How Bout Dem Bears?

SameOleJay wrote: »

You must be happy enough then pal.

2 DTs in the first 3 is too much imo. If you don't rate the safety class fine but then take a linebacker, another huge need for us.

With this level of investment we better hope the D-line tears it up next year and hides weaknesses behind. Here's to a big day 3 anyway.

Cheers mate. Happy with how I called it - getting our first pick down to Pryor and fuller above that. Then naming mainly dline men and seeing us take two I noted.

On phone, will do a full post before work Monday morning. Pretty happy with the draft now.

Would like a MLB (Skov if he can somehow make it to us), a safety and a RB now.

Weirdly I'd feel better had it been Sutton then ferguson - hard to get head around ferguson in second but still it would be same end result. I did mention ferguson but thought development prospect. A day w guy should really start. Has such limited experience and tape. Not sure that pick will work out, looks an nfl body just not sure if he has the play or brain.

Really surprised we passed ealy and Martin on the board at that stage - both screamed phil players but clearly we weren't in market for another DE. Houston clearly staying at LDE.

It's clear makes a board and trusts it. For all the talk of trading up or down, think we've only ever traded up for Jeffrey.

Sutton is a super pick - he was basically Donald in 2012 until he put on the weight, picked him as a value binkie on the board earlier this week. Went 68 spots after Donald which is crazy. Nice pick. Hope our double dipping works better than lat years LBers. Though we should see big improvement from them behind this line.

Our dline looks excellent now and will mask our safeties, never works the other way around Imo. Definitely looks like we are going the Seattle rotation route.

And no 4dt's **** up this year - we ll have paea, Ratliff, ferguson, Sutton and collins. Teams going to find it hard to run on us with ferguson and paea/Ratliff and Houston and young outside on running plays.

Love the fuller pick, much prefer drafting a cb when Tillman and Jennings are still on the roster and can influence him. Excellent all round player,good in both zone and man, good in run support. Will be great in 3 receiver sets. His tape is excellent. Only concern is durability - looks bit light and has had issues previously too.

Big negative is I really like the vikes draft- so didn't want them to get teddy of all the qb's as he's miles better than the others. Patterson will have a serious year getting quick ball from teddy.

Not as much time as I hoped so quick reflections;

- Really like the draft overall. We addressed needs at CB, DT, FS, RB, backup QB, punter and added O line depth.

- Like the Christian Jones pick up as an UDFA, I mentioned I didn't want him in an earlier post but that was me worrying they'd spend a 4th on him or something like that.

- None of the picks were spectacular, all have a good chance of contributing and the defensive ones will make us better and younger on defence, which is badly needed going forward. Both our DT picks have big risks attached but also big upside, i hope they work out.

- Fales looks like a great fit as backup QB - short, quick accurate passes. At the very least he'll protect the ball. They see him as a cheap backup, hence the confusion re Emery's comments on drafting a QB. Hopefully he won't have to start and Cutler might stay healthy for a change.

So where are we now after FA and the draft?

- Well our Dline is miles better than last year - this should help mask other issues (see below) - and we've 3 number one corners, no bad thing in our league.

- I think Carey will be way better then Bush, and we need to give Forte less carries and share the load if we don't want him to decline prematurely.

- I still worry about our LBer's a bit - Briggs and Williams are the only ones with real experience, and at any given time it's quite possible at least will be injured (especially DJ who I just don't trust to get through a 16 game season). That leaves us with 2 of Bostic, Greene & McClellin on the field. Wish we had one more veteran LBer - even if they are just average. Still that's a 1st, 2nd and 3rd round pick - so surely we need to be getting at least 1 good player and one average player out of that. If we don't well it's drafting like that, that will give major roster issues.

- I'm not sure if we've got better at safety, I think Mundy will be better than right Wright and our Dline (and hopefully LBer's) will help in the run game particularly. I'm still not sure at FS - not sure Vereen is the answer - the short arms (not hugely tall either) and small hands are a worry.

- Overall on defence I think we can have a mid ranking defence, we just need to hope we've less injuries (we need Ratliff, Houston & Briggs in particular healthy) and Tucker doesn't continue to be a disaster. He has the talent now, hopefully he can use it.

Seriously what other DC has been given 3 new DE's (2 high profile ones too) in FA, 2 new DT's in the draft, a first round CB, a 4th round safety? What more could he want!

I think our season will come down to that and Cutler staying injury free and continuing to progress under Trestman (and hopefully not regress).

It's pretty s'hit now that we've to wait around for ages for football to start again. I'll have to look up when rookie training camp starts and follow that and training camp to get my fix!

No doubt it will be a lot quieter until then. Hopefully actually - as hopefully we aren't discussing injuries or off the field issues.

A few independent observers liking the Fales/Trestman hookup. Looking forward to seeing him in pre-season.

