RynoRules

He's also been a good WR since then. Bears haven't had a good WR since...... Bernard Berrian? Turns out he wasn't that good. Marcus Robinson? He wasn't really that good either. (ironically both of their careers plummeted when they went to Minny; go figure). Maybe Marty Booker? Two really good seasons and faded into mediocrity in Miami. You could make the case that you have to go back to the Conway-Graham tandem of the early-mid 90's. Conway only had two really good years with us, and a third with San Diego when he was 30. Graham was very good the two years he was here, but for some reason we let him go at age 27. He was ordinary with the Jets fir a couple of years (likely due to how crappy they were at that time) but very productive with SD during the final three years of his career.. I think the more interesting question is when was the last time we had a good WR who was more than a two year flash in the pan? You might have to go back to "Wild" Willie Gault, who we also let walk at age 27, and who in reality was more of a track star than a WR...but at least he was a major freaking threat. He averaged 21.3 per catch in 85', and 19.9 per catch for his career. He was probably the fastest player in the game at the time, and the WR position was very different back then (Andre Johnson might have been playing TE). (Honorable mention to Wendell Davis, who looked like he was coming on before he had both of knees ripped to pieces by the stiched turf at the Vet.) This as much an indictment of our offensive philosophy and QB woes as it is of the WR talent. marcus robinson had the greatest season of any bear receiver ever. robinson had a pretty bad back injury while he was with us and he never fully recovered. he was big and fast and he made cade mcnown and jim miller look good. Fair point about Marcus; forgot about the back injury. And your second point is certainly well taken, though Miller was a much better QB than McNown.

He's also been a good WR since then. Bears haven't had a good WR since...... Bernard Berrian? Turns out he wasn't that good. Marcus Robinson? He wasn't really that good either. (ironically both of their careers plummeted when they went to Minny; go figure). Maybe Marty Booker? Two really good seasons and faded into mediocrity in Miami. You could make the case that you have to go back to the Conway-Graham tandem of the early-mid 90's. Conway only had two really good years with us, and a third with San Diego when he was 30. Graham was very good the two years he was here, but for some reason we let him go at age 27. He was ordinary with the Jets fir a couple of years (likely due to how crappy they were at that time) but very productive with SD during the final three years of his career.. I think the more interesting question is when was the last time we had a good WR who was more than a two year flash in the pan? You might have to go back to "Wild" Willie Gault, who we also let walk at age 27, and who in reality was more of a track star than a WR...but at least he was a major freaking threat. He averaged 21.3 per catch in 85', and 19.9 per catch for his career. He was probably the fastest player in the game at the time, and the WR position was very different back then (Andre Johnson might have been playing TE). (Honorable mention to Wendell Davis, who looked like he was coming on before he had both of knees ripped to pieces by the stiched turf at the Vet.) This as much an indictment of our offensive philosophy and QB woes as it is of the WR talent.

So he has yet to coach at Pitt? That school's coaching turnover has been entertaining the past 3 years. They've had like 6 head coaches alone since Wannstedt. Between Pitt and WVU its less "Backyard Brawl" and more "The Apprentice". The whole Bill Stewart drama was awesomely entertaining.

Appears unlikely, but if we hire Ruskell I am going to be pissed. Not particularly enamored of Emery either. Ross is still my fave based on some of the recent impact guys they have drafted, partuclarly in the later rounds (i.e., Ahmad Bradshaw). In general the Giants seem to understand the importance of having game-changing playmakers on both sides of the ball and they aren't afraid to use early picks to get them (Nicks one year, Pierre-Paul the next) even if they already have guys at the position. I like the approach. In spite of all of the injuries they have exprienced on the D-Line, defensive backfield, offensive backfield and at WR, they are often around at this time of year because of the high-quality depth at those positions.

Who replaces Tice here if he gets the gig?

Here's a sampling of the reaction over at ESPN.com: :nutkick:

Ross seems to have a pretty good track record. I like him at first blush.

Going somewhere, Soto?

Did he mention anything regarding the talks with Detroit? Nah, thhe last he said on that was about a week ago. Some Detroit fan said giving up Turner was too much for Garza and Marlin said he'd be pissed then, because if Detroit gets him it's Turner and more. If true, I love that Thoyer is driving a hard bargain here. We don't NEED to trade Garza, and his value is likely to be just as high (if not higher) come July.

I'd like to hear some opinions on this too.

Horrifying story.

