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you're saying that tampa has been wasting money on derrick brooks, too? no, in the tampa-2, the will better be fast, he better be quick, and he better be equally as proficient against the pass as against the run. the sam, on the other hand, is the position of no consequence in the tampa-2. the defense is built around the excellence of the will, and the bears have the right guy for it. The Tampa-2 isn't a defense built around the will linebacker. the will is the most important position in the scheme. No, the defensive line is the most important part of the scheme. The ability to get pressure with only the front 4 without blitzing is the big reason why the Tampa 2 works, and the team will always pick pass-rushing defensive linemen over any linebacker. The two safeties and the WILL are the next important, and the other two linebackers and the corners are the least important in the scheme. The big change that Chicago has made is to modify the system so that Urlacher becomes more important to the scheme to utilize his talents. Correct. Every defensive line position is more important than the WILL linebacker in the Cover-2. wrong. while the defensive line is impoprtant, it's importance is judged as a unit. as a unit, it's only important as the first wave of attack. when sacks and pressure aren't happening, which they weren't on a majority of snaps for the bears last season, the linebackers are revealed as the most important positions in the scheme. if the bears got more pressure on the QB last season, i agree, they wouldn't need such excellent LB's. but you can't assume QB pressure, ever. The Bears got plenty of pressure until Harris went down-they finished 8th in sacks (which I know is the not best indicator of QB pressure whatsoever). When Harris went out, the Bears had to compensate by blitzing more, which led to teams going for more yards. In fact, out of their first 11 games before Harris went down, Chicago allowed 300 or more yards 1 time. In the 8 games after (including the game he went down) they allowed 300 or more yards all 8 times. The Bears were able to stay afloat because of their great ability to force turnovers, but they were no longer able to keep people from driving up and down the field on them. No, you cannot always rely on consistent pressure on every play. That's why the Cover 2 defense is designed to not give up the big play. They force opponents to make long drives down the field, and if the front 4 is good enough they will get pressure on at least one crucial play during the drive and force a big play or turnover, or at least a 3rd down incompletion.

oh jeez, i doubt my perceived condescension can come close to yours, "sport". leave it alone. and i didn't avoid your point, i simply noticed that it was faulty. It's not faulty. Cato June was allowed to test the market, even though he played the "most important position in the Cover-2" at a pro bowl level. The Bears look like they don't want to give Lance Briggs a market value extended contract to play, what you call the most important position on the defense. Both of these guys were late round pics and Cato June is a silghtly oversized saftey. If the players and play at this position is so important, why aren't these guys locked up right away? I doubt we'll see a bunch a song and dance routine when it comes to Tommie Harris' contract. That's because Tommie's position is much more crucial to the performance of the defense. It's one of the easiest positions on the defense to fill and it is by no means the most important tampa-2 position. I've never heard anyone associated with this defense ever say anything like that. The Colts were actually so impressed with David Thornton at the WILL a couple of years ago that they moved him to SAM so that they could break in their young guy (June) at the easiest linebacker position to play, the WILL. That certainly doesn't sound like the WILL is valued all that much.

you're saying that tampa has been wasting money on derrick brooks, too? no, in the tampa-2, the will better be fast, he better be quick, and he better be equally as proficient against the pass as against the run. the sam, on the other hand, is the position of no consequence in the tampa-2. the defense is built around the excellence of the will, and the bears have the right guy for it. The Tampa-2 isn't a defense built around the will linebacker. the will is the most important position in the scheme. No, the defensive line is the most important part of the scheme. The ability to get pressure with only the front 4 without blitzing is the big reason why the Tampa 2 works, and the team will always pick pass-rushing defensive linemen over any linebacker. The two safeties and the WILL are the next important, and the other two linebackers and the corners are the least important in the scheme. The big change that Chicago has made is to modify the system so that Urlacher becomes more important to the scheme to utilize his talents.

