UMFan83

Well we all knew Murton could hit AAA pitching.

True, too young, mostly too young, who, and true. It's hard to hate a team that has been completely irrelevant as long as I've been a big fan of baseball. Since they've been in the same division as us, they've won 2 NL Central titles, 1995 which was maybe the first year I really cared about baseball, and this year. Before that they were in the West and didn't really mean much to me. Oh, suprised Joey Votto and Marty Brennaman didn't make your list. Edit: Oh....mario Soto

I don't know how Orton can't be considered good. His last 2 1/4 seasons, 1 being with Chicago: 08: 58.5% Comp, 6.4 YPA, 18 TD, 12 INT, 5 fumbles lost, 79.6 Rating Notes: Pretty mediocre season overall, but higher than expectations. Bears receiving options and o-line were fairly mediocre to below average. Numbers were higher before a high ankle sprain injury halfway through the season that he came back from early 09: 62.1% Comp, 7.0 YPA, 21 TD, 12 INT, 2 fumbles lost, 86.8 Rating Notes: Numbers up across the board, but in a better offensive system with an elite WR and decently good Oline. Note that again, his numbers started out higher and dipped the later half of the season, although no known injury as an excuse. 10: 67.2% Comp, 8.1 YPA, 6 TD, 3 INT (Projects to 24 TD, 12 INT), 0 fumbles lost, 96.3 Rating Notes: Another fast start. Will be interesting to see if he fades again in the 2nd half, but those are some solid numbers so far. WR options are notably worse this season, probably similar to what he had in Chicago in 2008 (Brandon Lloyd was on both squads). No running game to speak of.

I guess it all depends on what is going to be out there this offseason. When does the labor agreement end? I'm assuming between the draft and the start of FA? No doubt in my mind that OL is the number 1 priority on the team, and the team should probably draft at least 2 or 3 lineman in the draft. But whether its a 1st 2nd and 3rd or a 2nd 4th and 5th, depends on how everything plays out. I'd be pretty disapointed, but not surprised, if one of our first 2 picks wasn't a lineman.

Is it bukie that usually analyzes the football outsiders stats? I am interested to see how the Bears Oline is rated this week.

If he wins a World Series with the Reds, it really doesn't justify that I was incorrect in my evaluation of him. It just means they got really hot come playoff time and were lucky enough to not be in many situations where Dusty's decisions would kill them. I'm not actively rooting for the Reds, but I wouldn't really be devistated if they won a WS with Dusty. I'd prefer they not but, not enough that I'm rooting against them with a passion. Plus it probably pisses off the large contingent of Reds fans that inexplicably hate us to see Cubs fans not strongly rooting against them.

Yeah, Flames, why was this a better deal than expected? What were you expecting, a max contract? And who breaks their fall with a closed fist? He's probably referring to the rumor that Noah was holding out for 70 million originally

That's kind of a weird comment, isn't it. Because with concussions I'm pretty sure everyone is going almost solely off what the doctors say, not what coaches obervations are. And Lovie doesn't mention the doctors at all in that quote. So if it's just Lovie saying "There's no visual signs, that I can tell" then no disrespect to him -- but what he sees doesn't really matter. What does the doctor say? That's what pretty much everyone is going to want to know. I read this and have to wonder if a doctor had actually looked at him or if the coaching staff yanked him. Later in that article, Lovie mentions that they are willing to get and "specialist" to look at Cutler as Cutler would request. idk, I wonder if the staff just said to hell with getting him killed and pulled him. I listened to his press conference, and Lovie sounded like he had no idea about the new concussion rules. I think with all this new stuff known about concussions and the NFL making sure they enforce the rules, it would eventually come out if Cutler didn't really have a concussion.

I think I remember him picking the Braves and the Yankees in the pre-season. I can't remember for sure though, let's see if he responds and tells us.

Phillies over Reds in 4 (Crazier things have happened, but I cannot envision a scenario where the Reds win this series. I'm being generous giving them a game, meaning I am assuming they can beat one of Halladay, Hamels, or Oswalt) Giants over Braves in 4 (Don't really have much input in this series. The Braves could probably win but I like the Giants hitter better and the Braves struggled the last couple of months) Rangers over Rays in 5 (more or less a pick of hope. The Rangers have had a pathetic history. This is the 4th ever playoff series they've been in, they've never been to an ALCS and they've only won 1 playoff game ever. I also think that they have played the Yankees in every playoff series they've had so it is nice to see them playing someone else, although they almost drew the Yanks again.) Yankees over Twins in 3 (Just a gut feeling. I really like the Twins team, I just don't like the matchup with NY and I feel the Yanks are gonna step it up come playoff time. The Twins can be competitive in this series and it wouldn't shock me) Phillies over Giants in 4 (Just can't see the Giants hitters keeping up against the Phillies bats. Phils will be able to score enough off the Giants to make this an easy series) Yankees over Rangers in 6 (yeah a repeat of last years WS. If the Rangers can get this far that means they are playing well enough to compete in this series but the Yankees will be in control all series. I see it being a series where the Yankees go up 3-1, the Rangers take game 5 and then the Yanks finish them off in Texas). Phillies over Yankees (revenge. The series should be closer than last year. I actually don't mind seeing this matchup again. They are clearly the 2 most talented teams in baseball and it would be a good matchup) Really looking forward to these playoffs. Good to see some teams that never make the playoffs get in (Reds and Rangers), a couple of moderate to low payroll teams (Rays, Twins), 2 teams that haven't been there for at least a few years (Giants, Braves), and the mainstays (Yankees, Phillies).