Yuck. I guess Theo thinks he could be traded for filler at the deadline, otherwise you just DFA him in September when its time to call-up the McNutts of the world? They've done enough wonderful things over the past few weeks for me not to question this. Seriously, I'd just view this as a junk player only to be used in case of emergency, likely as bullpen depth and a 7th/8th starter. It's not like he's going to get a significant contract or anything. Occupies a spot on the 40-man. May be he's getting a minor league deal. I could live with that.

bc LSU didn't go to Ames and come home with a L. OSU should have been in the title game instead of Bama, but I'm not willing to totally overlook LSU's regular season b/c they had one [expletive] game at the end. I really despise the BCS system. Iowa State wasn't as bad as they have been in years past. They weren't world beaters by any stretch, but they were decent (played well in the Pinstripe Bowl, a clear road game). And it was in Ames, whereas LSU's loss was on a "neutral" field. But whatever. You are right - we shouldn't have to debate this horse****. At most we should be debating whether a certain team deserved to be in the 12 team tournament field, or whatever. Damn that would be epic.

How the ****** does LSU finish ahead of OSU? Maybe I am biased because I enjoy watching good football, but LSU has twice looked to me like a team that OSU would run off the field. EDIT: I was seriously LONGING for last years game. Oregon-Auburn was as entertaining a college football game as I have ever seen.

what would be the point of fielder doing this? he's going to get paid this offseason. Not saying I agree with B77, but who might need a 1B next season?

Yuck. I guess Theo thinks he could be traded for filler at the deadline, otherwise you just DFA him in September when its time to call-up the McNutts of the world?

Agreed. I'm really surprised. I thought we were looking at 3 years and 18-19 mill, or something like that.

Dickerson on Bears' offseason needs: Article I agree with his order of battle for the most part, but I don't get why the focus is solely on veterans. Maybe he just doesn't know enough about the draft, but the Bears are picking in a range where there should be at least one if not two good WR options available. Pair that pick with a veteran (Vincent Jackson please) and you've effectively given the entire offense a much-needed facelift.

In fairness he doesn't look much like a QB. He looks like Biff from "Back to the Future".

I'm quite aroused.

I didn't argue that switching to the 3-4 is a "magic bullett". My point is that ownership appears to resist modernizing the football operations / change with the times in spite of the fact that it is unquestionably in a position (financially) to do so. Edit: In other words it isn't part of the culture.

I think guys like Dick LeBeau (notwithstanding last night's unfortunate result; his body of work is far greater than one loss) and Bill Belichick can scheme a 3-4 to beat just about any offense. You can put a ton of pressure on offenses when the O-Line has to do a lot of thinking about where the blitz is coming from.

It could kill us to hire a 3-4 coordinator, considering all the personnel says 4-3. Teams that have made that change have invested heavily in the conversion (Packers- Raji and Matthews; Texans- JJ Watt and others). The Bears are already heavily invested in the 4-3 with the money paid to Urlacher, Briggs and Peppers, and they can't really afford to switch at this point. I agree - that is what I said above in bold. My point was that I do not believe the Bears as an organization have evolved at the rate that some of the more dynamic and succesful teams have. I was using the 3-4 and West Coast offense as examples of largely successfull, non-traditional schemes that have been used to great effect in other places. Obviously they don't work everywhere, but there's no reason (again, other than current personnel) that they couldn't work here. The 3-4 has been around a very long time. It is not new and innovative. Well, in that sense neither is the West Coast offense. My point is that the Bears tend to be stubborn in changing their systems and (for the most part) stay with fairly conservative ones. I realize the Cover 2 is different from the 4-3 that Tobin ran back in the 80's after Ryan left, but it isn't exactly an about-face in terms of dialing-up creative blitzes (in fact Rivera was sent packing in part because he blitzed too much for the Bears liking). The Bears have tended to be relatively vanilla on both offense and defense over the years. I could get into the details later, but if you are old enough to have been watching them for the last 30 years you likely get my drift.

It could kill us to hire a 3-4 coordinator, considering all the personnel says 4-3. Teams that have made that change have invested heavily in the conversion (Packers- Raji and Matthews; Texans- JJ Watt and others). The Bears are already heavily invested in the 4-3 with the money paid to Urlacher, Briggs and Peppers, and they can't really afford to switch at this point. I agree - that is what I said above in bold. My point was that I do not believe the Bears as an organization have evolved at the rate that some of the more dynamic and succesful teams have. I was using the 3-4 and West Coast offense as examples of largely successfull, non-traditional schemes that have been used to great effect in other places. Obviously they don't work everywhere, but there's no reason (again, other than current personnel) that they couldn't work here.

I honestly like Lovie and admire his professionalism, but how do we go from consistently mediocre to top-notch without changing the approach and culture, particularly on offense? I know that (as of now) we don't have the personnel for this, but would it kill us to hire a 3-4 D-coordinator and a head coach who belives in that system? How about an O-coordinator from the Walsh/Holmgren/Reid coaching tree? This is ultimately McCaskey's fault, IMO. If he genuinely wanted a dynamic team like the one to the north that has been kicking his arse for 20-plus years he would have stepped outside his comfort zone and grabbed McKenzie, who was clearly ripe for the taking. Now the best case scenario might be the guy from the Falcolns ("meh" draft record) and Mike Tice is this year's version of Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts.