Final Thoughts on Chicago Sports

2008 Bears: Over and Out

The Bears lost a heartbreaker to the Houston Texans today, 31-24, ending their 2008 season with a record of 9-7.  The Bears weren't very good this year, but they had a chance right down to the last day of the season; and that's really all I was asking for.  The Eagles and Raiders did their part; too bad the Bears couldn't help themselves.  On with my notes:

• Orton was decent today.  No major mistakes, a few decent throws.  Can't complain about the 24 points he put on the board.  Olsen was his usual solid self, and Devin made a real nice catch downfield.  Lloyd, too.  And I think I even saw Marty Booker.  I'm curious as to why they attempted a pass to Earl Bennett with the season on the line, considering he didn't make a play in the previous 15 games.  Not that it really mattered, I'm just sayin.
• Forte wasn't used enough.  He never is used enough, it seems.  It's weird saying that about the player who has the highest percentage of his team's touches in the NFL, but that's what its like watching these Bears.  The dearth of talent at the skill positions makes you want to go to the Forte well on every play. 
• The defense pretty much sucked today.  Andre Johnson is a man, and he abused Peanut and Manning all day.  I kind of figured the Bears would have a tough time with him, but I was hoping Tillman would get the better of him a few times.  Peanut was pretty eratic this year.  Some good games, some horrid games.  More than a few brain farts. 
• Poor tackling all day.  Did Urlacher even play?  I only saw him once, and that was when he was on the bench chewing his mouthguard.  The whole defense really just got "out-physicalled".  The line, the linebackers, and the secondary.  Roughed up.  And that's your season in a nutshell right there.
• Pretty lousy officiating.  A few major calls went against the Bears.  Not that the Bears really deserved to win, but they might have been able to squeak out a stinker like the Green Bay game had the officiating not been so lousy.

And that's your season.  It's disappointing not making the playoffs, but we all know what would happen if they actually made it.  So from that standpoint, it's not too deflating of a loss.  (On the flip side, imagine being a Cowboys fan right about now.  Now THAT would suck.) 

Looking back at my season preview, I predicted 7-9 and they ended up two games better than that.  Take a look at my keys to the season:

• Defense Stays Healthy - They mostly did.  Vasher missed half the season, Dvoracek missed 6 games, and that was more or less it.  They lost maybe 15-20 starts on defense this year, and that's about as "healthy" as you get in the NFL.  Turns out staying healthy wasn't the only key for this defense.  You actually have to show up and make plays.  Most of the big name guys on this defense didn't make nearly enough plays. 
• Forte pans out.  I'd call that a big yes.
• Playmaker emerges.  Outside of Forte, nobody on offense emerged.  Maybe Olsen.  Orton kind of stepped up.  Stepped up to "average", anyways.  Danieal Manning really stepped up on special teams.  They probably would have lost both the Saints game and the Green Bay game without him.  And they wouldn't have been close today.
• Line gels.  The line did FAR better than I could have possibly imagined.  They weren't great, and on occasion certain individuals had crappy games (St. Clair vs Allen, anyone?  Tait versus Mario Willams?)  But for the most part, they exceeded my expectations by quite a bit.

I said back then that if all those things went right, the Bears could be in line for a 10-6.  They were certainly within range of that, and if not for a Peanut brain fart against Tampa and an 11-second team meltdown against Atlanta, they very well could have won 11.  But it wasn't meant to be and its time to turn the page to next year.  I'll be back next week with a look at 2009.

Another Ugly Win for Bears

This team is thoroughly mediocre, but they keep winning and that's all that matters.  Every time they take the field, I just can't get that damn Denny Green quote out of my head.  You know the one.

• Kyle Orton was as ugly as his beard.  He's confident, he stands his ground in the pocket, and he's pretty accurate on short and intermediate throws.  He also stares at his receivers too much and he can't throw deep for shit.  We knew all this going into the year.  He truly is who we thought he was.  Worthy of big money?  No.  Worthy of a medium-sized bag o' cash?  Yeah, probably.  (You look around the league lately?)  You can obviously win with Kyle, but he's really just keeping the seat warm for the next year or two at most.
• Matt Forte was criminally underused again, until the fourth.  Then he came alive and quite frankly won the game. That fourth and one was "heart attack, part one." 
• I have a limit of one beer per quarter on school nights.  Overtime!  Time for a fifth.  Thanks, By Owner.
• Olsen and Clark are both very solid Tight Ends.  Wideouts suck, yada yada.  I feel like I write the same thing every week.  This team needs an impact receiver.  Period.
• I'm currently watching Rashied Davis get interviewed on Comcast.  Did he play tonight?  Has he played since the first Detroit game?  You'd probably get more relevant info from the equipment manager.
Defense was shaky in the first half but came to play in the second half.  Only two guys played well the whole game, and that's Corey Graham and Lance Briggs.  Everyone else was spotty.  Huge play by Alex Brown at the end, obviously, and some nice pressure by Tommie Harris.  I'm content with the performance on D, but I don't know how they're going to stop Andre Johnson and Steve Slaton this Sunday.
Lovie Smith referred to Adrian Peterson as AP.  For the love of God, don't embarass yourself by calling him that again.
• Outside of the Peterson late hit, Special Teams won the game.  Gould and Maynard were awesome, Danieal Manning was again a superstud.  Huge blocked kicks.  Can't say enough about them. 
• I had Ryan Grant tonight and lost my fantasy football championship game by one measly point.  That hurts but I'll take the 2nd place money and watch an interesting Bears game this Sunday.  Not a bad tradeoff.

