defiantgiant

One other thing about Cowher - wherever he goes, he's going to want to bring Kevin Colbert with him. Colbert is the Steelers' director of football operations: he's basically their GM in all but name, and he's run all their drafts since 2000. The word is that Cowher's put him on standby to come along with him as DFO or GM, and the Steelers have started getting ready to find his replacement if he leaves. Obviously I'd love for Colbert to come in, since he's got a tremendous track record for identifying talent: in addition to putting together a perennial contender in Pittsburgh, from 1989-1999 he was a scout for Detroit and then their head of college scouting. Not only did he find Barry Sanders, but Detroit went to the playoffs 5 times while he was there and haven't had a winning season since he left. As awesome as it would be to have Cowher bring a great talent evaluator with him, I have a feeling that could actually be a barrier to the Bears getting Cowher. Either they'd have to fire Angelo with like four years left on his contract, or Angelo would have to be willing to share authority with Colbert - otherwise, I can't see Cowher wanting to go to a team that wouldn't let him bring in his personnel guy.

Mine? It's the opposite, that Cutler's a more talented quarterback and would be playing better than Orton if he had a comparably talented team around him. I actually kind of like Billick's analysis of Cutler (except for the part where he compares him to Jeff George) that they posted on ESPN: I think that last bit is a pretty good summation of how I feel about Cutler: he's still mostly unfulfilled potential, and the crappy teams he's played on haven't exactly helped him to fulfill it. He needs to step up, but he's also never had a complete team around him, even going back to college - he's always had a substandard supporting cast on offense, a poor defense, or both. Even when he was lighting it up in Denver, he was always playing from behind thanks to their defense, so he had to throw it a ton and attempt a lot of risky passes. It's obvious that he's tremendously talented, and there's no way to know how good he could be if he were on a solid all-around team. Angelo clearly thought this team was a quarterback away from the postseason, but it just isn't: until we have an offensive line and a competent defense, I don't think we're going to know whether Cutler can live up to his potential.

Nah, his anger issues go back to college - he got benched and then eventually kicked out for his outbursts, both on- and off-field. I mean, the dude has a ton of physical ability, but he's got major anger problems. It's not like no one has ever gotten those under control before: Haynesworth had to do some anger management after he curbstomped Andre Gurode, and he hired a special coach to work with him on controlling his anger on the field and keeping his technique legal. That was a pretty serious approach to the problem, but it seems to have worked. Between his knee and his out-of-control play, though, I'd say Incognito's probably not worth the risk.

Jason, you said it way better than I did: you can't compare Cutler's track record to Orton's. Orton had 15 starts with a top-5 defense...Cutler didn't even have 15 starts where the Broncos' D held the other team to three touchdowns. And if you want to talk about wins, NSP2, when they did hold a team to 21 points, he was like 13-1. Like Jason said: it's like comparing Dilfer to Marino. Dilfer went 7-1 as a starter with Baltimore in 2000. He threw nearly as many picks (11) as TDs (12) and averaged under 200 yards passing per game, with a sub-60% completion percentage and a sub-80 QB rating. When he went to the Seahawks and the Browns, which stat did he take with him? Was it wins? Nope. It was all the other ones: the low yardage, low completion percentage, poor QB rating, and the nearly even TD-Int ratio. So what's the difference between the 2000 Ravens and the Seahawks and the Browns? Defense: the 2000 Ravens were the first (and only) team to have a stingier defense than the 1985 Bears. Baltimore's all-time-best defense and running game got those wins in spite of Dilfer being a mediocre quarterback, which makes it kind of hard to say that those wins are Dilfer's stats. A better comparison might be Dilfer to Carson Palmer. I think it's pretty widely recognized that Palmer is a very good QB: he's in the tier of near-elite QBs right below the elite guys like Manning, Brady, etc. His win-loss record? Not that great, because the Bengals had a crappy defense until the middle of last season, and they had no running game after Rudi Johnson. As soon as their defense and run game got better, the team was winning games with Palmer; now they've swept their division and are going to the playoffs. It just doesn't make sense to talk about a quarterback's win-loss record unless you put it in context of the rest of the team. Which means looking at defense, running, and special teams. Which means that there's no comparison between Orton and Cutler: Cutler left the Broncos just in time for their defense to get really good and the Bears' defense to completely fall apart. Orton did the opposite: he started one season with an elite Bears defense, one with a mediocre one, and now he's starting for a Broncos team that all of a sudden has a nasty D. He's getting a ton of help from the team around him that Cutler's never gotten in his career. Going all the way back to college, Cutler's always had a lousy defense: there's honestly no telling how good he could be on a complete team.

