Bears 10.0: GM and coach watch before the draft

[fleet]

Just heard the other Trace Armstrong coaching candidate is Joe Brady.

[NZB2323]

I feel like prioritizing drafting offensive linemen over signing them in free agency completely ignores the fact that the vast majority of lineman fail to succeed in the NFL or at least take several years to develop into good lineman. This is why there are so few good lines in the NFL. I think the best strategy is to mostly fill out the OL with established guys and supplement them with drafted players who can take the time to develop while on the bench. and we only really need to supplement older starters if we sign them. For example, if we sign Ryan Kelly to be our starter, we should draft a center in the second or third. If we sign Josh Meyers, we don't have to worry about drafting a "center in waiting" because Meyers should theoretically be the starter for 5 plus years.

With all the money we have, I'd much rather sign 2/3/4 starters and a couple bench guys and spend our 2nd and 3rd rounders on DL.

But, there is no one way that is the best, but I think the clear path to avoid (since we have many to choose from) is to not have multiple rookies in our starting unit and make up a good portion of our depth. I don't think the fan base will give them the time to develop and I think Williams needs a top OL as soon as possible. And I think the best way to do that is to sign vets and supplement them.

All that being said, the most important thing for the OL is getting the right OL coach with the right scheme and the ability to teach that scheme. Our OL was one of the worst in the league and one of the major factors in that was that the scheme was basically non-existent. It was mostly one on one blocking and not understanding blocking assignments. We can have 5 all pros on the line but they wouldn't do much better with trash coaching.

I would love to sign star free agent OL, but my fear is that teams keep their star FA OL, so we’ll be stuck getting guys that are washed up, like Orlando Pace in 2009.

[Betta Bulleavit]

This could be bad. And it goes against the narrative.

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When a team isn’t winning, it’s always open season for this kind of stuff. And it’s easy because average folks like us don’t know what to believe and what not to believe.

What I do know is that 50% of keeping a job in this field is being relevant and known for something. Even if it means exaggerating things in order to grab some attention. It’s for this reason that I am (and likely will forever be) skeptical of the media and so-called insiders.

[MAQ]

This could be bad. And it goes against the narrative.

Read on Twitter

When a team isn’t winning, it’s always open season for this kind of stuff. And it’s easy because average folks like us don’t know what to believe and what not to believe.

What I do know is that 50% of keeping a job in this field is being relevant and known for something. Even if it means exaggerating things in order to grab some attention. It’s for this reason that I am (and likely will forever be) skeptical of the media and so-called insiders.

I'm skeptical as well, but based on what I saw from Caleb this season, this report isn't hard to believe. His footwork was poor all season long. He did not improve upon his touch on the deep balls. There was really only 1 area I saw Caleb improve over the year, and that was fitting the ball over the corner but under the safety going up the right sideline. Everything else stayed the same or got worse.

All that said, the one thing that sold me on his play this year was his ability to drive a team down the field in the 4th quarter of tight games. He's got "it". I think everything else is fixable, provided he wants to fix it.

[Betta Bulleavit]

This could be bad. And it goes against the narrative.

Read on Twitter

When a team isn’t winning, it’s always open season for this kind of stuff. And it’s easy because average folks like us don’t know what to believe and what not to believe.

What I do know is that 50% of keeping a job in this field is being relevant and known for something. Even if it means exaggerating things in order to grab some attention. It’s for this reason that I am (and likely will forever be) skeptical of the media and so-called insiders.

I'm skeptical as well, but based on what I saw from Caleb this season, this report isn't hard to believe. His footwork was poor all season long. He did not improve upon his touch on the deep balls. There was really only 1 area I saw Caleb improve over the year, and that was fitting the ball over the corner but under the safety going up the right sideline. Everything else stayed the same or got worse.

All that said, the one thing that sold me on his play this year was his ability to drive a team down the field in the 4th quarter of tight games. He's got "it". I think everything else is fixable, provided he wants to fix it.