i really don't see the fascination with vasher. he's good, but good players can be had in the draft. angelo has shown a fairly decent ability to get good players in the later rounds of the draft on a consistent basis. players like briggs and harris aren't just good, they are top 3 at their respective positions in the NFL--they are perrenial all-pro players. a good GM locks up his all-pro players and shuffles his good players in-and-out through the draft, letting them walk when they ask for all-pro-type money, which they clearly aren't worth. briggs is probably worth what he's asking for. it's just a matter of whether or not he'll get it from anyone. I'm not sure Briggs really is that great. In that system, everything is supposed to be funneled to the WILL, and they get inflated stats because of it. If the rest of the Colts defense had been better this season, Cato June with his statistics would have been in the Pro Bowl for the second year in a row and would also be seen as a "perennial all-pro player", but the reality is that most good outside linebackers could do a great job as a WILL in that type of system. Briggs probably will be paid by somebody, but he is replaceable and probably not worth the money. I'm not saying Briggs isn't good-he is. However, just like June, Briggs benefits from being in the system he plays in which gives his position in particular the chance to pad their stats and make plays. you're talking to me like a bears fan could have no idea how the tampa-2 works. i think i know a little about football so let's just move on from breaking down the inner-workings of the bears defensive scheme. briggs's stats aren't the reason he's an all-pro player. I don't know then why you would want them to sign Briggs for all that money. The Bears could find several other people at that position to give them similar production at much less cost. If Briggs really is that good, then Chicago is wasting his talent by using that system with him at that position-any good linebacker could play that position very ,very well, and there's no reason to pay anybody a great amount of money to do so.

Two players peripherals right here-both are on NL Central teams right now, both were on the same team in the years these were taken from, and one is expected to be average while the other one is not: Year 1- A-6.17 K/9, 1.97 K/BB, 2.17 G/F, 1.42 WHIP B-5.27 K/9, 1.69 K/BB, 1.59 G/F, 1.37 WHIP Year 2- A-4.35 K/9, 1.45 K/BB, 1.59 G/F, 1.32 WHIP B-5.28 K/9, 1.81 K/BB, 1.43 G/F, 1.38 WHIP Here is year 3 for one of those 2 pitchers B-4.93 K/9, 1.51 K/BB, 1.61 G/F, 1.45 WHIP Based on those peripherals, what do you think of these two pitchers? Are they both destined to be pretty bad?

Right on again. The issue here is, it seems for many the range of potential outcomes with Marquis never approaches positive territory. For them, it's just a question of exactly how bad the guy's going to be. While it is true that I have a vendetta against Jason Marquis, it was never my point that he would DEFINITELY be bad. He'll probably bad. My main point was that it was an idiotic deal for the simple fact that he more than likely won't be any better than Marshall or Guzman and will probably be much worse than those guys. Not only that, but he cost 21 million while the other two guys would cost you relatively nothing. I have no problem with those statements whatsoever-if he's worth the contract considering the other people available will be much harder to justify. I'm not sure anybody was quibbling over what you said either because as you said you left open for the possibility that he will be all right from a baseball sense but just not likely to be worth enough to be anywhere near his contract.

i really don't see the fascination with vasher. he's good, but good players can be had in the draft. angelo has shown a fairly decent ability to get good players in the later rounds of the draft on a consistent basis. players like briggs and harris aren't just good, they are top 3 at their respective positions in the NFL--they are perrenial all-pro players. a good GM locks up his all-pro players and shuffles his good players in-and-out through the draft, letting them walk when they ask for all-pro-type money, which they clearly aren't worth. briggs is probably worth what he's asking for. it's just a matter of whether or not he'll get it from anyone. I'm not sure Briggs really is that great. In that system, everything is supposed to be funneled to the WILL, and they get inflated stats because of it. If the rest of the Colts defense had been better this season, Cato June with his statistics would have been in the Pro Bowl for the second year in a row and would also be seen as a "perennial all-pro player", but the reality is that most good outside linebackers could do a great job as a WILL in that type of system. Briggs probably will be paid by somebody, but he is replaceable and probably not worth the money. I'm not saying Briggs isn't good-he is. However, just like June, Briggs benefits from being in the system he plays in which gives his position in particular the chance to pad their stats and make plays.

It'd be something if MJ, Pippen, Rodman and Kukoc got together and popping open champaign to celebrate the Mavs losing. But hey, what's wrong with us fans doing it? You're just a jealous Pacers fan. ;) Nah, the Pacers had some great runs-I'm more of a journey than a destination kind of guy. It has been kind of frustrating though to lose in the ECF in 7 games 3 times, in 6 games twice, and in the Finals in 6 games once all in the last 12 years. They did give the Bulls the best fight that anybody has ever put up against them though in a 7 game series. Besides, if I wanted to do the same thing I could always do it with IU:)

