head coach who used to play for the Bears and a QB who grew up a fan of the Bears. I think Lovie's a good coach but I'd take a hard look at Jeff Fisher if he's interested.

If we didn't give everything we had to knock the Pack out in Week17 (and I've heard we didn't) then that's a little sad and we deserve to be kept out of the SB by that same team. I had a feeling letting the Pack in might come back to bite us and from the very beginning I considered GB and Atlanta (only because they would've had home field advantage) our real competition. We had our chance, man...twice.

Good video but I'm not really seeing it. Saying "Oh, well he's tough so of course he's not going to show it" is a little weak. But notice on that forearm shiver of Eric Walden that Cutler gets his plant leg hit by Walden after Walden falls underneath him...then Cutler gets up a takes a step or two away and actually does appear to be hobbling. Cutler may have actually injured himself on that play! He was feeling badass about his block but trying to hide that he actually screwed his leg up at the same time. Which also might explain why he's being so vague with the media because who wants to admit they ruined a Super Bowl run on a probably unecessary block (though it was an awesome block).

I've said this before, but it's silly to bash Orton to make ourselves feel better about Cutler. That trade is 2 years gone. Deal with it. Before getting injured in the Cards game (and I've read one source suggest the initial injury was actually 2 weeks prior to that), Orton was putting up one of the best season's in Denver history. At one point he had 10 out of 11 games with at least an 89 QB rating. He just plays like crap when he's hurt. It dropped him out of being a 1st round draft pick at Purdue, it lost him his job with the Bears, and it looks like the trifecta combo of his poor injured play at the end of this year, the "Denver sucks and we need scapegoats" thing, and that Tim Tebow is flabbergastingly popular without having done anything, indeed, may get him traded again (hopefully) because Denver is in rebuilding mode. He has however, improved every season in QB rating, yet again, and has even outperformed Cutler since the trade. He doesn't suck! Neither does Cutler! Cutler just doesn't care if you think he's not tough, so he didn't pretend to be in searing pain (my torn ACL didn't hurt that much either...I was gutted when I found out from the doctor because I never imagined it could have been that serious), but you saw how he played in the first quarter...did you people think adding an MCL tear was going to make things better? He had an off night against a great D. So did Rodgers, in the end. Quarterbacking is difficult. I think we're scapegoating to only go off on Cutler. Todd Collins is paid to be better than that. Why did one of the most athletic MLBs in the history of football fall on a pick return after what was a "kicker quality" tackle effort from Rodgers? Why did Tim Jennings do stupid stuff like pass interfere on the one play where he had his man covered like glue? Did we really need to get cute with only a yard to go on that 3rd down run play near the end? And what would we have done in the SB anyway with Cutler injured? If Cutler didn't have a ligament injury then I probably take it all back, but I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. We bought the farm for Cutler, he's not going anywhere. He is NOT the type to respond well to negative reinforcement from the fans, so let's just support him and worry about the other personnel changes the Bears can make this offseason. We should probably worry if he'll even be available for the first half of next season since this injury happened so late.

Really? Oops. That changes things! Somehow I got it in my head both Major Wright and Jennings were rookies. Well, Jennings played like it, I'll agree.

I just didn't want them to make it to the SB! Too late! Now...strategically, sometimes it's better for them to win it all if you know you can't. Some guys on their team may relax or retire now that they've got their rings, and other guys will want fatter contracts or get free agent interest from other teams because of how well they played on a good team and because other teams want guys with SB experience. Again, what I really wanted was for GB to mire in "wait til next season" blues yet again, but now it's too late, so I don't care as much. GB may be dissapointed if they lose the Super Bowl, but overall it will just motivate them, just like it did us, though we fired our quality DC Ron Rivera and had massive injury problems that next year.

I agree we also can't keep waiting on replacing Olin Kruetz. Getting a player who's a leader, can make the right calls, center the ball well, AND block his man well might not be easy...but it'll be even harder if we find ourselves in dire need of one right away because we didn't plan for the future. I also think it would be beneficial to let the guy get to play with Olin to learn from him. I wouldn't be too hard on Tim Jennings. He's a rookie. He's supposed to play the way he played today. Had he not been starting and making plays earlier in the season (though incosistent, true), we wouldn't have elevated expectations for him. We can't just keep starting rookies then cutting them next season because they play like rookies. Also, our D only allowed 14 points, so he had to be doing something right on the many plays where we didn't notice him.