There’s college “work hard” and then there’s NFL “work hard”. Admittedly, some QBs come into the league with an NF caliber work ethic while others have to develop it, which typically means ramping it up from anything that you may have done in college. If the sentiment is that Caleb hasn’t yet developed an NFL caliber work ethic, I could easily buy that. But to say that he isn’t working hard is an attempt to attack more than just his play. It’s the same song theme/narrative that’s slapped on every player (especially QBs) that don’t perform up to whatever lofty expectations that were bestowed upon them in their first year. Everyone’s path is different.

[fleet]

You’re hoping it doesn’t end up the Kyler Murray path.

[Betta Bulleavit]

You’re hoping it doesn’t end up the Kyler Murray path.

I’m hoping that this team can just start winning consistently. I don’t have agendas………

You may have noticed that I sat relatively dormant through out the season without much to say. Why?? Because I knew year 1 was going to be a struggle for Caleb. I practically stood at the top of a mountain screaming it although very few folks listened. With that, I actually came away pretty impressed with a lot of what I saw out of him. The only thing they took me by surprise was his erratic passes because that generally was not an issue for him in college. But the sacks, holding the ball. Over-improving. I saw every bit of that coming a mile away.

[fleet]

I’ll just say that Kap wasn’t the first time I heard something along those lines. Recently Caleb was said to need to endeavor to learn more about coverages, offense and defense. Not sure if he was suspected of not doing enough, or simply not understanding as much as he should understand for unknown reasons. But it sounded a little accusatory. Maybe the holding of the ball could relate to a gap in knowledge. What he said about working to exhaustion this offseason could be earnest acknowledgment that he has to change something. In contrast to Kyler who denied all charges. I can see a potential scenario where Caleb didn’t know what he didn’t know about work, and embraced the realization.

I OTOH did not see him holding the ball in the NFL because I thought he would be able to understand that he couldn’t play the way he did at USC in the NFL. However, appears he held onto the hubris for some period of time. At one point he actually was getting the ball out quicker for awhile, and had some success until defenses took away options. Then, he was left in confusion while he had no other choice but to throw dangerous, or eat a lot of sacks, and he chose the sacks. And for some odd reason, the Bears didn’t help him out with a run game.

[patryk7754]

I've seen a couple of videos with different people saying he needs to work harder but I'm not going to look too much into it. It could be as simple as him being a rookie and not knowing what hard work in the NFL looks like. Until we hear its something like whats going on with Anthony Richardson and showing up late to meetings and practice, I won't care too much. It's obviously concerning but a couple weeks ago we were hearing how hard he works. This is the time of year to take everything with a grain of salt.

People are still calling him a diva, which he clearly hasn't been. At least publicly.

[fleet]

Shane Waldron camp is a potential source of loose talk.

[patryk7754]

Bowers and Barkley (unsurprisingly) both made 1st team all pro

[patryk7754]

Shane Waldron camp is a potential source of loose talk.

That was one of my first thoughts. Along with Eberflus but it doesn't seem fair to make those types of aqusations.

[fleet]

Shane Waldron camp is a potential source of loose talk.

That was one of my first thoughts. Along with Eberflus but it doesn't seem fair to make those types of aqusations.

Anyway, I will just say what I always do. That players (the roster) have gotten off too light while people have mostly been pointing fingers at coaching. Not that the coaching has been on point.

[patryk7754]

Shane Waldron camp is a potential source of loose talk.

That was one of my first thoughts. Along with Eberflus but it doesn't seem fair to make those types of aqusations.

Anyway, I will just say what I always do. That players (the roster) have gotten off too light while people have mostly been pointing fingers at coaching. Not that the coaching has been on point.

I think the biggest concern we saw from the players was their lack of professionalism.

[Chi town]

So who is the shiftiest slot guy in the draft to be our Ama St. Brown for Caleb with Ben calling the plays?

We need a guy who can get open and move the chains.

[patryk7754]

Not the best showing for the Texas o line so far

[Dresden]

Texas is hanging in there, but Ohio is tough.

[Jcool0]

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[Dresden]

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There's been some talk of the Bengals fired DC getting a look for that position here.

[MAQ]

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Good for him. He obviously can coach defense. The defense performed at a top tier level when he was here and fell apart miserably after he left.

I'd be enjoying life if it were me, but he loves this thing. Like I said, good for him