Wrong? Hendry did a terrible job at constructing a team that lost 90+ games, how were people critical of his moves wrong? They were wrong about Jones. Stick to the subject. Wrong about Jones for one year. Still a couple more left to go, so lets not go patting ourselves on the back yet. If he plays like last year for the next two years, I'll be happy. He wasn't great, but it's better than I expected. As for Marquis, he was a contributor for the Cardinals last year, just like you said. Of course, he was absolutely terrible for them, so im not sure what you're saying there. He didn't say that-he said that he was a contributor 2 out of the past 3 years, which would be referring to 2004 and 2005. Oops, I saw it as "a contributor for the past three years", my bad. Still, I don't get what's so offensive about predicting a player will continue his downward trend into awfulness. Do these people do this for every prediction? Do you not fill out an NCAA bracket, because you don't know what's going to happen? "Ohio State should win the tournament!" "They might not, though!" Well no kidding, thanks for the revelation. It's not a matter of the prediction-it's the people who are saying that Marquis has absolutely no chance to be decent to good (or a negligible chance). If you said "There is no way for anyone but Ohio State to win this tournament" I'd point out reasonable ways that other teams could win. Marquis is one of those players where it would be reasonable to say that he's going to be anything from good to horrible (I'm not sure that it would be reasonable to think he could be great, so I left that out)-the definitiveness of what some people think he's going to be to the point that they think that there is no way he could be anything else is what people were addressing.

During the football season, they complain about the Dolphins people doing it, and then when it comes to basketball season, what do they do? :D

Wrong? Hendry did a terrible job at constructing a team that lost 90+ games, how were people critical of his moves wrong? They were wrong about Jones. Stick to the subject. Wrong about Jones for one year. Still a couple more left to go, so lets not go patting ourselves on the back yet. If he plays like last year for the next two years, I'll be happy. He wasn't great, but it's better than I expected. As for Marquis, he was a contributor for the Cardinals last year, just like you said. Of course, he was absolutely terrible for them, so im not sure what you're saying there. He didn't say that-he said that he was a contributor 2 out of the past 3 years, which would be referring to 2004 and 2005. Also, Jones was one of the most under-paid right fielders that have already hit free agency in the league last year. He already has earned about half his money in just 1 of the 3 years-even if only 1 of the next 2 years are like last year, he'll earn his contract.

Of course it doesn't. But that's not the point at all. ok, so what is the point? The doomsday predictors don't know as much as they think they know. I love how everything someone says that they think someone will be terrible, someone else shows up to say that they "might not". Really geniuses? You're telling me that there's a chance he might be bad, and also a chance he might be good. Well, gee, that sounds, almost like every other player in baseball. Marquis last year was as bad as Pujols was good. If you start a thread about how Pujols is going to be great this year, I'm not going to come in the thread and say "Yeah, but he might be bad too! You dont know as much as you think you do!" It's not a question of possibilities though-it's a question of reasonableness. Could a healthy Pujols be bad this year? Sure-but it's so unlikely to be unreasonable. Could Marquis be a league average pitcher this year? Definitely-his track record, his possible return to being a ground ball pitcher, the fixing of his mechanical flaw, the Cubs infield defense and the high grass at Wrigley all give him a reasonable chance of being average. Was the 3.71 an aberration in 04? Probably-was the 06 an aberration? Probably as well. He is a pitcher that if he gets ground balls will most years be somewhere in between the low 4's and high 4's, which means that in most normal years Marquis is a just fine 4th-5th starter with some years being a good 3rd. Now-he might not have returned to throwing primarily ground balls, but I don't think anyone can definitely say that for sure, especially with the limited ST evidence that seems to suggest that he is throwing his sinker well again. Could that change? Sure-but it is perfectly reasonable to think that it may stay that way.

Well, a lot of people think he can make it to the 4.3-4.7 range this year, which would be a 3rd-4th starter type. If he does that, he could earn his money with the current pitching market. Besides at this point, his contract is not very important. It's done with for good or bad-now the question is what is Marquis going to do this year, and can he be productive for the Cubs? Comparing him to the other 4th-5th starters in the league is very useful for that question because Marquis is still an asset if he outperforms some of those other 4th-5th starters-maybe not 7 million good, but he might not be an overall drag on the team this year. Finally, Marquis is known as somebody who is receptive for a while to his pitching coaches and then he gets stubborn and refuses to take direction. Both the previous coaches managed to get at least 1 good year out of him-our hope is that Rothschild can do the same thing for a year, and then the team can decide what they are going to with him after the year.