I was initially excited about seeing a plethora of ex-head coaches who, as we know, orginally got that HC job based on what great coordinators/position coaches they were. So far my expectations have been exceeded. If you compare Lovie this year to years where our assistant coaches were floundering as well as our team, I don't see a huge difference though. Luckily, the Bears are peaking near the end of the year, probably aided by the compounding advantage of not having injuries week after week, but I don't think it all adds up to Lovie is a great coach. I definitely think he's good, but it's this staff of assistants that is truly great. Marinelli's great, but he's not the first DC to helm a great Bears D under Lovie. What Tice has done with the Oline is something I've never seen as a Bear fan. Switching players around until it worked, steadily getting better week after week. Miraculous...well, almost, I suppose I should consider they could still revert for this next game. Lastly I want to mention that I think the overlooked Toub is the best coach on this team hands down. I read an article where Dick Vermeil is suggesting this Bears unit over recent years may be the best in NFL history. Hester gets a lot of attention, as he should, but IMO it's not coincidence that Manning/Knox/whoever else also has been exceptional, the one consistancy in Hester's time here has been Toub, and even before Hester RW McQuarters was leading the league in punt return average. Without Hester, we may have had only half the TD returns over recent years, but we'd still probably be leading the league over that time, to put it in perspective. "With so much focus on Hester, people may not realize that since 2004, the Bears have blocked an NFL-best 20 kicks, and punter Brad Maynard has landed the most punts inside the 20. Corey Graham led the league with 22 special teams tackles in 2010, which was four more than his closest pursuer." http://www.suntimes.com/sports/football/be...eague-toub.html

I think calling him lazy is making a huge assumption. His work ethic with the Bears just does not indicate the sort of extreme laziness you suggest (after all, doing an ad is easy money in comparison). Cutler doesn't want to play up the ad stuff because he doesn't want to owe the media/fans anymore than he has to, and there's an unwritten understanding that if you can successfully sell yourself in ad media, you have the news media and the fans to thank. It's true, but the tradeoff is they will try to take your soul when the time comes. Jay should get to choose whether he wants that tradeoff or not. Yes, fans pay his salary anyway, but for that he does what he's supposed to on the field and at practice. And there is a difference between not giving some pompous media jerk the time of day (there's a lot of 'em) and not bothering to acknowledge some kid who's a huge Bear fan after practice. The stuff about his Denver cronies is not good, I agree, but it's also old news and this is a new city, so where are the similar stories with respect to his time here in Chicago? I like what you said about sometimes you have to learn to do things you don't care about just because it's important to someone else, but the key is sometimes. So many people do what's expected of them just because they're afraid of what people will think, but Jay doesn't care about that bs. I'd like to believe that these days Jay knows the difference between that and doing something important for others. Also, this media guy's complaint reminds me of that other Chicago writer that decided because Urlacher was a curt sourpuss with the media, he deserved all the scorn the guy could possibly dish out in print. That takes an incredible arrogance and lack of empathy. So I'm not on this Reilly guy's side either.

Ah, indeed, but my preference was based on being so wound up for this next one, regardless of whatever goes down at the Super Bowl...I'll worry about the SB later. You see that news article where the ticket broker says this conference championship is the hottest ticket going in Chicago sports history? I know I'm not the only one. It doesn't hurt that this is the one that gets you to the dance...the media day interviews, newspaper press, late night hosts joking about 'em, half the US hunkered down watching our Bears on the big day...that all happens if we beat Green Bay...and doesn't happen to Green Bay at the same time!! Too sweet! I can't wait.

Hey, did you quote the wrong person?. Since "beat Green Bay is what's important" is what I said:) Unless you were just agreeing.

I think I'd rather beat the Packers in this game than win the SB. Not that both woudlnt' be nice, but seeing the Pack turn into another perennial powerhouse at the hands of another allpro QB for years to come....too much. Thus far the packers under Rodgers have been losers and they only barely made the playoffs this year. This is our chance to send them home muttering yet another "wait 'til next year", and that's a beautiful thing.

Uh... .... no!

You assume I said something I didn't. If you want, repeat that above sentence but quote me exactly, and see if your point still makes sense. I repeat, it does matter how you get there, and you'd see that firsthand if started happening often.

