SB Nation User Blog: Ando

Ron Rivera Promoted

Ando — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:07:48 -0000

Following the weekly theme of former Bears being promoted in coaching staffs, Ron Rivera has taken over for Ted Cotrell as the defensive coordinator of the Chargers. First I heard it on ESPN Radio's Mac, Jurko, & Harry Show and now it's on ESPN.com too.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3669441

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Bears Analogy....

Ando — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:00:32 -0000

This is from a Bill Simmons Article on ESPN.com, here is the link but I pasted the part about the Bears. Nothing none of us don't already know but a funny way of stating it.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/080904

Prediction No. 3: Everyone will hail Chicago's yearly attempt to breathe life into a passing game that hasn't shown life since the Willie Gault Era.

"Wait a second," you're saying, "didn't they let Bernard Berrian and Muhsin Muhammad leave? And didn't they just have a Kyle Orton/Rex Grossman battle for the starting QB spot? And didn't they just make a kick returner their No. 1 receiver? How are these good things?"

OK, let's say you just bought a new house, only you got soaked on your mortgage and had to go with a 75-25 instead of an 80-20. You're short on funds, so you decide, "We're going to spend most of our time in the kitchen, TV room and bedroom" and spend all your remaining funds to make those rooms nice: Maybe a 52-inch plasma, comfy sofa, kitchen table, king-sized bed, a few framed pictures, some homey knick-knacks and so on. By the time you're done, every room in the house looks great except for the dining room. Instead of half-assing it and putting a cheap-looking table and chairs in there, or even worse, splurging on a nice table and crappy chairs, you decided to sacrifice that room for 12 months, leave it empty and use that extra money on the rest of the house. It's the right move. And when friends visit and see an empty dining room, you just explain, "Yeah, we haven't gotten around to that room yet." They will understand, especially when they see the rest of your kick-ass house.

Well, that's exactly what the Bears did. Last year's passing game sucked because their quarterbacks sucked. Instead of spending money to patch together another inevitably disappointing passing game, they basically said, "Screw it, we'll leave the dining room empty and spend money everywhere else!" What's the point of spending 10-15 percent of your cap to upgrade your passing game from an "F" to a "D?" If Chicago's defense, running game and special teams can carry them like in 2006, maybe the Bears could play four straight months of ugly, low-scoring games and eke out a 10-6 record or something.

(Would I bet on this? Of course not! Not in a million years! But splurging on the likes of Chad Pennington, Berrian and Donte' Stallworth wouldn't have changed anything other than hurting their cap in 2010. You have to admit.)

2009 Compensatory Picks

Ando — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 01:37:02 -0000

This is a pretty ridiculous topic but seeing teams get a 3rd or 4th round compensatory pick got me thinking. That's a nice bonus. Anyways, the NFL does not release it's formula but this article below seems to do a pretty good job predicting it. It's pretty much what you would expect, value of players received vs. value of players leaving (based on salary and playing time on the new team) with a couple of other restrictions. Berrian obviously helps this, but noone else the Bears lost does (Ayanbadejo, Gilmore, and Jimmy Kennedy.) Coming in are Booker and Lloyd, who have low salaries and playing time is a wildcard. That still leaves us with a big loss vs. potentially no big gains and an overall net loss of players, which would result in a decent pick.

One thing I don't quite know is if re-signing players during the free agency period (Briggs) affects this. If it does that evens things out. And of course free agency isn't over yet so the net loss vs. gain could change, and that seems to be a pretty big factor.

Anyways, sort of boring and technical article but pretty interesting as it covers a little known topic.

http://sportsnewssouthwest.com/nfl/projecting-the-2008-nfl-compensatory-picks.html

Giants re-sign Derrick Ward

Ando — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 05:38:10 -0000

This is a guy I wouldn't have minded pursuing for cheap, and cheap is what the Giants got him back for. Seems odd that he would want to go back to such a stacked backfield. Maybe he sucks, but he sure looked good against the Bears last season. However, I'm not going to sweat about losing out on another decent running back. After looking at some of the comments on the running back post on the main page and looking through some of the running back prospects, there seem to be a lot of good backs available in rounds 1-3.

Everyone knows Mendenhall. Stewart, Felix Jones and Ray Rice are good options in round 2, Kevin Smith and Chris Johnson seem like they could be steals in round 3.

Mariotti the idiot

Ando — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:58:12 -0000

I know most people here agree with me that Mariotti is a moron who has made a career bashing the Bears, but his article from today was so ridiculous that I had to say something to make myself feel better. He is criticizing the Bears for not bringing back Berrian at an insane price, and he is even criticizing Angelo for getting Briggs back. How can you possibly do that? I realize he is saying Angelo is just lucky that there was no market for Briggs...but maybe that is exactly why Angelo should be praised. Maybe he knew that. In any event, we got him back for a good deal.

As far as the receivers go, Mariotti is right we are weak there (great reporting, who doesn't know that?). But there is still a solid WR in Johnson that I hope will sign. I loved how Mariotti called him a "hopechest" right after saying that Donte Stallworth would have been a good option. Stallworth is a poster child for underachieving. And of course you can find good mid round recievers who will probably not be a star in their first year, but can contribute. On top of that we have Bradley and Hester who have great potential. This could shake out to a solid receiving core. Or, it could backfire. But teams that blow huge money in free agency for pretty good players rarely work out and I for one don't want the Bears to be one of those teams.

Trade Urlacher? Are you kidding?

Ando — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 03:40:49 -0000

Anyone who is even mentioning a trade of Urlacher needs to calm down. Has he been as good as he normally is? No, of course not. But he has still been pretty damn good at times (and granted not so good at others). To name a few, he made the pick that turned around the game against the Packers. Thrown right at him but low, that was not an easy pick. He had a great game against the Eagles, a must win at the time for the Bears. He forced a great 3rd and goal stop on the Lions the other day, a much needed play at the time despite the eventual loss. This is a big time player and he's hurting but they'll figure it out. And for those of you who believe that this is a permanent thing (and you may be right, I'm no doctor) don't you think that other teams know that as well and won't give up anything worthwhile? Do you really want to see a future Hall of Famer, bad back or not, traded for a 5th round pick?

Being smart about the situation may call for a bit of a gameplan switch that doesn't give him so much responsibility downfield, or making sure that we can get Briggs back so that there is another top notch linebacker out there next to him...but let's not jump the gun yet as it is still early and I think this guy has proven that he needs to be on the field for the Bears.

Fun to be back?

Ando — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 06:12:03 -0000

Is it just me or is it strangely fun to be back in an extremely familiar situation where we are fighting for our playoff lives? I'm only 23 and from Wisconsin, so my entire childhood was spent watching losing teams and hoping for 8 or 9 wins out of 10 games to make the playoffs and even come back to beat the Packers for the division, which never happened but hopefully will this year. Coming into this season I couldn't envision the Bears losing more than 2 or 3 games, so thus far I have been sickened by what has happened with injuries and general bad play...but being at the Vikings game when only half of the stadium was left for what was almost a great comeback reminded me of the good old days when true Bears fans (like almost everyone that I've read on this site) ruled the world and optimism was king.

That's not to say that I enjoy losing as it ruins the week of myself and everyone reading this, but just that I love the attitude that the team seems to be taking right now and I know that this team is good enough to turn things around. So instead of thinking about the poor start let's start enjoying the familiar climb back to the top