They were saying those things last year too at this point in the year. Also weird the timing of his comparison. I could have told you that at the time of the trade Kyle Orton was a really solid qb. His numbers in 2008 pre ankle injury were pretty solid. The difference between him and Cutler is that Cutler is a statistically more accurate passer and gives you a definite added dimension. But it comes with added risk. Put orton and cutler in a vacuum and cutler has better numbers.

In what might the last relevant update of this thread, the aforementioned Blackhawks Stanley cup box set is released tomorrow. Gonna be broke after buying this and NBA 2k11 tomorrow.

He certainly could be. But why would he casually mention that he fell with a closed fist? Did he have a doctor tell him that the only way he could break that bone was with a closed fist, so he figured he had to mention that so his lie matched up with the injury? I guess its possible. In the end it doesn't really matter how he got hurt. I don't care if he's lying as it doesn't benefit my life one bit to know the truth.

Yep...it was in David Haugh's column this morning. He's the only one that apparently noticed though. Others are saying that his teammates on the sideline noticed he wasn't acting like himself in the second quarter. They thought something was up. I'm just criticising to criticise at this point, but if teammates noticed him acting strange on the sidelines, he walked to the wrong sideline for a play, and on several plays he was for some reason unable to get the ball out of his hands while staring at an open target, why did it take until halftime to put 2+2 together and get him out of the game? Not that having Collins in earlier would have done anything but still.

670 in Chicago was saying that from the research they did, almost all injuries of the fifth metacarpal occur due to punching something. Well wouldn't falling to the floor and bracing yourself with a closed fist constitute the same motion as punching something. Boozer himself said that if he had managed to hit the ground with his hand open instead of in a fist he probably wouldn't be in this situation right now. So most likely for whatever reason he tried brace his fall with a closed fist and broke it. He must have had something in his hand that made him not want to open his hand to land with an open palm, because I'm pretty sure the natural reaction is to open up your hand to brace the fall.

I know Bears game threads are jersey's birthright, but I've only seen one post of his since before yesterday's game started, so guess I'm gonna take the reigns since Week 5 news is already leaking into last week's thread. So since yesterday's game was about as depressing as the entire 2010 Cubs season, let's stick to positives. -The Bears are 3-1 and got there by beating a couple of preseason Super Bowl candidates -Cutler is alive and there are very early signs that he will play next week -Carolina really sucks and Steve Smith is looking like he's going to be out so Peanut won't have nightmares all week. -The schedule is a lot easier for the next several weeks -The offensive line can't get worse, and it was so bad yesterday theres no way Martz comes in with a "lots of 5-7 step drops" gameplan to start this week's game. -The defense has looked inconsistently great so far (made up term I know). -At game time it will be mid-October and the Bears will be in 1st place. So let's get off the mat, dust ourselves off and get some revenge for 2005 against the hapless kittens (sorry Andy).

Or maybe Cutler didn't have a concussion at all and he was just pouting in the locker room!!! /wilson

Ronnie Brewer won't play tomorrow either because of a hamstring issue. Wouldn't normally be a worry except a hammy injury is something that bothered him all year last year and caused him to miss significant time. Keith Bogans will start in his place.

Yeah it was partially a joke. I mean I could see the Bears deciding what Philly did...if Cutler is out and no one is going to be able to stay upright with our o-line lets bring in Vick/Juice. The issue is that Juice does not have the arm accuracy to be successful in the NFL IMO. He's fast, but how many "fast" college QBs can be a successful run/pass threat in the NFL? Hell even Vick is like 75/25 Pass/run these days.

THE JUICE IS ALMOST LOOSE!!! TBH, I'd rather start Todd Collins again than Juice.

I don't think it had anything to do with prep or overconfidence. The defense played inspired most of the game. We didn't make any glaring mistakes on special teams. The WRs were getting open at least some of the time I was focused on them. The entire game comes down to the fact that the Giants D completely manhandled all of our blockers and quickly knocked our QB at of the game by completely ramming them to the ground. If the line blocks like even a slightly below average line would, we probably win that game. But instead we were treated to a historically bad performance. Maybe their D-line came ready to play, maybe that's a part of it. But if you put Peppers, Straham, Ware and Reggie White all in their primes on the same line going against an average O-line and they get less pressure than the Giants got last night. Even the best lineman in the league don't get past their man on every play. And it's nearly impossible for 2+ rushers to get free on 80% of all passing plays. So maybe their Dline had a little to do with it, but it was only combined with a historically bad performance by the Bears o-line. I still can't decide what is more frustrating about this game, the fact that we could have easily won this game with a league average O-line, or the fact that I could easily see us having this type of performance in more games this year.

I'm sorry, I know some of those teams listed had a long run of ineptitude, but any franchise that has won a WS since 1990, I cannot say it's worse to be a fan of them than the Cubs. My GF is a Reds fan (sorta) and she always tells me about how happy her family was when they were in the WS in 1990. I walk through their house and they have framed newspapers from the morning after. I tell her about that one time Aramis hit 2 HRs and we got to within 1 game of the World Series. And then she asks me what happened after. I dunno I might rather have a World Series title followed by 20 years of mostly irrelevance than no World Series title in a 20 year period with sporatic relevance, even if that team was easily more popular during that time span.

Those were 7 awesome wins. All against St. Louis IIRC

Yeah but I don't think he really wants to go anywhere but NE. The last thing about him is that he was content in waiting this out and trying to play the last 6 weeks of the season for whatever reason. I would think we would have heard his name already at this point if he was a possibility.

Did anyone else read that apparently after one of his many sacks last night, Jay started walking towards the wrong sideline?