Trent Dilfer ‏@TDESPN: Not one bit surprised that #QBWhisperer Mark Trestman was the HC to pick David Fales.Gr8 spot to learn from Jay & @JwPalms #SomeJustGetIt

NFLosophy: (Video) A real scout's breakdown of a guy that I think could be THE pick of this draft: http://t.co/WSuaPbHQmf

smartfootball: .@NFLosophy Trestman's Bears a great landing spot for Fales. Mark doesn't need QB with a gun; brains and accuracy are more important for him

2014 NFL Draft all under-drafted team: David Fales leads the list of sleepers

padraig_f wrote: »

NFLosophy: (Video) A real scout's breakdown of a guy that I think could be THE pick of this draft: http://t.co/WSuaPbHQmf

Bit off-topic but I think the bears have the best media setup in the league. The new studio they built last year when HH was being upgraded is great. There is some great content put up for fans now compared to a few years ago.

Oat23 wrote: »

Bit off-topic but I think the bears have the best media setup in the league. The new studio they built last year when HH was being upgraded is great. There is some great content put up for fans now compared to a few years ago.

The content is great. I love the Bears sight, very handy around TC to see the photo's and videos. You can often tell who is really in shape and who is not.

http://www.windycitygridiron.com/2014/2/13/5408074/chicago-bears-set-dates-otas-veteran-mini-camp-offseason-calendar

Schedule for what's upcoming to keep us going.

New contract for B Marshall. Signed it on some show called 'The View'



3 years/$30m acording to Marshall. Schefter says it is 3 years/$40m.

Yay.

This is a great deal and Marshall is a great guy to have on the team and a vital component if we're going to progress in the next few years. But what on earth was he doing on the view? Needed to burn off some oestrogen?

Delighted to have him around for years to come - total legend. Not only a great player but what he's done with Jeffrey and Wilson has been awesome.

A very good news day!

Great news, about my favourite player on the team and $10m/year is great value. He could've got more so I think definitely gave the team a discount.

OTA's start today As usual all reports will be hugely positive so large dash of salt required.

Also if anyone hasn't seen it there is a half decent video (about 2 mins) with some clips of yesterday's OTA's. Greene looked a lot less fat than last year which is a positive.

Apparently the new D coaches are hard ass and take no s'hit.

The Fuller & Jennings thing makes sense for making it easier for Fuller to adapt plus he has the better length - still never seems a great idea to move around a pro bowl corner even if he did play slot in Indy. As always it's first day and everyone will have loads of opinion on it (it writes column inches) but every chance we will see the opposite look (fuller inside) at some stage too.

Hard to figure out the thought process on it. 4 qb's for trest to coach means splitting more time. Has there been any quotes on it?

Spongey1975 wrote: »

http://espn.go.com/blog/chicago-bears/post/_/id/4692591/clausen-intriguing-entry-in-backup-qb-derby

Article on the reasoning for it. I'm thinking its more of an issue with Palmer as backup. They will probably keep 3 with Fales as the third and either Clausen or Palmer as the backup

Thanks, I had read about Trestman preparing Clausen for the combine and his pro day, hence the link. Just love to hear something from the organisation (Trestman really) behind the thought process. Definitely see it as a bad indictment re Palmer.

Will be interesting to see how it plays out.

Have enjoyed the minicamp updates on the CSS website - but nothing now to till camp on 24th July! This offseason sure feels long.

Conte might miss camp with a contagious bug - Vereen being talked up repeatedly too. That's the end of Conte as our #1 FS anyway unless Vereen ****'s the bed at camp.

Oh and Izzy released, always liked him, we needed him last year tho not this.

Got my ticket for the Dolphins game the other day, can't wait, just seems so far away.

Long is there. Huge that he is still getting the technique side of things in despite teh virus - will be key for his development

The new punter Pat O'Donnell seems to be a big hit:

On a team full of star players and household names, it’s strange to think that a rookie got the biggest reaction from the crowd. What takes it from strange to bizarre is the fact that the rookie was punter Pat O’Donnell. Yes, Pat O’Donnell got the loudest cheers at camp today.

O’Donnell boomed a series of punts during special teams period, sending perfect spirals into the air that traveled well over 65 yards down the field, much to the delight of the fans. Cheers of “Mega punt! Mega punt!” echoed throughout the practice field.

Special teams coach Joe DeCamillis was equally surprised at the reaction O’Donnell got from the fans.

“That’s a first. I was thinking, you gotta be kidding me over there, let’s keep the kids feet on the ground,” said DeCamillis.

Durkin’s Training Camp Notebook: New Defensive Line Sets The Tone


I was curious how much bad punting costs you. The Bears were 29th out of 32 last year in net yards per punt:
http://espn.go.com/nfl/statistics/team/_/stat/punting/sort/netAvgPuntYards

38 net yards, compared to a league average of about 41.

With about 4 punts a game, that's costing you 12 yards/game. 12 yards of field position is worth about 1 point on the scoreboard.

So bad punting is costing you about 1 point/game, compared to an average punter, and 2 points/game compared to the best punters (44/45 net yards).

Quite significant. I suppose there's coverage and things like that which are going to affect it, but interesting see if O'Donnell can help improve things this season.


edit:
actually worse when you look at the gross yards:
http://espn.go.com/nfl/statistics/team/_/stat/punting/sort/grossAvgPuntYards

Bottom of the league and 5 yards/punt below the average. So if you just come up to average, you gain 20 yards/game.

lol