And that's a wrap.  Rap?  Wrap.  Bears are in Houston, and I'm not overly confident about this one.  Let's see if they can "find a way to win."  All I know is, meaningful football in week 17.  I'm not happy, but I'm satisfied. 

Bear down.

Bears Need Help, Bears Get Help

The Bears need help to make the playoffs, and they got some serious help today:

• The Vikings lost to Atlanta, 24-17.  The Bears "easiest" path to the playoffs required two Vikings losses and two Bears wins.  One down, three to go.  I'm not really sure why the Vikings switched back to Tarvaris Jackson for today's critical start, but I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.  Yes, Jackson was the player of the week against Arizona last Sunday, but everyone's a player of the week versus the Cardinals lately.  He's still an eratic thrower who generally relies on his legs to make plays.  Maybe a notch (or two) better than Henry Burris.  MVP candidate Purple Jesus did the Vikings no favors today either with his greasy palms.  Vikings will still likely make the playoffs, but I wouldn't look for them to get out of the first round.
• On the opposite end, Atlanta looks awfully good.  They aren't going to be some wild card pushover in the playoffs.  They should easily take Arizona, and I bet they'd give NYG or CAR some fits as well.
• Dallas sputtered to an ugly loss versus Baltimore on Saturday night.  Tons of talent on that team, but I think they have one too many egos at Wide Receiver.  I'm not saying T.O. is the only reason, but he certainly doesn't help matters much.  Throw in a Pac Man and a Tank, and it could happen to a nicer bunch.  Still, Dallas needs to lose next week at Philly for the Bears to have a shot at the Wild Card (if the whole division thing doesn't work out). 
• On the flip side, Baltimore is no slouch.  Easily a top 5 contender.
• Tampa crapped themselves at home against the still alive San Diego.  One of the great underchievers in football this season is still around thanks to Denver's dislike of playoff football.  Tampa doesn't scare me at all, but they're in with a Dallas loss and a win over Oakland.  Oakland is a train wreck, but they beat a solid Houston team today and you never know.
• Philly had a chance but they blew it against Washington.  The Eagles have been hot, but I think their hotness was due more to "easy schedule" than anything else.  Donovan McNabb...  I can say 10,000 words on McNabb, seeing as how he's always the go-to guy for Bears offseason rumors.  But I'll keep it short and sweet:  No thanks.

That's pretty much it.  Bears still need some big time help, but their odds are looking a whole lot better now than they did this time yesterday.  Still, doesn't it even matter?  I get this a lot from people.  Does making the playoffs really matter for this team?  What good is making the playoffs if you lose in the first round?  Forget the whole "anything can happen" scenario, but I generally would be happy with 10 wins, playoffs or not.  At least this season.  It's not my ultimate goal, of course, and a string of 10-6's would get old really fast.  But considering where they were at the beginning of this year, and the extreme lack of talent on offense, I was thinking 6-10 was the most realistic scenario.  Frankly, I'm content that this season comes down to week 17.  That's 17 weeks of meaningful football, and that's a heckuva lot better than most of the last 15 years have played out.  "Evaluating the roster" every December is the worst.

Bears-Packers, Monday Night Football.  Keep it interesting for at least one more week. Bear down.

Why I can't get into the Bulls

I like the NBA, I really do.  And I really want to like the Bulls; I try and try and try again.  But I just can't get into them this year.  I watch the Bulls, and I'm mostly disgusted.  Poor disjointed play, a few flashes of brilliance, poor disjointed play, then either a tight win or tight loss.  (Or they're blown out from the opening whistle, and those games make me want to put a gun in my mouth.  Like the upcoming game against the Celtics.) 

