defiantgiant

From the Sun-Times this morning: "If the varied opinions on the Bears' acquisition of Jay Cutler has bothered the quarterback, he certainly didn't show it Saturday when he made his first Chicago appearance for his foundation working with kids with diabetes. 'I think every quarterback in the NFL has a lot of pressure,' Cutler said. 'Anywhere you go you're going to have pressure. Obviously, Chicago has great fans and great tradition. They expect a lot. And, I expect a lot out of myself. It's going to be a fun year.' Tony Dungy, Mike Ditka and Rodney Harrison have all questioned Cutler to some degree in recent weeks, and the quarterback had not visited with media since last month. 'I'm fine with everything they said,' Cutler said. 'I haven't played a game here. I'm yet to step on the field and throw a pass. There is a lot of stuff out there and there is a lot of questions. They are all good questions. I think once the season gets going we'll have some answers to some of those. But I'm enjoying it here. I'm having a great time. I'm having a great time with the Chicago Bears. I'm looking forward to the season.'" If you ask me, Cutler's saying all the right things, telling the media that he welcomes criticism and that he'll prove himself on the field. I definitely think that the questions about his leadership will evaporate the first time he hits Devin Hester for a TD.

No, Shaun Smith: defensive tackle out of South Carolina, used to play for the Saints and the Bengals. For whatever reason, the Browns have two nose tackles named Shaun. Anyway, there's no way the Browns are letting Shaun Rogers go, and he'd be in another league in terms of trade value. Rogers is an All-Pro nose tackle in a division where you absolutely have to have one. Shaun Smith, though, could probably start for some 3-4 teams; it's just that on the Browns, he's stuck behind Rogers. On a sidenote: I'm incredibly glad that Shaun Rogers is out of the NFC North. That guy is a freak. I was just looking back at the Lions-Broncos game back in '07, when Rogers had four QB hits, 2 and a half sacks, a pass broken up, and an interception that he returned 66 yards for a touchdown. Even on a team like the Lions, he was a monster.

I think, were we hypothetically to trade for Marshall, it'd have to be a three-way trade with another 3-4 team. Here's my pie-in-the-sky scenario, ignoring Marshall's off-the-field problems for the sake of argument: Chicago sends Nathan Vasher to Cleveland. Cleveland sends Shaun Smith (NT/DE) to Denver. Chicago sends our 2010 2nd-round pick and Israel Idonije to Denver. Denver sends Brandon Marshall to Chicago. Here's my reasoning: Cleveland has terrible problems at corner, but pretty good depth on the defensive line after acquiring Kenyon Coleman from the Jets. Their starting d-line in 2009 is probably Coleman-Shaun Rogers-Corey Williams, with Robaire Smith as a backup. That leaves Shaun Smith without a major contributing role. He's also out of favor with Cleveland's current coaching staff, since he apparently punched Brady Quinn in the face. At corner, they're heading into the season with Brandon McDonald, Eric Wright, and Rod Hood as the top 3. Vasher would be right in the mix for a starting job there, and they'd be giving up a guy who's not going to start for them on the d-line. Denver, meanwhile, is in the middle of a 3-4 switch with nobody to play on the defensive line. They were running one of the most undersized d-lines in the league in 2008, and all their d-line talent (Tim Crowder, Elvis Dumervil, Jarvis Moss, plus their first-round pick Robert Ayers) has been moved to OLB. They're in for MAJOR problems in this first year as a 3-4, unless they somehow acquire at least a couple of 3-4 linemen. Shaun Smith would immediately start for Denver at nose tackle: he goes 6'2' 325 lbs, and is a pretty stout run defender. He's talented enough to be an average to above-average NT, and he's only 27, so he could hold down the spot for a while. Idonije could add a little weight and be a perfectly good 3-4 end. He's got the height, arm length, and run-stopping ability to be a good base end. Denver would give up a genuine #1 receiver, but they'd only have to solve one position on their defensive line, which is much more doable than fixing all three. They'd also get a day 1 draft pick for the future, which would be useful as they continue to switch to their new defensive scheme. Chicago would have to give up Idonije, Vasher, and a 2nd-rounder. That's a lot. But Gilbert should be able to step in for Idonije as a rotational LE/DT. They'd really be gambling that DJ Moore could step in for Vasher, but the staff seems really high on him, and he's got a similar skillset. They'd risk an adjustment period on defense, but Chicago would get a 100-catch, 1300-yard receiver who has an established rapport with their new QB. That might be a deal worth doing.

