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.

There's a perfectly good reason. You just actually have to read to connect the dots. I'll leave that to you though.

Someone needs to refine their understanding of whataboutism

Yeah you're another dude who has just basically horsefeathers on anything that they do, though I know thats kind of your thing. Who did I call great? In the post that you're quoting I just said those guys were "good pickups" I do think Moore and Sweat are "great", but Im not looking to have one of your sematic discussions that go on for 4 pages

So far the argument has been that he sucked at FA, even though I disagree. I'd say Brisker and Gordon still look like they could be something. Wright and Jones were great draft picks. He somehow added a bonafide #1 WR and a great DE. He has stocked draft picks and avoided bad contracts. Not sure what you guys are looking at. Poles has been fine, and I'd argue theres good reason for optimism with him. Seems to me like everyone here forgot the Pace era and expected a young GM to come in, be perfect and preform miracles.

Who would you have signed for D-line thats better than Sweat? It seems like he invested in LB because that's where he saw surplus value and an availability of younger impact players, and those same kind of players were not available on the D-Line with this FA class. The O-line class this year was terrible too. We have needed young talent pretty much everywhere on this team, because Poles started with less than nothing. If we would've signed a bunch of B tier D-Lineman I feel like everyone would just be complaining about not signing Roquan. I also don't get being upset over the concept of trading for and paying a guy, like that makes it all worse. We paid the second so that we could ensure that we signed a premium, young DE who's excellent in stopping the run and good at getting to the QB. Those guys don't make it to FA very often for a reason. I kind of laid it out in the post that you quoted, but I like Edmunds, Edwards and Billings in particular. D'onta Foreman is looking like a good pickup. Poles certainly hasn't crippled us with any bad contracts in the process either, so I think that's even more room for optimism as long as he keeps slowly and steadily adding the way that he has. I feel like we're purposefully not getting our stars through FA and everyone is kind of missing that point somehow.

Kind of all over the place here dude. I don't hate any of his FA picks and I certianly wouldn't rate it an "F". I dont hate Edmunds, or pine for Roquan like you guys all do, Edwards has been decent, Nate Davis was good when he wasn't injured and Andrew Billings has been very good. As far as punting and barely meeting the salary floor, it sounds like you wanted him to buy a bunch of crap just to have a bunch of crap. I'm glad that we have flexibility to trade for and sign guys like Sweat and I have faith that Ryan will use that flexibility on players that are actually worth it. The stars are what hes been trading for, and hes been aggressive in doing so. I said it before and Ill say it again, Moore and Sweat are studs.

"Poles has done a terrible job. He can’t be trusted to run this team." That's the kind of pointless whining that irks me. You talked about Sweat being garbage "without 3 other good d-lineman" earlier in the thread too. Stop trying so hard to be miserable. Poles has been decent at worst. He had a horsefeathers pile to start with and for some reason that seems very difficult for you to grasp.

You know, this team is bad enough that you don't have to struggle so hard to be a sourpuss about them. The defense is looking good, even better with Sweat (go figure). Poles has made some really good moves and has had a couple of mistakes. Particularly Velus and Claypool. This team is looking better, and we still have a lot of resources and draft picks upcoming. I am excited to see what Fields looks like when he comes back. He was looking better before the injury and the o-line seems like its improved since then.

Honestly man, these are pretty level headed takes that I can either agree with or understand. I am not 100% convinced that Fields cant be a stud though. Don't get me wrong I see his warts, but I think if you had the right personnel and coaching to go with the cannon arm, monster size and speed, that maybe he could be something. I certainly wouldn't be upset if we moved on from him, but I could see it being a mistake. I think he passes the "eye test" a lot more than Trubisky did, as low as that bar is. I view Poles not drafting LT as his faith/falling in love with his pick in Jones and this Sweat trade has me convinced he didn't love any of the available DEs.

Poles hasn't been here for 5 years. Poles was hired last year, and it does take multiple years when you start with basically less-than nothing. You don't build through FA and the dude has basically had one full strength draft. "This is the NFL" is a cop out to good discussion. Yes, teams can get better quickly, but those teams usually have something to build off of. When he took over he had an aging, expensive D-Line and Justin Fields. Literally the rest of the team sucked, other than Montgomery and Roquan, and neither of them play a premium position. You all like to crap on Fields too, so maybe you're right and he didn't even have anything there. Please, put together a mock draft from last year, and a FA class that would've made this team likely to win the Superbowl. I bet you struggle to do it even with the benefit of hindsight. I am glad that Poles didn't try to do anything that stupid.