BigbadB

I can't imagine he's sandbagging. There is probably nothing worse for an older NFL player than missing games on a big contract. He missed several games over the last few years, so he can just assume he's not getting a multi-year contract after this year if he continues missing games. And actually, that could work out in the Bears favor in possibly bringing him back on a reasonably priced yearly deal if he does prove healthy, sans the first 3 or 4 games.

I had You Tube TV for awhile in San Diego 3 some odd years ago. I don't hate it. Hopefully they pick up Chicago Sports Network once NBC Sports Chicago goes off the air on September 30.

What kind of streaming are you talking about that I don't already have? I've got You Tube TV, Prime, Netflix, Apple TV, Paramount +, Peacock, Max and Hulu. I don't have cable. I'm rural and just switched from Viasat (satellite internet) and DirecTV (satellite tv) to Starlink and You Tube TV. I'm not overly concerned about price. I just went from $512 a month for internet and DirecTV to $220 a month for Starlink and You Tube TV. Even added Sunday Ticket since it's basically paid for in one month of savings from my switch. I'm cool with adding Marquee and/or Chicago Sports Network (if they create a stream and aren't available any other way) as streaming channels, also. ETA: Thread hijack. Go Bears!

I've had my Amazon account long before Prime even existed. The free shipping was worth it for the membership all by itself. We had friends over. I fired up the Weber and made Brats, put a tv on the patio, got the tiki torches fired up, put on some music and watched the game. $10,000 fine for punching Roschon Johnson? That's it? Too bad we aren't playing the Jets this year. We could get every Bear player lined up to take turns punching Aaron Rodgers in the face.

I don't want to go to the trouble of jailbreaking Firesticks. I don't want to go to the trouble of setting up a VPN. I just want everything I want, all in one place, easy to find and preferably legally.

I'm not even going to pretend I know Bears football better than you, and I have no idea if it will play out that way. It's just how I would imagine it playing out in my own mind. It's possible that we try and run it down their throats and avoid having to make high percentage throws. I hope this is the game they can get on the same page and start moving the ball AND scoring points. With that said, Sunday Ticket has had me watching all of the NFC North games pretty closely, and I also have some Texans on my fantasy team, so I'm always going to dial into their games as well.

I agree that it all seems very fixable. I don't see why the Bears coaching staff can't catch and run plays when they have so many speedy receivers. I don't know if screens are the answer when opposing defenses are stacking the box and bringing pressure. The better answer is drops behind the line with guys in stride. I watched Jayden Reed and Rashee Rice burning guys after the catch on medium/short range passes and letting their feet do the rest. Those are blitz killers.

I can't see the Colts overcompensating to stop the run since they aren't losing blow outs. I think they watch Houston game film and look for ways to keep Williams from having time to throw. No one in the Bears backfield is Mixon or Jacobs, so worrying about a running game that has been non existent thus far doesn't seem like Indy's best plan. Looking for ways to confuse Williams or pressure him to make mistakes seems like the deal of the day until the Bears make them pay. Williams has been pretty respectable with a clean pocket. It's the blitz packages that: A) the coaching staff completely ignored planning for because the Texans don't typically employ blitz packages B) Williams is failing to recognize and make the necessary adjustments to beat the blitz C) players don't understand their assignments well enough to execute blitz beating plays D) all of the above I can't pretend to know more than the Offensive Coordinator. But, it sure would be nice to see the adjustments made to not only march down the field, putting opposing defenses on their heals, but scoring at will, also.

I purposely got You Tube TV a month ago and ditched DirecTV. The reason I went with YTTV is because of the Bulls and Hawks. I don't regret it, provided they offer a stream of some sort at some point. I'm not going to buy an antenna. If they can come to a deal with You Tube, then all the better. Without the Bulls and Blackhawks, NBCS Chicago is worthless to me.

Colts offense scored 23 against Houston, but two of those td's were deep passes where the receiver beat the DB's. Richardson only completed 9 passes in that game vs. Houston, and take away the 115 yards on those two deep pass plays, and they had less than 100 on the other 7 passes, which includes some garbage time yardage. Richardson ran for more yards than Taylor. Richardson is still technically a rookie QB since he missed so much time last year, so he's likely still going through his own growing pains still. Houston ran the ball 40 times on Indy at a 5.3 clip, Mixon with 30 of those carries. 8 different receivers caught passes, and even though they ran 40 times, they still threw 42 passes, so Houston mixed plays pretty well. Taylor ran the ball well, but only had 12 carries for the game. Green Bay ran the ball 53 times at a 4.9 clip. Indy had no answer for the run, and the holes were huge. Indy hasn't had more than 20 minutes in TOP yet this year. Indy should have Josh Downs back against the Bears. That makes their receiver room a bit stronger, but certainly not as strong as Collins, Diggs and Dell. As important as it will be to get the run game working in this one, the Bears should be able to move the chains on this Indy defense through the air, also. After losing Buckner to injury and watching Houston game tape, I'd expect Indy to stack the box and bring pressure to stop the run and force Williams to throw more. As much as I want to see the run game produce, I also feel like this will be a good game to let Williams expose blitz packages with better play calling.