Yeah, before the whole trade went down, I thought he was primed to have a big season for us in '09. Denver might have given up a franchise QB, but Orton is much more than a stopgap. I think he'll do well there.

Yeah, my thoughts exactly. I'm really excited to see what Cutler can do, but prior to the trade I was looking forward to having Orton for another year. What he did in '08, with Booker/Lloyd/Davis at receiver and a pretty bad ankle injury, was enough to make me a believer. Plus I genuinely liked the guy: he seemed like he didn't expect to get anything without working hard for it, he took his shortcomings seriously and worked until he improved on them, and he had the respect of the other guys on the field. I hope he does really well in Denver.

I'd be happy if Chicago brought him in for a look, definitely. It's worrisome that he did close to nothing in St. Louis, but if there's a good explanation for that, we could do worse than giving him a shot. At the very least, he'd give us a big red-zone target.

I posted this in the thread about Rex, but there was a great article that examined quarterbacks' consistency using the difference in their Adjusted Yards per Attempt from game to game; the upshot was that Rex in '06 was more inconsistent than any quarterback they had ever seen, going all the way back to 1995. I think Cutler gives us the same big-play ability that Rex had (I'll be the first to admit that Rex had an amazing deep ball on the occasions when he was playing well) but with accuracy on short passes and much better decision-making. I know KC Joyner wrote that article criticizing Cutler's bad decisions, but he must not have been watching when Rex imploded. Cutler's a major upgrade over Rex in terms of his mental game: with any luck, he should give us a consistent quarterback with some big-play potential for a long time to come.

Yeah, I definitely don't think we have the ammunition to get a trade done for Marshall. Also, the guy's a liability as far as his off-the-field problems. I'm not saying I wouldn't take his production on the field any day of the week, but I don't see any reason to think he'll stop having run-ins with the law and getting suspended by Goodell. And it's not like he's getting arrested for pot possession or something, it's for domestic violence. I don't know if I want a guy like that on my team. If he can get into some kind of counseling or anger management program and really demonstrate that he's turned it around, then sure. But then there's the whole question of what we'd have to offer in a trade. Apart from next year's second, I don't know that we have much to send to a 3-4 team. Maybe Mark Anderson could make the switch to 3-4 OLB? He's got the build and speed for it, but I have no idea whether he can drop into coverage. I don't think just the second next year would get it done, and we don't really have any positions of depth that we can afford to trade from.

Yeah, that's pretty impressive, considering dude is 5'8" and change. I mean, he's not a guy you can put on Calvin Johnson for a jump ball (who really is, though?) but his vertical should make up for his height to some extent.

The shots they showed of Corey Graham looked like he was lining up at nickel, not safety. I didn't see any footage of him in the deep middle. Anyway, hard to judge from just a couple of shots, but he looked like he didn't know where to go. I hope he can make the transition mentally: in terms of range/ball skills, he's easily our best bet at FS. Also, I love watching Rod Marinelli stomp around yelling at players. He's exactly the guy I want coaching my d-line.

I think we're saying the same thing, just about different guys: that's pretty much my take on Lovie in 2007. After a couple of poor front office moves and a TON of injuries, he just didn't have the personnel he needed in order to put together a winning season. The fact that he still got the team to 7-9 is a testament to his coaching. I'm not trying to say that good coaches don't sometimes have losing seasons. But I think it's safe to say that a good coach, over his career, wins more often than not. Lovie's had two losing seasons, one where he inherited a losing team and one where he did what he could with a badly depleted roster. I'm more than willing to excuse both of those and still call him a good coach.

I'm beating a dead horse at this point, but how do you measure a coach's performance if not by how often his team wins? Seriously, I want to know if there's another metric where a coach isn't ultimately responsible for winning. Is there such thing as a bad coach who consistently wins? I can't think of any bad coaches who had winning seasons more often than not. If Lovie's a bad coach, why has he won more than all but ONE team in the NFC? If he's lucky to be ranked 20th, the what's the explanation for the fact that he's won more than 14 of the coaches ranked better than 20th? When I think of a bad coach, I think of a guy like Dick Jauron, who had one winning season in five years with the Bears. In point of fact, 2001 with the Bears was his only winning season in 9 years as a head coach in the NFL. THAT'S a bad coach.