No way we take a chance on this guy. He plays with more than a "mean streak." It's not like Kreutz or Colombo - this guy gets called for TONS of personal fouls, and that hurts his team. He got cut because he got called for TWO headbutts in a single quarter, then popped off at Spagnuolo on the sidelines. There was a game against the Redskins where he got called for three fouls: a major facemask, an illegal chop block, and repeated verbal abuse of an official (for calling him on the first two.) He's got some ability, but when his temper gets away from him, he's a train wreck. The difference between a nasty player like Kreutz and a guy like Incognito is that Kreutz keeps it under control and doesn't let it hurt his team. I'm all for going after a guy like Trueblood from the Bucs or Dahl/Clabo from the Falcons: nasty blue-collar guys who play through the whistle. Those guys don't make any friends among d-linemen, but they're not like Incognito - he plays out of control. He's played in 44 games and he's been called for at least a dozen personal fouls. On top of that, he's got some relatively major knee problems: he's only played ONE full season, in 2006. He missed all of 2005 and most of 2007. As bad as the Bears could use a guard, I'd much rather play Beekman at LG until we can get somebody in the draft.

One other pre-draft scouting report, this one from ESPN:

So I went looking around and I found the Sports Illustrated scouting report on James Marten, the tackle we just signed off the practice squad: And from War Room Report: Also I found some reports from Cowboys beat writers - the consensus seemed to be that Marten looked pretty good at tackle, but he couldn't get on the active roster because Doug Free from NIU was a surprise hit (he's now their starting RT,) and Dallas' other active backup had to be able to play both guard and center, whereas Marten only plays tackle and guard. I imagine there are a lot of tackles in the league who wouldn't have been able to get playing time over Flozell, Colombo, and Free (who's playing at least as well as Colombo on the right side.) Dallas then moved Marten from tackle to guard full-time, presumably so he could have a better chance at some playing time, but it sounds like his build (6'8" 310 pounds) was a problem at guard. According to one of the Dallas beat writers, Marten couldn't hold up at the point of attack as an interior lineman. My two cents: there's a reason you don't see any guards that tall in the NFL. Marten even said prior to the draft that he's more comfortable playing in space than in a phone booth, and that he thinks he's naturally a better fit at tackle than guard. I'm not trying to get my hopes up here, but this guy was an excellent player in college (where he lined up next to Beekman) has no major injuries, no work ethic problems, high football IQ, and a good skillset for RT. He's not as versatile as he was advertised to be (he played every line spot but center at BC) but if he can stick at right tackle and take over for Shaffer some time next season, that would be HUGE for this team.

I'd be surprised if anyone would trade anything for him, to be honest. He's still a good player, but he's not the elite guy he was, and his contract is still an elite-player contract. Nobody's going to want to pay him what he's slated to earn. If we could renegotiate his deal, maybe he'd bring a 4th/conditional 3rd? He's getting up there in years and he's got some major injury concerns now. Whatever pick he brought back, I'm sure it would be conditional on playing time. I don't see Hester, Harris, or Urlacher being worth the trade. None of them would bring very much (I remember PFW quoted a couple of NFL personnel guys saying that Harris had no trade value whatsoever) and we don't have adequate replacements for any of them yet. I think the only positions we could afford to trade from are DE, TE, and OLB. Or maybe we could deal Danieal Manning to some team that needs a nickel DB/kick returner. Afalava looks like he's settling in at FS, Corey Graham could play nickel for us and Knox can return kicks. Manning probably wouldn't bring much in return, though.

Yeah, it's way too late for this season, and maybe for Turner/Lovie/Angelo's jobs, but I'm still glad they're evaluating the young guys if it means we can come away with even one starter at one of the major need positions. And it helps that Boston College linemen have a ridiculous track record...they've sent at least one starting lineman to the NFL basically every year since the mid-90s: 1994 - Tom Nalen, OC, Broncos (5 Pro Bowls) 1996 - Pete Kendall, OG, Seahawks/Jets 1999 - Damien Woody, G/C, Patriots/Jets (1 Pro Bowl) 1999 - Doug Brzezinski, OG, Eagles/Panthers 2001 - Paul Zukauskas, OG, Browns 2002 - Marc Colombo, RT, Bears/Cowboys 2003 - Dan Koppen, OC, Patriots (1 Pro Bowl) 2004 - Chris Snee, OG, Giants (1 Pro Bowl) 2006 - Jeremy Trueblood, RT, Buccaneers 2007 - Josh Beekman, G/C, Bears 2008 - Gosder Cherilus, RT, Lions In that same time period, I only count two drafted BC offensive linemen who didn't start for an NFL team at some point. So if history's any indication, Marten's got a good pedigree. Also, the guy has been with one team that had a ton of talent ahead of him (Dallas) and another that has some of the worst talent evaluation in the league (Oakland) so I'm hopeful that there's at least a chance that he's decent.

Yeah, I know that a no-name group of receivers won't draw PI calls like Randy Moss or Andre Johnson, but it really has seemed like opposing defenses get a free pass against the Bears. In the Packers game, AJ Hawk straight hip-checked Earl Bennett before the ball arrived, didn't even have his head turned around. There's no way he was making a play on the ball, he wasn't doing anything but hitting the receiver while the pass was in the air. Same thing happened to Kellen Davis in the 49ers game, he just got checked out of bounds before the ball ever got there. No call. I swear I've seen one or two of those go totally uncalled in EVERY Bears game this season. And there'll always be an announcer going "oh, he got away with something there." All the Chicago media keep harping on Cutler for jawing at the refs, but I'd be doing it too. The dude's sticking up for his receivers when they're getting jobbed.

Yeah, I really liked when I saw Cutler walking off the field after that pick. He wasn't slinking over to the bench or bitching to the refs, he got right with Knox and started going over the route. I don't usually like to get into the whole "body language" crap when it comes to analyzing players, but he didn't even look mad, he was just focused on talking over what to do next time with his rookie receiver. That's the kind of thing that makes me think he's going to be a good leader for the offense. I mean, he's a guy who's going to throw some interceptions even under ideal circumstances. Even if we fix the o-line and he has a go-to receiver and the running game gets going, he's probably going to throw 12 picks a season. But that's fine, you can succeed that way, as long as the payoff is big enough. What we're seeing this season is a guy who was already a high-risk player, only now he's put in a situation where he can't succeed and he's trying to make things happen all by himself. When the protection's been good enough and his receivers have done the right thing, he's made some good plays. Even in that Urlacher interview where he was bitching about trading Orton, he made it clear how impressive Cutler can be (Urlacher was going nuts over that one TD to Knox.)

OK, when I say "#1 receiver" I mean "the best receiver on his team" - Hester, for the time being, is the Bears' #1. He'd be the #1 on a few other teams, like the Rams, the Raiders, and probably the Dolphins. On most other teams, he'd be their #2, same as the rest of our receiving group, which is what I was trying to say. That's not to say they wouldn't be an upgrade: Hester would be a tremendous #2 for a team like Kansas City, San Diego, or Detroit that had a big, physical #1 to take some attention away from him. But it's important to note that the terms "#1 receiver" and "#2 receiver" don't really mean anything. Anquan Boldin is a #2 receiver. Wes Welker is a #2 receiver. Now that Santonio Holmes has really stepped up, Hines Ward is a #2 receiver. When we talk about Hester not being a #1, what we're really saying is that the Bears don't have a receiver as good as Larry Fitz, Randy Moss, or Santonio Holmes. If we did, Hester'd be our #2 and the whole stupid argument would be done. And you're right, he was the best returner in NFL history. Emphasis on "was." He's not any more, and he's not going to be again. It's been said before, but return men these days have a very short shelf life. Look at Dante Hall. Also, returner is just not a high-value position. You can get 7th-round picks and UDFAs and CFL players to return kicks, and they'll do it at a very high level. Even a pretty-good #2 receiver (which I think Hester can be, once we get a good receiving threat across from him) is more valuable than an all-world returner, in terms of yards, scores, impact on drives, every metric you can think of. A return man can't get you a first down. Even the best returner in history only scored 6 or so times a season, which is pedestrian by receiver standards. And receivers, unlike return men, often have long careers. When you consider the value of the two positions and the amount of time a player can contribute at each, moving Hester to receiver was the right move, even if it's disappointing.