And I thought I was anti-dramatic almost to a fault. Ok, you're not impressed, I get it. Your point above is a good one though. Of course it's not as simple as I made it seem. That doesn't meam it wasn't an fascinating ovservation though...in my opinion.

I think Cutler might actually be a bit of a "prick", though maybe not quite the way we'd assume. Of course it does matter how you treat people in everyday situations, not just on the field. And I should point out that reporter specifically related tales of him alienating his own head coach, a teammate, and a legendary player from his franchise's past with his "you're not worth my time" schtick, not just the media. Having said that, and this is where I throw you a curveball, I actually find his lack of pretense refreshing. Jay is 100% real, and part of the reason everyone else seemingly has to play the game is because there aren't more guys like Jay who'll just refuse. Does he have a pesonality issues? Very likely, but I'm gonna worry about myself first. And I don't think Jay is a bad guy. Deep down, I don't even believe he's arrogant. My 'pretend I know something about psychology' guess is that Jay's aloofness is a self-defense mechanism that stems from a lack of trust. Even if he sort of does think of himself as a dandy overall, there can still be some part of him with self-esteem issues that makes him subconciously not believe others would ever like him (people are complex and not entirely logical), and he's not going to give them any power over him by acknowledging to others or himself that that matters to him. Unfortunately for him, he's in a profession where people will love him one month and hate him the next, which means to some degree this attitude is necessary and is probably only being reinforced. I also wonder if he's not very different towards your "alpha" types than our more humble fellows. He's certainly no born leader, but I think the more time he has in Chicago, the more the people/teammates who don't "get" him will stop making assumptions and start judging him on things of a more important nature than whether he always makes you feel good about yourself.

We compare the quality of teams between years all the time. We can tell the difference between a team with all the pieces set and a team that needs major help. So although you suggest it couldn't cheapen the Super bowl to have a team make it by injury luck and playing nobody but two barely wildcard quality teams, I guarantee you if that were to happen year after year, exactly that would be the result. Fans (maybe not you though:) ) would slowly start putting less and less stock in a SB appearance and more into season record. As you note, the Super Bowl is a big deal, but you take for granted why. So my Bears fandom aside, I don't want to see the Pats or Steelers face off against some crappy NFC team that if they played 'em 10 times they'd lose only once. That's not going to happen this year because as I said, ATL and GB are worthy adversaries...IF somehow Seattle were to make it past us all, they'd deserve it based on beating us/those teams. But that doesn't mean the scenario I originally proposed and repeated in my third sentence above couldn't happen in the future.

Eh...my realization isn't unimportant I think, if that's what you're suggesting. One of the more interesting thoughts that comes out of it is how overly litmus test we are with evaluating a coach's success based on playoffs. Reality is, all a coach can do is help the team win...it's everybody else that will determine whether you make the playoffs. You could go 12-4 and miss the playoffs. It also underscores the parity in the NFL. It's one thing to have one play determine whether you barely get the wildcard, but it pretty much blows my mind that one play can be the difference in missing playoffs and getting a cushy first week bye with nothing to play for in game16. It feels like there's other things to take from it too that I haven't put my finger on. I think it adds some entertaining drama to the season, and I'm in favor of that. I wouldn't call it unfair. If anything, the Seahawks taking down the Saints will quiet those people who want to do away with division wins = automatic playoff bid.

I'd have to check to see for sure, but it occured to me how fragile our position maybe really is. Had Detroit been given the win on that end zone catch at the beginning of the season, we finish with the same record as GB, meaning GB probably wins the tiebreaker and we have to get a wildcard, which we would have lost to NO's better record and the Giants who destroyed us head-to-head. In other words, that one call was the difference in us missing the playoffs/Lovie maybe losing his job and our sitting pretty against the Seahawks in Round2. A game of inches indeed. Again, I'd have to check to see for sure because in that scenario, but GB and the Bears would have the same record, same record within the division, same record head-to-head, but GB would have had a better record in the NFC, meaning they win the division and we're out...I think. There's a lot of levels to the tiebreaker rules.

I was thinking the same thing. It would cheapen the Super Bowl if a team like the Bears can go relatively uninjured, get the wildcard bye, beat two teams that maybe ought not be in the playoffs, and then go to the super bowl. Either GB or ATL will be a worthy test, as it should be.

I want to know what that shining light of wisdom, Gale Sayers, has to say about all this.