Bearded_Beef

At least they doused us with all of the cold water upfront this season. It looks like we're running it back unless Jed can work some trade magic this off-season. I doubt we'll get anything too "magical" for Cody and/or Nico though.

Fair enough I guess. You didn't say Hendry was better? I could have sworn you had early on in the Epstein era. I thought I even remembered you comparing him unfavorably to McPhail at one point. I also thought you had strike out concerns about Bryant and Rizzo. If that's not the case, my bad. I'll go back to my lurking corner now. Though I still think your nuts for not liking the Sweat trade.

I get what you're saying. I can't speak for the "internet", but I don't remember the specifics as well as you do most of the time, I guess. I thought that I remembered you being down on some of our prospects (specifically when you were living and dying by SO%), saying we had a changed-for-the-worse Theo Epstein because he wasn't willing to spend money and just generally being down about the plan and direction of the team as a whole. Then I thought I remembered you saying something about being wrong about everything when we won in 2016. I thought that I remembered you being really down about Poles and his ability to evaluate talent through the first 2 drafts and specifically hating us trading away picks for Sweat and Moore, calling it a trend and "not building through the draft" or something to that effect. But really, I am going off of an imperfect memory and this stuff wasn't incredibly important to me. I am more of a lurker than a poster and I assume you remember better than I do because you were actually writing it. I just come here to see others reactions, findings on the internet, snark and deep dives on stats, drafts and free agencies. It's like trying to remember something from an article you read 9 years ago, so it's possible that I am just remembering the "vibes".

It's kind of a fair inference because you're gloating though. You were right about Fields man. Wrong about Theo and it's looking like you might have been wrong about Poles too, but your self-admitted, obsessive content consumption and analytical tendencies probably give you better insight than most. Trying to figure out quarterbacking isn't easy and thats especially true for Bears fans who haven't really had a good one, outside of maybe Cutler. None of this is to take shots btw, I have appreciated reading your takes over the many years here and at PSD, even when I have vehemently disagreed and even argued with you.

I definitely don't consider myself to be in the group that's given up on him, but the whole thing feels pretty familiar to me and its really frustrating. I can understand fans going straight to meltdown after these 2 games. I think Caleb can settle in and figure things out, but it's a lot harder with a bad Oline and bad coaching, and it certainly looks like he has some growing into the position to do. I can say that I was hoping he'd look a lot more polished and that the team would at least look like a cohesive unit, and it just doesn't at all. I am already finding myself making excuses, like "Well the Titans interior D-Line is brutaL..." and "Well the Texans are just better..." Truth is, it shouldn't matter that much if we were actually good and ready. As it stands right this second, the Bears are a crap offensive team, and we spent the majority of our resources there this year. It's definitely a discouraging start to the year

Do the fans over at brewer fanatic know that you're responsible for our 5 game win streak?

FWIW Greg Gabriel is convinced that we're going to trade the pick and seemed to insinuate that Williams isn't the generational prospect that everyone thought he was at the beginning of the season. I'm not sure the consensus on Williams has matched that of guys like Luck, Manning or Lawrence, so he makes me nervous. His size also concerns me, but maybe that's just because of how Bryce Young has looked this year. The question is, if Williams and/or Maye aren't as sure of QB prospects as you can reasonably be, do you think that you can win with Fields? If you think we can win with Fields, why not throw open this window by continuing to stockpile 1st round picks and sign a few big ticket FAs? I kind of agree with Greg that this trade could be the gift that keeps giving.

Nah, that's definitely underselling him by quite a bit. Ngakoue is considered an "above average DE". Sweat is a bonafide stud, even if he's not on Macks level. He's one of the best run stoppers at his position and a guy who consistently hurries QBs.

Thats not what I said though, Kyle. I said that you don't "value him very much". I have yet to see anything to the contrary either. I don't think it's my observational skills and maybe a communication issue. I can't remember reading a single positive thing that you've said about him or the deal. I am sure that I could have missed something, but I certainly haven't missed how hyper critical you have been of him and the deal.

This is all very fair tbh. Those are fair criticisms and the idea of bringing in a whole staff together has some debatable merit. I personally don't think that Poles destroyed Fields, but I definitely can understand that pov.

Right, because then you'd have to acknowledge how wrong you might be on Gordon. *Paying what it reasonably takes to get a guy that you and your scouts really like* I get that you don't value Sweat very much though. You've definitely made that clear

You sure do make a lot of assumptions for someone who considers themselves "astute". That's just terrible deduction. I'm not so sure Sweat would've been available this year, so the pick was necessary. And I don't think that contract saddles us like, say, Macks did.

Other than skipping over Wright, I think this is a pretty reasonable post. I guess I had less of a problem going bargain hunting and not saddling us with bad contracts than you. I'd rather take chances in the draft and get guys like Sweat who are more of a sure thing. Who would you have signed at DL? Poles had been pretty clear that he thought Edmunds fit the scheme better. I'm excited to see what he does with an improved D-Line. I still think its too early to judge how that one has worked out, but I certainly haven't felt like Roquan would've been that much better. We can blame Poles for Roquan, but Roquan had the same problem with Pace too. I do think he was probably a bit of a diva

You act like sacks are the be all end all of stats here. Nobody thinks you're a meaniehead, I personally think that you and Jersey in particular sound miserable and look for reasons to be miserable when it comes to the bears. I get it, it's been a miserable franchise to be a fan of, but you guys seem to have difficultly celebrating any good thing the team might have going for them. And you add and remove context to fit your narratives You've been trying to horsefeathers on Sweat since he got here, excitedly talking about how much he sucks at the start of each game and growing quiet about him as the game progresses.

Again, where did I call the crack fillers "great" here? You're straw manning left and right, and associating me with previous arguments from different people from a different year. You yourself have acknowledged that Pace traded away the future for "win-now". Poles had to try and course correct a dearth of talent, youth and resources.