I agree with everything from nfo - Rex really did choke away the Super Bowl in the last quarter. We were still in the game until he threw two fourth-quarter picks and one of them went for a Colts TD. Rex's problem was always consistency and performing well under pass pressure, even when he was doing well. There's a great blog entry at pro-football-reference about this. They break down quarterbacks by a single composite stat, Adjusted Yards per Attempt. The NFL average AY/A was 5.81 for the 2006 season. Grossman had a 5.26 AY/A in 2006, which is somewhat below average, but not awful. But the really interesting part comes when they examine his AY/A from individual games, to see how he got to that mark for the season: "Three times [in the 2006] season, Grossman had AY/A ratings of over 9.50, and three times this year he had AY/A in the negatives. That’s pretty odd: only eleven times this season did any QB have a negative AY/A in a game (min: 10 attempts). No QB reached that level of futility twice, but Grossman did it three times, and had the two worst averages in 2006. But there’s another side to Rex, of course. Only seven quarterbacks had three or more games with an AY/A of 9.50 or greater: Peyton Manning, Ben Roethlisberger and Donovan McNabb did it four times each; Philip Rivers, Damon Huard, Drew Brees…and Rex Grossman hit that mark three times. None of those six ever had a negative AY/A, while Grossman did it three times. So is Rex the ultimate two-faced QB?" They go on to examine the standard deviation of his AY/A numbers, and it's ridiculous: "Not surprisingly, Grossman tops the list [at a standard deviation of 5.74], and by a wide margin. For those unfamiliar with standard deviation, what that 5.74 number means is that if Grossman’s performances are normally distributed, we’d expect his AY/A in a given game to fall between -0.48 and 11.00 roughly 68% of the time. On the other hand, we’d expect Peyton Manning’s AY/A in a given game to fall between 5.66 and 9.78 about 68% of the time. Obviously, Manning’s performance in any given game is going to be much more predictable than Grossman’s. Perhaps even more amazing is that nearly 1/3 of the time, we’d expect to see Grossman play absolutely out of his mind good (over 11.00 Y/A) or absolutely horribly bad (a negative AY/A). So how inconsistent was Grossman? Not only is his 5.74 mark the worst this year, but it’s the worse since 1995 (which is as far back as the PFR games database goes)...So there you have it; Rex Grossman has been the most inconsistent quarterback in the last 12 years of NFL football...We don’t have game data going back much farther, but I’d be surprised if there’s ever been a QB as inconsistent as Rex Grossman was in 2006." That's basically what I remember of 2006 Rex: sometimes he would just explode and destroy teams, and just as often he would lose you the game all by himself. There was really no middle ground. As far as Rex on the Texans, I hope that they don't have to start him any time soon. He's got really top-shelf arm talent, but his decision-making needs a HUGE amount of work, and I don't know if he'll ever get there. If he finally puts it together mentally, he could be a dangerous quarterback, but I wouldn't bet on it.

I'm not sure we could get much more than a conditional late-round pick for him, but I agree that if we can deal him for a pick, we should. I'm sure that there are at least a couple of 4-3 teams out there with question marks at linebacker. If Angelo Crowell's knee problem turns out to be serious, maybe the Bucs would be interested.

Right, I don't mean 2 seasons where we went to the postseason, I mean that the Bears have played in 4 postseason games in Lovie's 5 years. I'm not just splitting hairs here: think about where Lovie'd be if we'd made a first-round exit from the playoffs in 2005 and in 2006. Four game appearances isn't bad; two game appearances (meaning two first-round exits) and Lovie might be coaching a different team. In all seriousness, 2-14 is probably an exaggeration, but that absolutely was NOT the same team that just went 13-3 and played in the Super Bowl. Do you remember the '07 offseason? We lost 10 players from the Super Bowl team. Tank Johnson, Alfonso Boone, and Ian Scott were all missing from our DT rotation. We lost Thomas Jones from the run game and Chris Harris from the secondary. Those decisions were all made by the front office, particularly when it came to Jones. It was Angelo who promised Jones a trade after the 2006 season if he'd keep quiet about wanting a new contract. Plus, you have to remember the injuries that happened that season. On the d-line, we lost three more defensive tackles and Mark Anderson. Darwin Walker made seven starts in place of Tank, sucked horribly, then broke his elbow. By the end of '07 we were giving significant playing time to Jimmy Kennedy and some practice-squad guy named Babatunde Oshinowo, for chrissake. Thanks to the issues at DT, we were 24th in the league in run defense. The secondary had roster problems, too. The front office replaced Chris Harris with Adam Archuleta, then we proceeded to lose Mike Brown, Nate Vasher, and Kevin Payne to injuries. Danieal Manning proved he wasn't a free safety, Arch proved he wasn't even really a football player any more. Our secondary problems led directly to the Bears ranking 27th in pass defense. There wasn't the bizarre defensive scheme that we saw in 2008 (that was legitimately a coaching problem on Babich's part,) it was just the standard Tampa-2 played with incapable personnel. Cedric Benson was the starting running back, which was bad enough; once he got injured, we had Adrian Peterson running behind the worst Bears o-line in Lovie's tenure. John Tait and Fred Miller showed their age, Ruben Brown got injured, and Terrence Metcalf proved that he wasn't even close to a starting-caliber lineman. Peterson and Benson got 347 carries combined, but only eked out 1184 yards and 7 TDs. Neither running back even managed 3.5 yards per carry. The Bears' three quarterbacks were sacked 42 times that season, and combined for 17 TDs to 21 interceptions. None of that is on Lovie. In '07, Lovie had to work with a roster that suddenly had MASSIVE personnel problems on both defense and offense, none of which were really his fault. That roster should not have won CLOSE to seven games, not by any stretch of the imagination. I think it speaks well for Lovie as a coach that he got seven wins out of a team that had no ground game, porous defensive and offensive lines, inept quarterbacking, and no real scoring threat outside of Devin Hester.

