Splendid Splinter

i'm not arguing that (even though i wouldn't even say he's an all star on merit, even though he has been a very nice addition and fit on this roster). is this your first time following an all star selection process? (let alone NBA all star). how often do guys who don't put up stats get in (unless they're big name old guys getting in on their past, which also happens)? i just don't see how it's remotely hard to believe that he's not getting hype. My disbelief was with the Bulls not doing anything to promote him. It just seems like something I would expect them to do whether or not he has a realistic shot of being an All-Star in a league focused on offense only. His stats aren't that much different than some Pip All Star years with the Bulls. Sure the points are the biggest differential but Lonzo is still over 13 PPG this year while being an elite defender & passer on the 2nd best team in the East. Lonzo is 4th on this Bulls team. Pip was 2nd when MJ was around and legit an All NBA player (1st-3rd team) most years in the 90s while Lonzo won't even sniff that. Say what you want. Lonzo is a damn good player and a guy who IMO would make ANY team better with his defense/passing/intangibles, but he's going to have a hard time making an all star. It's what? 3 PGs on the all star team each year for each conference? 13/5/5 just ain't gonna cut it. If he was like 13/8/8, ok.... now there might be a debate with those numbers plus defense, but he's not as popular as you think he js to get those votes.

I do too, but you do need 3 solid CBs every season with how pass happy the league is so having that reliable 2nd CB with Johnson would just ease my mind with the secondary. Especially how meh Eddie Jackson is these days.

Plus you always could front load it a little bit the first 3-4 years and give him an opt out then, but also be able to say that you gave him his 10 yr/300+ mil asking price.

Realistically, what do we need to add for next year to feel like we're putting Justin in a real position to succeed? Something like this? - 2 1 starting caliber WR + a WR who isn't necessarily a starter caliber (% of plays-wise) but can play either slot/outside... ideally one of these HAS to be a big WR... lacking in size really hurts us IMO. Scheme/playcalling from the new HC will be more important than getting 2 starters at WR. - 1 starting caliber TE I would let Kmet be the main guy and let him sink or swim and then get a decent backup that doesn't cost whatever Graham is costing us. If Kmet disappoints, then you can draft a TE or sign one for 2023 season. I would save $$$ here so it can go towards WR or C. - A starting caliber Center- Definitely need one at this position. - A starting caliber guard (ideally just extend James Daniels)- Extending Daniels would be best assuming he won't get 10+/mil a year. Who else will be a FA that is starting caliber? - A backup tackle (these last few weeks to determine how good he needs to be)- I would let Jenkins and Borom run with it next season regardless. We need to know exactly what we got with these guys. A decent backup swing tackle would be nice to have for injury purposes. Try to save $$ here as well for WR or C. With the cap space open this offseason, that's probably actually doable? You're left bargain hunting on defense, but I'd be happy to finally have a team that can win games 34-27. I think this is a more realistic approach for this offseason. I think this would still be enough to put Fields in a position to succeed, but it's on the lower end of the spectrum. Think of it as bare minimum as you're asking a lot to sign quite a few starters (5- possibly 6) on one side of the ball in one FA signing period. The question becomes is if we extend both Daniels and Roquan Smith (he should be extended IMO), will we have enough to do all of this? I would also like to sign a decent CB opposite Johnson or in the slot on the defense side. I really like what I saw from Graham last night, but I would feel better if we got another CB that we can rely on. The rest of the D we can bargain hunt like you said. We have an early 2nd and 3rd in the draft where one of those picks could fill one of the spots up above. Plus we got all those cuts/restructures that we could do although I haven't look at the Bears roster and salary cap that closely yet.

People been talking about Justin Fields and his fumbles. It does suck that he's coughing it up a bunch in his rookie season, but it's not like it's out of the norm for a QB. It could very well be an outlier so I will chalk it up as growing pains at the moment. Hopefully he'll learn to protect the ball a little bit better, but it's not a dealbreaker because QBs fumble A LOT. Here is a list of QBs I looked up (past and current) and # of seasons in which they fumbled 10 or more times: Tom Brady: 4 (all within his first 6 seasons) Peyton Manning: 1 Brett Farve: 7 Philip Rivers: 2 Matt Ryan: 2- has 9 right now this season so could be 3 Eli Manning: 4 Aaron Rodgers: 3 Joe Flacco: 2 Donovan McNabb: 2 Russell Wilson: 4 Jay Cutler: 3 Tony Romo: 2 Cam Newton: 1 Kirk Cousins: 2- has 8 this season so far Steve McNair: 3 Derek Carr: 5- has 11 this season so far Andrew Luck: 2 Michael Vick: 5 Dak Prescott: 2- has 10 this season so far Patrick Mahomes: 0- has 8 so could get to 10 this season Alex Smith: 2 Ben Roethlisberger: 1- has 9 this season so far Randall Cunningham: 5 Warren Moon: 8 Daunte Culpepper: 4- had 23!!!! in 2002 Then you have Kyler Murray (11), Jared Goff (9), Ryan Tannehill (9), and Josh Allen (8) rounding out the top 10 leaderboard this season along with Justin Fields 12 and the guys I've mentioned above.

