Bears Offseason News: Latest on Harris, Hester and the 2008 Schedule
Lots going on with the Bears over the last seven days:
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Contract talks with Tommie Harris broke off. There's lots of time left before the season starts, but this is not a good sign. I don't think I'm overstating this by saying that it's imperative that the Bears extend Tommie Harris. I predict a holdout, a disgruntled Harris, and a Bears "cave." All will be fine in Harris-land by week 3 of the preseason.
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Devin Hester wants a new contract, too. For some reason, he thinks he deserves a raise for being only 25 and already the best and most dynamic returner ever. Is any Bear happy with his contract? Wait, what's that? The Bears are $16 million under the cap? Let's see, $8M for Harris, $5M for Hester...then give the rest to Urlacher. Done and done. Stop being cheapskates, or nobody will ever sign here again.
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The
schedule was released Tuesday, and the Bears have lots of opportunities to get embarrassed on national TV this year. "MNF" and the new, true incarnation that is "SNF" have been largely a sore spot for Chicago for, well, my entire life. They historically win something like 1-in-3 games under the lights, though frankly their night record doesn't even seem that good. The Bears just have a habit of playing lousy ball on national TV. The good news, as Lovie Smith stated, is that three of the night games this season will be played in Chicago, whereas the last few years have had night games predominately on the road.
My thoughts on the schedule in general? Pretty tough. We've already known for months (if not years) which teams they were going to play this year (outside of the six tough divisional games): AFC South, NFC South, and a pair of last place teams. Now we know when.
The AFC South is tough. Outside of Houston, there were three playoff teams in Indy, Jacksonville, and Tennessee. (Though Tennessee doesn't exactly give me the heebee-jeebees.) The NFC South isn't good but it's far from the worst division in football. (Though it is notable that not a single player from that division made the Pro Bowl last season.) Then the last place teams they will face are Philly (a team that may have been in last place but hardly fit the description of cellar dwellers) and St. Louis (who were banged up last year but fit the cellar-dwelling description to a tee.) And that's it.
But I will say this, if they can somehow get off to a 4-3 start before the bye, they should be in good shape to make the playoffs. The second half isn't "easy", no NFL schedule is. But it's easy enough to envision that, provided the 4-3 was legit, that 10 wins will be in reach. And that'd be plenty to make the playoffs.
I think I'm going to pass on giving my official prediction for the time being. I'll just say that the Bears will win 7, plus or minus 3, meaning anywhere from 4-12 to 10-6. But that prediction would probably cover 90% of the teams in the league, so I'm not exactly going out on a limb there. Nothing but the best when you read MikeJ on CSB!