Right, you said it much better than I did. It's very, very difficult to win a Super Bowl without a legitimate starting quarterback. You don't need an elite guy if you've got other things going for you, but the quarterback position absolutely can't be a weakness. The only team I can think of that won a Super Bowl despite poor QB play was the 2000 Ravens with Trent Dilfer. But the Ravens that year had literally the stingiest defense of all time: they only gave up 165 points and 970 rushing yards over 16 games. They also had a nasty 1-2 running game, thanks to Jamal Lewis and Priest Holmes, but the real thing was their defense. The 2000 Ravens and the 2006 Bears basically tried the same game plan to win a Super Bowl, and the difference in the Ravens' success and the Bears' failure shows you exactly how dominant your defense has to be if you're going to win that way. Dilfer only threw for one touchdown in that game; the Ravens got another one rushing, one off an interception return, and one more off a kick return. Sound like a team we know? The difference is this: the Bears had a very good defense, but an elite offense like the Colts' could still put up some points. The Ravens, on the other hand, were one of only 3 teams in SB history to shut out the opposing offense. The Giants got their only touchdown on special teams. If you're going to win a Super Bowl without the ability to make plays in the passing game, you need a HISTORICALLY dominant defense, something on par with the '85 Bears or the '00 Ravens. If you've got a Dilfer or a Grossman under center, you're not going to win without a defense that's one for the history books.

I don't know that you can say that Lovie's not a good coach based on the postseason. Lovie Smith's 2-2 in the postseason with the Bears. 4 postseason appearances in 5 years isn't great, but it's better than a lot of guys. When you factor in his regular-season record, and the fact that the Bears missed the playoffs by a single game in 2008, I think you can still call him a pretty successful coach in the postseason. Like I said earlier in the thread, he turned a losing team into a Super Bowl team practically overnight. In fact, but for a godawful fourth quarter from Rex Grossman, the Bears might have won that Super Bowl. They were only down 22-17 until Grossman threw that pick-six and then another interception afterward. If Grossman had held it together for 14 minutes of play, I doubt we'd be talking about Lovie as a bad playoff coach. I think it's easy to lay the blame at Lovie's feet, but he's done admirably with some very questionable roster pieces. In '05 his starting QB was Kyle Orton as a rookie. In '06, it was Rex Grossman. Lovie's Bears still put up a 24-8 record during that time, and they made the playoffs both years. Last year, starting a somewhat-improved Orton with no receivers and a cheesecloth o-line, they still posted a winning season. Look at Lovie's one losing season since 2005: it took massive injuries to the defense, a three-headed monster of Griese-Grossman-Orton at QB, and Cedric Benson as the starting running back to get the Bears to lose in 2007, and they still posted a 7-9 record with all that. That roster should have gone 2-14, but Lovie got them to 7-9. Last season he took a legit 6-10 or 7-9 roster (thanks to the poor/injured o-line, ineffective passing game and poor pass defense) and got them to 9-7. They were a couple of minutes of play away from being 10-6 and in the postseason. If we've got a 9-7 team on paper this year, I think Lovie gets us back into the playoffs.