Jokic doesn't horsefeathers around! Pretty sure this isn't his first incident either. Players in the NBA should know better by now than to mess him. He might not start it, but he will definitely end it! He's going to get suspended a decent amount of games, but the NBA should also suspend Morris for 3 games or so as well. He was legit looking to start something or hurt him. Didn't even attempt to go after the ball or anything. Just ran and threw his shoulder/elbow right at Jokic. Also LOL at Butler trying to act all hard like a minute after the fact at Jokic while he's on the bench just chilling.

Good. Exactly what I want to see tbh. They need to lose while Fields shown flashes and improvements. At the end of the season, get to like 6-7 wins so it's good enough that Giants aren't getting a top 5 pick while being bad enough because they weren't close enough to the playoffs or even .500 that they have to fire everybody. There will be no reason or excuse that you can argue to keep any of them.

Didn't Urlacher have a big tackle game against the Lions? I wanna say like in 09 or 10. I remember him just making a bunch of tackles in a short span that kept the Bears in the game and they came back to win. That game still stands out to me that nobody has mentioned yet. Plus he had a similar game like Culpepper against Minn, but it was against Tarvaris Jackson a couple years later. I think they lost that game though.

You're not the only Arkansas alumni/fan here. It was beautiful!

The odd and even number irons are both there. Odds are on one side while even is on the other. You can kinda see what I'm talking about on the picture below. You were just on different side of the hitting bays when you went.

So I'm trying to figure out a good comp for Madrigal since you guys are talking about his bat profile and contact skills, defense, etc and I haven't been paying much attention outside of the Cubs the past 2 years or so. Trying to get a sense of what we should "expect" the next couple years from him. The guy that's popping in my head is Placido Polanco. Is that close or am I way off?

Figured I would give an update on this since it's been 5 months. I passed my written test 2 months ago and then my playing qualifying test 3 weeks ago. The target score that I had to beat that day was 159 (36 holes) on a course I've never played on (The Player's Club at Wooland Trails- which is where Ball State plays at). Ended up shooting 150 (77-73). Now all I have to do is start looking for jobs, apply, etc. Haven't decided where I want to move to yet. How is everyone's game coming along?

A girl in my class had a grandma that was 33 when she was born. That girl ended up having a kid at age 17 so a great grandmother at age 50. At that time, there was 6 generations of the family alive. The oldest was 83. It was pretty crazy. 17,17,16,17,16 were the ages they had their first kid (all girls).

NCAA did it again. What a crock of horsefeathers they did to the women's regional championship! I feel so bad for these seniors who were there. I don't know how you can just end their season like that. Just pisses me off.

Pats also traded Matt Cassel (and Vrabel) for a 2nd. He did diddly squat outside of 2010 after being traded.

This is the first thing that pops in my mind every time I hear the name Joey

This will never happen, but would have a lot of ammo for 2022 draft for the new GM/HC!!!

Why though? He isn't getting drafted high, if at all. Sure he could go to G-League or Europe, but he could also stay and start making money on his likeness. Granted, I still think he's leaning towards leaving, but it's not as closed as some may think. Why risk injury? Even though he’s one dimensional, he’ll get drafted and make some money and develop his game at the next level. Is he a 1st round material? I'm not 100% sure he is talent/skills-wise right now, but you also can't teach height and size so... :dontknow: Only 1st round pick contract is guaranteed IIRC. He needs to stay another year and work on expanding on his skill set IMO.

If Nagy/Pace are seriously going through every QB option out there, they might as well call Andrew Luck and see if he'll come out of retirement. At this point, can't hurt to try right?

I think the only way you're not giving up 3 1sts is either you're also giving up the 2nd the next 2 years along with the 1st and probably more picks OR you're adding something like 1 of Hicks/Fuller, 1 of Nichols/Johnson/Smith, and Foles along with the 2 1st. In those 2 scenarios though, I think you offered enough that they should send something back to the Bears. You wouldn't get anything back with your proposal as it's too light IMO. If I had to guess Smith's trade value, it's probably a mid-late 2nd?

Sounds like Buster Skrine is getting cut. We all knew that was coming.

If Pace does end up trading for Wentz, how does that work out for salary cap purposes as far as a team goes? You would think that Pace will have to send Foles or someone else to offset the $$$ some and then start figuring out how to get back under the cap? Aren't the Bears already pretty much right up to it right now? Also... if this does happens, hopefully it'll make ARob want to stay and get a deal. That could be a nice bonus.

So if I remember right and assuming he offically retires, Brees will count against the cap for $22.65 mil this coming season (all dead money) or $11.15 mil plus 11.5 in 2022 if post June 1st. Is that correct or did I miss something?

This is probably the closest to what you're looking for? I've seen a couple people with these although I've never had one personally so I can't say if it's any good or not. ProActive Sports Groove Cleaner

Kyle- How's the golf game coming along? Been able to get some rounds in lately? In other news, I talked about making a career change and moving from Indiana later this year in the Politics thread. I'm actually going to apply for the PGA (actually called PGM Associate Program) to become a golf teacher/instructor/pro at a local course. Pretty excited about this change although I got a few things to do before I even get into the program. Getting ready to do my background check/screening sometime this month and once I pass that (my brother said I should pass easily as I guess he did a background check on me when I told him I was thinking about applying for this job this past summer and have to do a background check first), I have to buy a package of 5 qualifying level courses so I can register for a qualifying test which I have to do within 6 months IIRC. I will keep you guys updated along the way.