I think Lovie and Angelo have finally figured out that there's no way they're making the playoffs, and they're in full-on talent evaluation mode. There's some question about whether Hester will play against Baltimore, and Aromashodu might get another chance at a start. Also, they just cut Cato June and brought that BC offensive tackle James Marten up from the practice squad. Apparently they're going to get him active on game days before the end of the season. I'm all for this, to be honest. However unlikely it might be, if there's some chance this guy can contribute, the team needs to get a look at him. The same goes for Aromashodu and Gilbert - we need to get these guys some reps so we can figure out what we've got.

Let's just get this out of the way: wins are not a stat, unless you're talking about a team. No quarterback in the history of the NFL has ever gone out on the field by himself and gotten a win. Cutler's wins in the NFL? Zero. Orton's wins? Zero. Wins are a team stat, NOT AN INDIVIDUAL STAT. Thank you for your time.

I don't think one sub-100-yard game against a defense with very little film on him makes Aromashodu a #1 receiver, and (as I've pointed out before) Knox has been way less productive than Hester this season, even accounting for the difference in targets/playing time. Remember how well it's worked in the past when this team handed starting jobs to guys who hadn't earned them? Was Cedric Benson a better starter than Thomas Jones? Aromashodu's warranted a closer look, sure, and I don't think the team should be rushing Hester back from injury, but it's WAY premature to say Aromashodu's a better receiver. Sorry. Hester's the closest thing we have to a top receiver - there's no way he should get demoted until we have somebody demonstrably better than he is. Also, he hasn't been an elite returner for a couple of years now - regardless of whether he should've switched positions in the first place, we won't gain anything by switching him back now. Like you said, the major problems up front have to come first - this team can muddle along with a bunch of #2 receivers (which includes Knox and Aromashodu until they prove otherwise,) but having a real #1 wouldn't help a damn thing if Cutler's still running for his life every play. If the Bears spend a couple of mid-round draft picks on RT and LG, they'll be fine with Hester and company while they iron out the line problems in 2010. They won't be spectacular, but I'm confident that Cutler can be at least pretty good if he has some time to throw on a consistent basis. Then maybe we'll be in a position to draft Julio Jones or AJ Green in 2011, and we can have a really scary receiving corps. In the meantime, though, the focus has to be on offensive line and defense. The offensive skill positions are by FAR the least of this team's worries.

Umm, I promise you wouldn't. Tom Cable's Raiders have been a train wreck, and they don't have an untalented roster. You want to talk about Lovie wasting our defensive talent? Cable has the best corner in football, a very solid group of linebackers, Richard Seymour and Greg Ellis on the d-line, and he's somehow managed to turn them into a godawful defense. Cable's only had three years in the NFL, and never risen above a position coach until this season: the guy's in way over his head and it shows. Lovie's a big disappointment, but he's not close to as bad as Cable. I agree that the team needs to move on, but firing Lovie alone isn't going to do it. Ted Phillips needs to take a long hard look at the roster Jerry Angelo's built and the draft picks and millions of dollars he's spent doing it, then ask himself if Angelo's competent to build a competitive NFL team. Quick answer: No.

Yeah, I think that's a big question. A great position coach can definitely turn a player around physically and mentally, but I don't think you can do it midseason. Look at what Benson's been doing in Cincinnati. When the Bengals got him in midseason last year, he still looked a lot like he did in Chicago: he was playing harder, but he still had slow feet, poor acceleration through the hole, no patience for blocks to develop, no redirection to cut a run back to the outside. After one offseason working with their RB coach, Jim Anderson (who was responsible for Corey Dillon and Rudi Johnson,) he looks like a whole different running back, both physically and mentally. When they got him midseason, he was playing like he did with his old team; after an offseason, he's playing up to his potential. Gaines Adams, thus far, has looked pretty much like he did with the Bucs - he's very fast from what I've seen, but he never seems to translate that into making plays. I don't know if Marinelli can pull a miracle with Adams the way Jim Anderson did with Benson: if he can, he's a position coach we need to retain. But the bottom line is this: I really don't think we'll know one way or another until Marinelli's had a whole offseason to work on Adams.

Just posted this in the other thread, but Lovie's comments about the depth at d-line made it sound like they don't have enough spots to dress both Gilbert and Adams without deactivating someone ahead of them. Just speculating here, but I think Lovie's probably going to rotate them week-to-week, unless one or the other steps up and earns more playing time.

Does this mean he's basically a healthy scratch, or did he get downgraded at the last minute? I hope it's the former - it'd be nice to see the coaching staff acknowledge that he's a liability and dress somebody else for game days. Also, Jarron Gilbert is a healthy inactive, but Gaines Adams is active. I bet we see them rotate dressing one or the other every week from now on.

