Marshall, Cutler, Jeffrey, Forte...virtually every skill position difference maker was a Lovie-Angelo guy.

Lovie's biggest difficulty as a coach was in hiring coaches. He sucked at it even on defense and it hurt him as a HC throughout his tenure.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

How many of the bad safeties-- both draft picks and FAs-- that Lovie had over his tenure were his fault?

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I believe that is correct. Unless the rule has changed, Weems could have picked the ball up and then handed it to the Vikings and the Bears would still get the ball at the 2.

Once the kicking team touches the ball, getting the ball there is the worst possible outcome not counting the chance of a personal foul.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

If I ever hear about Lovie & Angelo again it will be too soon. Both were peter principle guys who were in way over their heads.

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CSFMB 2014 Nascar Pick 'em Champion

We don’t have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven’t taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much. — Ronald Reagan

Once Minnesota touched the ball it was technically dead unless the Bears advanced it. Even if Weems had ran to the Vikings 1 and fumbled it the Bears would have still gotten the ball at their 2. Other than injury there was no way it could have been a bad play for the Bears.

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Then ok. It worked out, but that was just luck. Weems clearly didn't know the rule because of what he said, and because on the replays it was clear he was trying to pick the ball up and run with it, not just bat it into the end zone.

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If he did run with it it would have been better than getting it at the 2.

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Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Marshall and Jeffery were drafted and traded for while Smith was here, and the o line a TE positions were so disastrous that it is highly unreasonable that Emery doesn't make the moves he made this summer simply because Smith is still here and may or may not be reticent about what is needed on offense.

Angelo did in fact try to upgrade several positions on offense but simply was bad at doing so.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

But if he got tackled at the 5, it would have been a lot worse than getting it at the 20.

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I guess this makes sense. Seeing the Vikings players still going after the ball once Weems touched it made me think they were right.

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That's the Lovie tenure spelled out simply and correctly.

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I'm not sure he got the most out of his players. He had elite talent a key positions at times he did diddly dick with everybody else. Are you really getting the most out of players when they have elite talent?

It was more than just coaching, his philosophy was terrible, IMO. It led to some trouble with getting a staff.

There's issues with this team. I think trestman will be better than Lovie but not sure if it will work.

I agree about the coaches which is what I was talking about to begin with. Lovie had to go to get competent offensive minded coaches in here.

Sure, they had a few pieces but that seemed to be the Lovie & crew offensive plan, just get some guys and plug them in there with no clear philosophy. They get Brandon Marshall, talent, and just throw to him all the time.

Lovie's philosophy changed from OC to OC.

We run off the bus.
We are a precise, complicated pass offense.
No...wait...we run.

I understand that Lovie is a defensive guy so he's not going to be designing an entire offense. But, he should at least have an idea of what he wants to do offensively. Best I can come up with is that he wanted to hold the ball long enough to get the D some rest and punt them down deep into their own territory on a regular basis.

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You know me like that.

Disagree noisy. His offensive philosophy was for nutty to ball punch and score on that or have devin Hester run it back for a td.

His defensive philosophy was similar to what you say the offensive one was. Get a couple of freak d linemen, a great middle lb, and search for that safety talent. Throw them in, plug them in, and it will take care of itself.

He coached up the D. He had as clear of a defensive philosophy as any coach ever. He knew exactly what he was doing and stuck to it like no other coach to great success.

That's why it seems weird to me that he had such seeming disinterest in what the offense was. I would think that kind of mindset would translate to every aspect of a team he was in charge of. Maybe it was just out of necessity due to his inability to attract any kind of OC that would take the job. But, that's ultimately why he failed.

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You know me like that.

The whole Bob Babich saga was particularly pathetic, especially when Babich was not fired but merely "relieved of playcalling duties," the implication being that Lovie hadn't been calling plays on defense in the first place.

I hate taking the "well, in the business world..." tack with football, because football is most certainly not the business world, but good people do know to hire good people, and Lovie hired a parade of cronies and idiots. That the Bears made the NFCCG once and didn't completely suck with luminaries like Babich, Tice, Martz, and Turner is a testament to someone's talent somewhere.

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I'm a fan of Lovie, and that was precisely my critique of him when he was fired. He can really put himself in the super elite category of coaches if he just figured out what's going on out there offensively, attached himself to a modern system, and networked accordingly.

That being said, he was also a good coach because he got guys to play for him. His lack of candor during press conferences and interviews rubbed many the wrong way, but that style obviously was part of his larger commitment to his players and his way of keeping things in-house. One of the things I think we got used to under Lovie was the absence of petty controversies, the likes of which plagued and plague dysfunctional teams like the Jets, Bucs, Raiders, Cowboys, Chiefs, and so on. That kind of achievement is alone very commendable in a modern, me-first culture.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

This is a pretty solid critique, but I'm pretty sure the Bears made it to the title game twice - once in 2006, and once in 2011.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

It wasn't only that Lovie didn't know who to hire as coaches. He didn't know how to scout players either. He had influence with Angelo on some free agents and draft picks. Adam Archulleta and Cedric Benson were his calls just to name two bad ones.

I know that! I was just talking about finding the positives in the four-misses-in-five-years portion of Lovie's tenure.



We just had big controversies, like Tank Johnson and his guns, or Tommie Harris going bananas.

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Sure, but what I meant is more along the lines of respecting the coach's authority. Lovie earned and sustained that respect. Johnson's thing has little to do with the locker room and winning/losing; that was a personal thing. If we are going to mention that then we should mention the even bigger controversy of Sam Hurd's arrest, which was another private fault. Both in my view had little to do with Lovie's locker room and his job as their football boss.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

They had to. If you went into his dog house, you sat, and you didn't come out. His faves could do as they pleased. I'd think that there was trouble, but it couldn't be vocalized, and mostly on offense. That's not respect, it's fear.

I heard a lot of talk about favorites when he was fired, but I still don't understand it. I'm open to be corrected, but was there ever an instance where a qualified player was denied a chance to grow or play because Lovie stuck with an alleged favorite? Where are all the wronged players who rubbed Lovie the wrong way simply for being someone other than a "favorite," and what sort of opportunities where they denied on account of Lovie's alleged favoritism?

I don't recall a single starter whose starting status could be linked to something other than merit or to the realities of the personnel chart.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

rex is our quarterback

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Davis, AA, and maybe Rashied Davis were faves. I think we could have done better than them. Moore and Graham were in his doghouse. Jennings was benched for awhile but can't remember why.

As for Rex, that's a personnel thing; there were no better options. There was Orton for some time, and Rex was indeed benched for Orton, but nothing else.

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

I think the criticism is only valid if those players stood in the way of giving a better backup an opportunity to play. Was that the case for the players you mentioned?

_________________
Successful calls:

Kyrie Irving will never win anything as a team's alpha: check
T.rubisky is a bust: check
Ben Simmons is a liability: check
The Fields Cult is dumb: double check

2013 CSFMB ROY

come on guys. lovie took us to a superbowl. his philosophies or scouting wasnt that bad, obviously. the worst thing love did was have that dumbass look on his face looking up at the scoreboard thinking "where am i?". that, and never looking at wikipedia to learn what a timeout is used for.

we knew we had talent, we saw individuals do awesome things, and aside from a few legal issues most of them werent bad guys. the problems came on sunday, when lovie had to work in real-time and he sucked at that. tressman could be twice as dumb as lovie football wise but we wouldnt see it because the guy obviously can handle game-speed decisions. i really wish we could have lovie practice with the guys 6 days a week and have tressman run the actual games.

who knows though, because the tressman/emery combo certainly hasnt had any foreseeable misses yet on recruiting... and we are all talking about how much this team looks like a "normal" nfl group. hell, they have been making our declining players better... hester is just as good as hes ever looked- which is something we havent seen in 3 years, and cutler- even with his on-cue interceptions, looks like a noticeably better qb.

all i am saying is the new bears look better, they havent frustrated us yet... but thats saying something because lovie did a decent job considering how much worse other teams were during the last 8 years.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

Harris was better than AA anything was. Moore was better than Kelvin Hayden off the top of my head. Rashied would piss me off no end.

Lovie ruled through the iron fist of fear and intimidation.

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You know me like that.