Sports Illustrated is reporting that, according to Drew Rosenhaus, Rex is visiting the Houston Texans on Thursday. Rosenhaus expects Grossman to sign a one-year deal. I have to say, this makes some sense. The Texans have an injury-prone starter, and Dan Orlovsky is a significant downgrade from Sage Rosenfels. Rex definitely needs some rebuilding, but he's more talented than Orlovsky by a long shot. Maybe he can learn something from Schaub, who's consistently made good decisions with the football thus far in his career. Plus, Grossman could get away with a lot more of his throws into coverage if the guy he's throwing to is Andre Johnson.

I agree. If the Bears only keep 6 linebackers this season and they're convinced that Jamar Williams can be Urlacher's backup, then I think the 6 are probably Briggs/Urlacher/Pisa and Freeman/Williams/Roach. Hunter could very well be the odd man out.

There's been a lot made recently of the available free agent wide receivers. They each have their problems, obviously, but those have been pretty well discussed at this point. I wanted to start a different thread to discuss some trade options the Bears might pursue, if they determine our current options across from Hester aren't going to cut it. I'm not talking about guys who might be available for a blockbuster trade, like Braylon Edwards or Anquan Boldin. There are a number of receivers around the league who aren't street free agents, but could be available pretty cheaply via trade. If all it takes is a conditional second-day pick to get a guy, I think that's functionally the same as picking up a free agent. Here are some guys I've been wondering about, with arguments for and against: Reggie Brown, Eagles Pro: Former #35 overall pick, still relatively young at 28. Fast, very talented, with a good all-around game. Between 2006 and 2007 (his second and third seasons in the league) Brown had 107 catches for 1596 yards and 12 touchdowns. His only down season was last year, when he was dinged up for most of the season. If he can revert to '06-'07 form, he could be a very good option. Con: Needs to demonstrate consistency. Not particularly tough or physical, and will drop some passes when he's about to get hit. Overshadowed by the emergence of DeSean Jackson last year even after he was healthy. Does not play special teams, so he ultimately had a hard time dressing for games over guys like Hank Baskett and Jason Avant, who do. Arguably a much better fit at flanker than split end. Analysis: Brown will almost certainly be traded, and should come cheap: the success of Jackson/Curtis last season and landing Maclin in the draft means the Eagles don't really have a place for him. He'd be a fair bet for at least 700-800 yards receiving if he's fully over his injuries from last season. If he can take the next step forward, he might be good for even more. He'd have a QB in Cutler whose arm talent is comparable to Donovan McNabb, and Devin Hester might draw more coverage than Kevin Curtis did. With defenses stacking the box against Forte, Brown might have an easier time separating. Might not be spectacular, but could be a decent starter. Ernest Wilford, Dolphins Pro: Big and physical, at 6'4" and 223 pounds. Pretty talented, could be a decent red-zone receiver. Would provide a big target for Jay Cutler, which the Bears don't currently have. Runs good routes inside, isn't scared of contact, and is a very capable blocker. Con: Slow. Man, is he slow. Ran a 4.77 coming out of college, and there are concerns that he's lost a step since. Definitely struggles to separate from DBs. Has never broken 700 yards receiving or 45 catches in a season, and hasn't even come close to his 681-yard, 7-TD season in 2005. Analysis: Like Brown, Wilford is falling behind other receivers on his team. However, where Brown is struggling to beat out a very talented trio of DeSean Jackson, Kevin Curtis, and Jeremy Maclin, Wilford can't get past Ted Ginn, Davone Bess, and Greg Camarillo. Could offer some value in the red zone, but that's about it: might not even have the separation skills to be a possession guy. Is already 30, and appears to be declining. Could provide some veteran competition, but wouldn't necessarily be a good bet to beat any of the guys we've already got. Malcom Floyd, Chargers Pro: Huge target at 6'5" and 225 pounds. Good straight-line speed considering his size. Very capable red-zone receiver and nasty on special teams. Has some years left at 27. Hasn't gotten beyond #3 on San Diego's depth chart, but he's behind Vincent Jackson and Chris Chambers, so there's no shame in that. Cons: Questionable hands. San Diego evidently doesn't view him as much more than a red-zone guy and special teamer. Has had some injuries. Analysis: Floyd finally signed his one-year tender, but that was after a protracted holdout. He wants a long-term deal, which San Diego doesn't want to give him. He's on a second-round tender, and obviously that's too much to give up for him, but the Chargers might be willing to trade him for a Day 2 pick. Roscoe Parrish, Bills Pro: Very quick, good long speed, still young at 26. Despite limited use as a receiver, has more receptions (97) than anyone on the Bears' roster, and has broken a couple of long touchdowns. Offers top-tier ability as a punt returner. Con: Small. Listed at 5'9" and 176 lbs., which certainly limits him to the slot as a receiver. Best value is as a return man, which is not an area of need for the Bears. Analysis: The Bills shopped Parrish earlier this offseason, for reasons unknown. He's a great returner, but he's now fairly low on Buffalo's depth chart, behind T.O., Lee Evans, and possibly Steve Johnson or James Hardy. Parrish wouldn't be a candidate for a #2 job, but could push Rashied Davis out of slot receiver duties if Iglesias can't step up. ...anybody else you guys can think of who might be available for a late-rounder? I'm thinking somebody from the 49ers could get either cut or traded, what with Crabtree falling into their laps and Josh Morgan emerging last season. Crabtree/Morgan/Isaac Bruce look to be their top 3, so a guy like Arnaz Battle or Brandon Jones might not have a place. I'm not sure what value they could offer, though.

