Lousy Weekend for Jerry Angelo
Wow, what a terrible weekend for the Bears. First of all, Thomas Jones has reportedly stopped his offseason training program and is "receptive" to a trade. His new agent, Drew Rosenhaus, is becoming a thorn in the Bears' paw. Last weekend, contract negotiations with Rosenhaus' other client, Lance Briggs, went to the toilet and now there's this. Mike Mulligan is reporting the Bears are looking to deal Jones to the Colts for a third rounder and an additional late-round pick. That would be a colossally stupid move. With Cedric Benson and Adrian Peterson, I could maybe see trading Jones for a first rounder, but to deal an all-purpose back in his prime with low mileage for a third rounder? Jeez. At this point, keeping Jones is the safest move for the Bears. Yes, Benson might be a great player, but we already know that Jones is a very good player. It'd be like when the Bulls traded Elton Brand for Tyson Chandler, only worse. Brand was a solid 20-10 guy that, while never a MVP candidate, was established and dependable. Chandler, at the time, looked like he might develop into the next Tim Duncan. But he was a very raw 18-year-old and his future was a huge question mark. Krause gambled and lost. Chandler is a very good defender, but he has no offensive game to speak of. He's a poor man's Ben Wallace. Brand eventually did turn into a MVP candidate for the Clippers and would look absolutely awesome in the Bulls front court right now.
Mulligan pointed to Kansas City last year as Exhibit A in his list of reasons to keep Jones. They started the year with former MVP Priest Holmes and a former high draft pick, Larry Johnson, as his backup. Once Holmes went down for the year, they discovered an even better talent in Johnson. Depth is so critical in the NFL and I don't know why the Bears would mess with one of their strongest positions. So yeah, trading Jones for a third round pick would be dumb. That's not all that happened this weekend, though.
On Friday, the Bears signed restricted free agent Ricky Manning, Jr. to a big contract. On Sunday, he got arrested for assault with a deadly weapon. He and his posse were at a Denny's at 3 a.m. early Sunday morning, and started picking on a guy with a laptop, calling him "geek" and "nerd" and whatnot. The geek complained to the manager and shortly thereafter the gang punched him and started kicking him. Manning got the "deadly weapon" charge because he was kicking the guy with his shoe. Gee, I wonder if Carolina is going to match that contract offer? I doubt the Bears can rescind the offer at this point, and the Bears are going to be stuck with him. Unbelievable. Guess I'm taking a cornerback now in the mock draft.