Yeah, St. Clair's played decently in Cleveland. I think the Browns really soured on Shaffer when they tried to play him at left tackle and he sucked. The guy's a pure right tackle. Then again, St. Clair was exposed at LT for the Bears and has looked OK at RT on the Browns, so if Shaffer keeps playing acceptably at RT, I think the trade is pretty much a wash.

Or the Patriots, who have THREE 2nd round picks and a lousy receiving tight end in Ben Watson. And nfo, remember that in Braylon's one good season, he got the ball thrown his way 153 times - he barely caught half of his targets that year. Don't get me wrong, that was a monster season, but it wouldn't do anything to convince a GM who was worried about his drops, which is what was hurting his value. A lot of receivers would put up big numbers on that many attempts, the same way a mediocre running back can still pile up big yardage if he gets 400 carries. For reference, look at Hester's per-target production this year: if he saw 153 passes come his way, he'd have 95 catches for 1199 yards, and we'd be talking about him in the same conversation as 2007 Braylon. I'm really not one to overvalue our players, but I guess the reason I see Olsen having a lot of value is the mix of potential and production: both Adams and Edwards were much more risky trades than Olsen would be, but at the same time, Olsen has more unfulfilled potential than a player like Shockey. I don't think we should be trying to trade him, but I think some teams could be interested enough to make it worth considering.

True, the Bears are having to get most of their first downs through the air this year. I was just using first down numbers because I don't have situational stats for three-and-outs - subjectively, it seems like there have been a lot fewer of those. Still, it's clear that the passing game is significantly more effective at picking up yards and first downs than it was in 2008; if we can get the run game up to even a league-average level next year, we could have a pretty effective offense.

Good. We need to let Williams and Shaffer play. There's no way Pace is the starter next season, so let's get the new guys some game reps.

Williams held off Chris Long pretty well, and Long's been one of the few bright spots on the Rams' defense this season. Also, Lovie went out of his way to say that Williams looked like a "natural" at left tackle. I wouldn't be surprised if they're planning on giving Pace the start and pulling him almost immediately. Lovie tends to give a lot of lip service to the veterans, but I can't imagine he thinks that Pace gives us the best chance to win on Sunday. As much as Pace has struggled against 4-3 DEs, he's even worse against 3-4 outside linebackers. Elvis Dumervil spun him around like a weathervane in that preseason game against Denver; Pace could barely get a hand on the guy. Clay Matthews has been playing really well, and I'd be very surprised if Pace could contain him. They can say Pace will start all they want, but if he isn't getting benched at the first sign of trouble, it's going to be a bad game for Cutler.

You're actually helping make my point: Adams was a 1st-round pick, didn't perform up to expectations, and then got traded for a 2nd, based on his youth and the fact that he still has a lot of unfulfilled potential. That's almost exactly what I'm projecting for Olsen, and Olsen has come MUCH closer to living up to his draft status since he came into the league. So how does that make it unlikely that Olsen goes for a 2nd and a Day 2 pick? Also, Gonzalez is almost a decade older than Olsen, that's why he only garnered a 2nd. The Gonzalez trade is a totally different kind of move: it was a short-term win-now move by the Falcons, where Olsen would be a potential building block for the future (like the Jets trading for Braylon Edwards.) Age and potential play a major role in how high a draft pick a player will command, since you're giving up the opportunity to draft some 22-year-old who could be part of the team for a long time. That's why the Saints didn't have to give up a 1st for Shockey: having "been around a lot longer" doesn't help his value, it hurts it. Yeah, Angelo was stupid in the Gaines Adams trade. Another GM wouldn't have to be stupid to give up a 2nd and a later pick for Olsen, though: look at the Braylon Edwards trade, which was widely considered a pretty smart move for the Jets. Braylon's another former high pick, MUCH more of a rehabilitation project than Olsen, and he went for a 3rd, a 5th, and two young players who are now starting in Cleveland. If Rex Ryan gave up two picks AND two decent players for the chance that he could coach Braylon out of his drops, don't you think somebody would send something comparable for the chance that Olsen could continue getting better as a blocker? I'm not saying we should be trying to move Olsen. I think he's a guy we can build around and continue to develop, the same as Hester. But with the kind of talent deficit the Bears have right now, there are very few guys on the roster who I'd call untouchable. If somebody wanted to offer Olsen's fair value on the trade market, the Bears front office would have to at least consider it.