I look at all the lottery picks on this team, and I just can't figure out why they're so mediocre.   The team is just the epitome of wasted talent, and I think that's my problem.  There's only one player on this team that I really like, and that's, of course, Derrick Rose.  While he's hit some snags of late, the sky is the ceiling for that kid.  There's a couple guys I kinda like, and that's Gooden, Gorden, and sometimes Nocioni.  Gooden I like because he seems to get the most out of his talent, and I like Gordon because its hard not to like his NBA Jam-like "on fire" games.  (My Gooden approval, I must admit, is totally fake because he, too, is more-or-less a failed lottery pick.  I just like him more than our failures because he was somebody else's failure.)  Noce, well, he sucks most of the time but at least he appears to give 100% at all times.  It's appreciated.  (and he can get on fire at times as well, like last night, and those games are hard to ignore.)

And then there's Luol Deng.  Lottery pick, massive contract, average player.  It's just the expectation factor that's killing me.  Tyrus Thomas, Joakim Noah...massive, massive busts.  Noah looks bored and is starting to look like he'll be out of the league in two years.  I never would have guessed that when they drafted him.  I knew he wasn't a star, but I thought he'd be a solid, high-energy big man off the bench at the bare minimum.  Grab some boards, a couple of putbacks.  Good D.  He's done none of that.  Thomas is the most perplexing.  He's got all the talent in the world, yet he rots on the bench most nights.  Not that he's earned playing time, mind you.  He gets in there and does nothing.  If he wasn't a top three pick, he'd have been cut long ago.  He's just worthless.

I guess when you get right down to it, I hate watching the Bulls because of John Paxson.  In more ways than one.  First and foremost, the Bulls roster.  It's all his.  If he didn't win the lottery this year with those 1.7% odds, he wouldn't have gotten Rose and the Bulls would have been stuck with another lottery disappointment.  Guaranteed.  But the second reason I blame Paxson is because of his playing career.  His team, well, Jordan's team, just set the bar extremely high.  I look at the Celtics now and I see the '96 Bulls who won 72 games.  Three superstuds, great role players, come to play every night.  And then I look at the Bulls now and I see what the Atlanta Hawks were then.  Mediocre, first-round fodder.  At best. 

The grace period is over.  I cut the Bulls some serious slack during the first five years post Jordan.  I mean, six championships in eight years buys an awfully huge grace period.  A couple of 15 win seasons?  A few draft busts?  No problem.  I'm still drunk on Champagne and Grant Park rallies.  But this is Year Ten A.J., and they've won exactly one playoff series.  Never contenders.  Never really even close. 

I just can't take it any more.  Every time I click past their games, I'm superfly TNT, I'm guns of the navarone.  I'm like "Jim Hendry" in this video.

Time to clean house.  Everybody but Rose goes.  Make a run at LeBron.  Or Wade.  Do something.

Bears-Saints Rapid Fire Recap

Bears Win!

• Offense was crap.  Orton was sub-par; Forte was stuffed; receivers still suck royally.  Lucky with a pair of huge pass interference calls.  Lucky, because he wouldn't have caught them anyways. Turner's an idiot.  What are you passing for with 5 minutes left and a four point lead?
• Defense was OK.  Could have been better, but the Saints are one of the best offenses in football.  24 points?  Mostly off stupid Bears turnovers?  Could have been worse.  Ogunleye and Adams had nice games.  The Browns, too.
• Special Teams.  Manning was awesome, Hester was garbage.  How would Manning look at tailback?  He hits the hole hard.  Fake punt?  Ballsy, bud I'd have pinned them deep.  Still, Peterson caught it.  Don't know what the ref saw.  Gould is great, Gould is good.
• Coaching.  Like I said, Turner was crap.  Cover 2 was more like cover nobody.  But in the end, euphoria.  As witnessed by my WAP.  Stupid train schedule.

Did this post have any value?  Probably not.  I'll try better next time.  Two more wins to secure a playoff spot.  And even then, need some help.  Bear down.

Finally, I just heard Cedric Benson told nfl.com that he could have run for 1800 yards if he had the holes Forte has been getting.  Excuse me while I pick my ass up off the floor.  I just laughed it off. 

Bears Win a Cold One over Jags

A free ticket to the Bears-Jags game landed in my lap today and I couldn't pass it up.  (Thanks, Dave!)  It was awfully cold out there, but it was a nice view of a much-needed win for the Bears.  Some thoughts...