I felt like that was at least a 2 or 3 week injury for such a big guy.

This is more week 3 nonsense, but I peeked at the schedule this week. I'm happy to see a better split of games at noon and 3pm instead of 10-3, but why have two games on Monday that compete at the same time? That seems rather strange. Also, looking at the names of the stadiums on the schedule for week 3, I would fail a test to name where these stadiums are. Lucas Oil and Allegient and possibly SoFi are the only ones I think I'd get right.

Texans recognized early that the blitz was sabotaging the Bears offense and they relied on it early and often. Ryans probably runs less blitzes than Eberflus, but when you find a magic potion that the other team can't figure out, you keep using it. I'm guessing Waldron knew that the Texans didn't blitz much, so didn't practice plays to beat the blitz. And that might be a flaw in daily practices. Bears don't blitz all that much, but every team in the league is now going to be implementing blitz packages against this Bears team until they find a way to beat it. There are plays to burn a blitz, but it didn't seem like any of the play calls were designed to do that at all. I realize Caleb isn't likely ready to recognize the blitz or stunts that defenses are throwing at him, but if this OC doesn't figure out ways to bail out the QB, it's going to be a long season. A lot of Caldron's plays look a bit too similar to Getsy's screen plays that blow up before they ever get a chance to even start. Rather than sweep right or sweep left, maybe try right over the line 5-10 yards with crossing routes. That's probably where it hurt most not having Allen, but someone on this WR crew needs to be able to beat their defender off the line and be open in the middle of the defense when they are blitzing. Hit that guy in stride and you are looking at big gainers. The offense was pretty vanilla for good reason, but where the defense made adjustments for the better at the half, the offense went into a complete shell, forcing long 2nd and 3rd downs on every series. There was even a running play on first down from deep in their own side of the field when they needed two scores and only about 6 minutes left in the game and only one time out.

Would Payton have been in the same situation in this era than he was in the '70's as far as scholarships, training, coaching, etc....

Imagine how bad Damar Hamlin feels about it, even though it was a clean tackle.

LA Rams put both their starting LT and LG on injured reserve. That should make Stafford a more easy target when the Bears play them.

Kmet didn't get many snaps in that game, and he was pretty upset about it. I wasn't much of a fan of having Carter and Jones both active and Tyler Scott inactive. With Odunze possibly out this week, this would be a great week to sit Jones as further punishment for muffing that kick so badly. Indy beat Houston's secondary deep a few times, and in a game we may have to throw more if the defense can't hold Houston's offense, I'd like to see what Scott's development in year 2 looks like. I want more competency at WR than Jones or Carter as 4th WR's. Houston is going to look at game tape and see how well the Bears special teams unit got excellent field position all day and make sure they kick out of the end zone, so I'd expect the return game to take a hit this week in Houston.

Indy couldn't stop Mixon, which is probably the difference in the TOP being that much different. 30 carries for 160 yards. The Bears did a pretty good job containing Pollard outside of the one series they scored their first td. Pollard had 47 yards on 3 carries on that drive, leaving him with 13 carries for 35 yards for the rest of the game. Houston will be much tougher to stop in general since they are a much more balanced and talented offense, but I'm not sure Indy is a better team than the Bears on either side of the ball, and that's including Caleb going through his growing pains.

That quote I saw was that he was blocking on a Velus Jones screen play, and Jones and his defender both rolled up from behind Rome.

And that explains why I didn't see Rome in there in the 4th quarter.

Isn't an inactive QB still available as an emergency replacement if both QB's get hurt? I thought that was one of the new rules.

Carter was in on some of the plays Keenan was in. Keenan was in the slot and Carter was lined up outside on the same side as DJ. Wasn't really paying attention to Velus, but now wondering if Rome was the one who was doing most of the sitting in that fourth quarter.

I just finished rewatching the game. He was actually in for their very next offensive play, which was oddly the 2 point conversion. I then saw him lined up in about half of the offensive plays they ran in the 4th quarter, but the Bears were pretty much just playing kill the clock at that point.

Speaking of Keenan, did he ever come back after he limped off the field on the touchdown attempt in the 4th quarter?

I was skeptical when Caleb was saying he never gets nervous. He looked nervous out there, which should be expected. While he was practicing weekly with the Bears strong D, they had to play a bit soft and not attack the star QB. He played very little in preseason. And then Tennessee found some weaknesses on the OLine and exploited them. I was most disappointed with the OLine. I saw several TE's run routes without hitting anyone and sure enough, the guy they were covered up with pre-snap was the guy making Caleb run for his life. I saw Blasingame miss blocks. I get it, it's going to happen because the other team has play makers, too. But, jeez..... The overthrows seemed more like a guy feeling overwhelmed in the best league for football players in the world and his big eyes when he saw an open receiver weren't communicating with his overzealous arm. I wanted to see some first down passes, which the OC seemed to be shying away from. The times they did try to throw on first down, the OLine was issuing free passes to the DLine. So frustrating. Caleb was bad today, but he didn't have turnovers, the team won with bad offensive play, so there is some confidence builders in there leading up to a game they will have a tough time winning. This one will be a good test, because Houston is a playoff caliber team and the OC has a lot of bad film to show to improve things in week 2.