I totally agree - we need the defensive line to get pressure like they did in '05 and '06. I think the rotation is going to be key this year: we might not have one guy at any spot who puts up numbers like the front 4 in 05-06, but each position has at least two quality guys who should be able to rotate, so hopefully each position will perform up to the level that it used to. Marcus Harrison and Anthony Adams should probably be able to combine to equal Tank Johnson's production in 05-06. Tommie Harris and Jarron Gilbert should be able to match Harris' production from those years, even if we have to spell Tommie a lot for the sake of his knee. Ditto for Ogunleye and Idonije at left end. Right end, though, is a question mark. That position accounted for 19 sacks in 2006, with 7 for Alex Brown and 12 for Mark Anderson. That same two-man rotation didn't get it done in '07 or '08, and that's the same rotation we've got going into '09. At least as critical as getting Harris back to form is whether Mark Anderson can bounce back under Marinelli. Brown, I think, is a lock for at least 6-7 sacks: he's been good for that basically every season. But Anderson's got to get back to his rookie year as a situational rusher. I understand that he flopped as an every-down end in '07: he's just not that kind of player. But if he has another year like '08, where he's put in his natural position and just can't get it done, then we're in trouble. Between Brown and Anderson, they've got to rack up somewhere north of 15 sacks. If Marinelli can make that happen, then I think he's done his job as a d-line coach.

Yeah, this is exactly it. Coaches are measured by wins. Lovie's definitely made a couple of bad decisions, but he's won more than most other coaches in the NFL. In response to Bears4Ever_34 - what does it matter if a coach is "stubborn and annoying," as long as he wins? And if there are 19 coaches in the NFL better than he is, why are there only 5 teams with better winning percentages since 2005? Are those other 14 teams all getting jobbed by the referees or something? Basically, for me, it comes down to winning, and you can't argue that Lovie's not a winning coach. He took over what was, under Jauron, a perennial loser of a team; one season after Lovie came in, the Bears were a legitimate NFC power and made the playoffs. One season after that, they were in the Super Bowl. The guy's got 45 wins to 35 losses. If you discount his first season, when he was basically playing with Jauron's team, he's 40-24. That's a hell of a record. Also, destroyed by Dan Orlovsky? What game were you watching? Orlovsky's passer ratings in the three games he's played against the Bears were 43.8, 48.6, and 74.1. He's never had even a league-average game against Chicago, and he gets to throw to one of the best receivers in football. Here are Orlovsky's career stats versus the Bears: 43 completions on 76 attempts (56.6%) for 409 yards, 2 TDs, 3 interceptions, 63.9 passer rating You can definitely point to some guys who passed more on the Bears than they should have (like Griese in the Tampa Bay game last season) but Orlovsky's not one of them, by any stretch of the imagination.

Ask and ye shall receive: Cutler has only played in a dome once in his professional career - in 2008 versus Atlanta. In that game, he completed 19 of 27 passes (70.4%) for 216 yards, one touchdown, and no interceptions. He had a 106.4 passer rating for the game, which the Broncos won 24-20.

Cliff Stein strikes again. PFW and Rotoworld are reporting that the Bears just signed Jarron Gilbert and Juaquin Iglesias, putting all of our draft picks under contract. Only 30 drafted rookies have signed in the entire league so far: 9 of those 30 are Bears.

Missing in action...I don't think their rosters are totally up to date. He was an 85 in the last Madden and he led the Rams in tackles last year, so I'll be interested to see how they rate him in the new one.