• Orton was solid.  He's just a solid guy.  That's pretty much what he is when he's not playing Detroit (and essentially an All-Pro).  Probably the 12-15th best QB in football.  Can the Bears do better?  Sure.  But they can do a LOT worse.  A LOT.  I'd still draft a QB in the 2nd or 3rd round this April, but I'd definitely sign Orton to an extension with the intention of him starting the next 20 games or so.  I wonder if he'd take a five-year, $35 million dollar deal, with the first dozen mil or so guaranteed?  That's a pretty good haul, and not too much to sit on your bench should a young stud rise up and take the job.
• I'm looking at the box score, and it sure doesn't seem like Forte had 21 carries today.  Freezing in the upper deck, it seemed from my point of view that he only had two or three carries in the second half.  And when he did carry the ball, the Bears had four-wide with no interior blocking in an attempt to create mismatches inside.  His under-use was criminal, in my opinion, and Ron Turner has been in a funk since Orton twisted his ankle in week 8.
• Another day, more drops from our "receivers."  Hester did have a pair of nice grabs, but also another couple of mind-boggling drops.  Booker is probably the best receiver on this team, and he's ancient and hurt all the time.  (By "ancient", I mean one year younger than me.  I'm old.)  The Bears number one priority this offseason should be to acquire a number one receiver.  Could be through the draft, a free agent, or a trade.  I don't care --  it has to happen.  (That's why I'm willing to wait until the 2nd or 3rd round for a QB.)
• The defense was solid enough.  I saw a lot of "bend but don't break" from my perch.  They had a decent pass rush (Mark Anderson!!!!), but they gave up some big chunks of yards on the ground to bowling ball Maurice Jones-Drew and the nearly petrified Fred Taylor.  (Now that's ancient, my friends.)  Part of the Bears success was due to Jacksonville's lousy/cold receivers, part of it was due to Jacksonville's lousy/cold QB, but part of it was because of a solid effort in pass defense over the middle by our linebackers.  They left some picks on the field, though, in the form of tipped balls.  They're going to need to make those grabs if they have any hope of beating Drew Brees and the Saints this Thursday.
• Tillman doesn't seem to have his head in the game lately.  Does a sore shoulder affect his brain?  Dumb plays.

The Packers lost today, and they're dead as fried chicken.  The Vikings got a reprieve from a Minnesota judge, allowing their run-stuffers to play, and they still just barely beat Detroit.  (It's official.  Lions will go 0-16.)  It's not looking good for the Bears playoff chances.  The Bears just have to win out and hope two of Arizona/Atlanta/Giants take care of the Vikings.  It doesn't look good.  But its nice to see wins anyways.

Till next time...

Quick Hits, Random Musings, Whatever

Here goes...

• The Bears chances for making the playoffs rose exponentially on Tuesday when The Great Girth in Minnesota known as "The Williams Brothers" were both suspended for the remainder of the regular season.  Those two behemoths are imperative to the success of the Minnesota defense, and it honestly wouldn't surprise me if Detroit beat them on Sunday.  Well, I'd be "surprised" because Detroit is the worst professional football team I've ever seen, including those in Arena2, the WFL and the XFL.  But I wouldn't be "woke up with head sewn to the carpet" surprised, if you know what I mean.
• Seriously, though.  Our team is so mediocre that we're trumpeting the fact that our opponent will be short-handed because of trumped up cheating charge?  Pathetic. 
• While we're here, I think the Bears will cover over the Jags this Sunday.  That team has been quite Lion-like lately.
• The Bulls lost their last two games, but they've been gellin' like Dr. Scholl's quite nicely with Derrick Rose since my post on Opening Night.  Derrick Rose has impressed the hell out of me.  He's so awesome, it almost makes up for the rest of the team sucking so bad.  Seriously, he's the only thing to watch right now.  Well, that's not entirely true.  Gordon's been largely on fire, Gooden's been solid, and Hughes has been somewhat refreshing.  (Defense and scoring?  Huh.  Last year's Ben Wallace trade is starting to look like a win for the Bulls.)  But let's focus on the lousy guys (because that's so much more fun!)
• Looking back at that post, which was only a short month ago, the Tyrus Thomas part looks rather comical.  After a great opening night, he's been almost uniformly garbage ever since.  Another top 5 draft bust for the Bulls, and he's officially entering Marcus Fizer territory. 
• The Luol Deng love in that post looks misguided as well.  He's just an average dude, and that huge contract he got in the offseason is looking dumber by the day.
• Has anyone seen Thabo Sefolosha?  Maybe he's out Christmas shopping with Mark Anderson.
• The Cubs are still alive in the Jake Peavy talks.  Wake me when something happens. 
• In former Cub news, the Giants signed Bob Howry (for nearly $3 Mil!) and the Cubs declined arbitration on Wood.  Howry was awfully good in his first two years here, but last year he was just awful.  I wish him luck, but I can't say I'm optimistic about his chances at returning to 2007 form.  With Wood, I was kind of hoping the Cubs would offer him arbitration.  If he accepted, Cubs would get one more year of Wood for maybe $10-12M.  If he declined, the Cubs would get two draft picks.  Seemed like a win-win to me.  But I guess Hendry was doing Wood a solid in not attempting a cock-block of Wood signing with another team. 

That's all I have.  Till Sunday...