A few points to add to the discussion: Maybe Marquis was lucky in 04-that certainly is likely. For a pitcher like himself who lets the ball into play so often, he's at the mercy of when the ball bounces for a hit and when it goes for an out. Some years he's very lucky with that, some years he's very unlucky with it. 06 doesn't factor in to that part of the equation there though-he stopped being a ground ball pitcher in that year, and he got hammered because of it. So far, he seems to have corrected that so he won't be the same pitcher that he was in 06. The question is, do the Cubs need him to replicate the luck of 04 in order for him to be successful? My answer is no, they do not. They don't need him to have a 3.71, but more of around a 4.5. He needs a lot less luck for that to happen. The Cubs also have several advantages for Marquis. The high grass will keep some of those grounders from getting through. The infield defense is mostly excellent with a quick DP combo. For Marquis to take advantage of those advantages though, he has to return to being a ground ball pitcher like he was in 04 and 05. So far, he's been unbelievably good in GB/FO ratio. He doesn't have to be as good as he has been in ST or even close to it, but he does need to be in the top 1/3 of ground ball pitchers in order to be successful. The last issue is his BB percentage. That has been slowly improving for Marquis with the exception of 2006 (which again, we hope has been erased by the mechanical flaw). If he just continues to slowly help his BB percentage, than Marquis can be a guy that depending on luck will usually have an ERA somewhere between 4 and 5.

He was sidelined with a minor injury at least part of that time.

He's a special teams stud, but is one dimensional as a player. He's good against the run, but he can't cover, and he can't rush the passer either. He's a good backup ILB/special teamer, but that's about it. Eh, sounds ok. No idea why we're going to pay him $4 mil and didn't have interest in similar dollar amounts for Stallworth, Bennett and Travis Henry, though. Oh, don't worry. You guys aren't the only team not to do anything in FA :x You've at least been rumored with a player or two even slightly haven't you? The only news I hear out of the Colts camp is who's leaving-the only thing I've heard is that Chris Brown wants to come to the Colts-that doesn't mean that the Colts have any interest or any Colts fans have any interest either. It could be possible that the Colts biggest free agent move of the entire offseason is signing Rob Morris-that's almost comical to think that's the biggest.

I will be on my honeymoon the next 2 weeks so that way I dont want to know how bad I will do this year! Last year was brutal... Stupid George Mason! i had the same thing happen to me in 2002. i was in tahiti for IU/Maryland. from what i understand, i didn't miss much. Wow-that was either a win-win for me that year or a lose-lose. I had Maryland picked in 2 nice pools, so I either won a pretty good amount of money or watched my team win the national title. I've never been so upset to get money before-Coverdale's ankle was just not good enough to match up with Dixon that night.

From your descriptions, sounds like pretty bad luck in that inning-a single that bounced into a DP, and a possible double went foul in an at-bat that resulted in a K. Not too bad.

Lou did say that he wanted Samardzija to face Bonds-Bonds is up 4th next inning, maybe Lou will intentionally walk somebody :D

and I'm confident that Izturis can get close to Theriot in that department :D I guess we can come back and actually find what happened after the year.

Soriano single, Theriot double, Lee reached on Visquel error scoring 1, Ramirez singled, Jones singled in 1, Floyd singled in 2, Blanco got out, Izturis got an RBI out, and Z tripled in another run before Soriano got the last out of the inning. That's how you like to see a game get started! Did they chase Morris off of the hill, or is he still in the game? He stayed in.

Soriano single, Theriot double, Lee reached on Visquel error scoring 1, Ramirez singled, Jones singled in 1, Floyd singled in 2, Blanco got out, Izturis got an RBI out, and Z tripled in another run before Soriano got the last out of the inning.

Without looking up numbers, Theriot pretty much is David Eckstein. Kennedy's career line: .280 .332 .398 If Theriot develops a little more pop with an every day chance, he could be there. I chose Kennedy as he is a 2B and seems to have a similar game. I think he's saying that Theriot has a little more OBP in him than Kennedy does-.332 would be low for Theriot if he played well. He would be much closer to Eckstein (.351 OBP/.359 SLG) numbers wise as far as OBP/SLG breakdown.

I think there's a decent chance he would be worth 21 million over 3 years compared to the other pitching salaries that were given out this year-now, he may not be worth his contract each year, but he may be worth more than his contract in 1-2 of those years (for example, people were paying 10 million for 4.2-4.5 ERA's this year-so if Marquis can do that, he makes up 10 of the 21 right there). Now, you can certainly argue that all the pitchers were overpaid this offseason, but that's going to be a league problem-we'll see what happens with the market next year.

I think he could be better than that-but if there are any ties right now about which one is more likely to flame out, the tiebreaker for the job has to go to DeRosa-not only for the contract, but for the simple fact that they promised him the job. You don't want to send a sign to other free agents that the team may go back on their word this early into a contract unless you are sure that the other player can do better, and Theriot and DeRosa seem to have an about equal chance of succeeding right now.