I didn't think the Bears had the resources to pull off this trade late this afternoon with the Broncos for Jay Cutler. The Bears BETTER hope this trade for a star quarterback pans out a lot better than the Rick Mirer disaster about a decade ago with Seattle, and Eugene Levy, I mean Jerry Angelo, still needs to upgrade the receiving corps considerably. It doesn't matter who the Bears' QB is unless the receivers catch the damn ball, stop dropping it, and run the right pattern!

Obviously, this board is creating a level of group-think that's potentially dangerous to society.

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You can't see me because of internet.

The landowner effectively owns part shares in millions of part-time slaves called, "taxpayers." -Roy L
A Personal Relationship with Jesus?

Quite...

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We all have private ails. The troublemakers are they who need public cures for their private ails.- Eric Hoffer

It isn't one sided. Boilermaker Rick and Nas are against the trade. They haven't shown up yet, but they'll throw some cold water on it.

Let's look at this calmly for a second and figure out what it means going forward:

There's a lot of sarcastic talk about the low value of a draft pick for the Bears, but remember that these draft picks could be flameouts or huge successes. A 1st round pick could be Michael Haynes or Tommie Harris. Etc. The cost was high. Really high.

There may be some uninformed "remember Hershel Walker ha ha ha" talk in the next few days, but he was a RB, and an aging one wat that. There is only one position on the field that this trade makes any sense for, and that's a young QB with some proven track record. That fits the bill.

The trade surprises me insofar as I didn't think the Bears had the ammo to get it done. That Angelo pulled the trigger doesn't surprise me in the slighest. He has consistently tried to fix the QB situation since 2002, and the best possible path in each case was always bad. The best QB to be had in the 2003 draft after Palmer was Grossman, and he was bad. He drafted a back-up plan with a mid-round pick in 2005, and that pick turned out to be mildly successful after his rookie year. Fearing more injuries, he went out and got the best veteran backup on the market in 2006. Maybe you can fault him for not drafting a QB in 2007, but the pick was low and they did pretty well with it. The 2008 draft was garbage as far as QBs were concerned. This one is as well, and he's pulled the trigger on a once in a decade opportunity.

I still think there's a little bit too much excitement over Pace, however. It's not a bad signing, but it's probably inconsequential in the end. I still don't think the Bears are a Super Bowl team in 2009, although I hope I'm wrong. You're not getting any more than a season out of him, so the "window", so to speak, is practically closed in that regard. He'll help next year if he can stay on the field, and that's always good.

I've written before that the only way you can avoid inevitable ups and downs in the NFL is to have a hall of fame QB. Of course, Cutler isn't that, but he could be. I mean, it's conceivable that he could perform, given his career arc thus far, at an HoF level as he enters into his prime. That's of course true of any high draft pick, but here there's a track record of proven success. That's worth even the Hershel Walker bounty.

signed,
Irish Boy
Jerry Angelo ass-licking society

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Fire Phil Emery

Do you have me on your foe list? Pace is another body for the line and lets them go WR in the second.

Mr Reason + commander mcbragg = MATCH

No, that's good. I'm with you there. I just think that if you thought they needed an OT before (they did), they still do. Pace doesn't change that, because he's not giving you anything past 2009. He saves you the high draft pick this year, if you want to use it on something else. But you may still have to use it on OT anyway, depending upon your comfort for starting rookie O-linemen in 2010.

The good thing is that OT and WR are both deep this draft.

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Fire Phil Emery

I'll say this: just about everything in the NFL is a crap shoot. The NFL prognostication game is about on the level of Miss Cleo. No one has any earthly idea whether this will work. But on of my biggest criticisms of the Bears in general is that they very rarely roll the dice and make a big move. And they did that today.

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You can't see me because of internet.

The landowner effectively owns part shares in millions of part-time slaves called, "taxpayers." -Roy L
A Personal Relationship with Jesus?

He is a patch for this year and I think they know it. They could not have gotten Cutler and giving up a 1st rd without addressing WR or OL in FA. I'd rather have Pace than Holt.

If I were them I'd have taken a WR & OL in the first 2 rds. I'm a little sad they may miss out on Oher but there was no guarantee that he'd be there at 18. I was hoping if Oher was not there they could take Nicks and then Loadholt or Meredith and I would have been estatic. I hope this works out and I can't fault them for trying this no matter how good or bad this goes.

Not that I have any hard numbers, but I'd bet the house the odds of finding a 2nd round OL that can contribute immediately are far, far, far greater than finding a 2nd round WR that can do the same. If you don't expect the WR to pay immediate dividends, fine, but to use a 2nd round pick on one and expect immediate productivity out of him isn't based on reality.

The thing is the hardest find is a quarterback.

You can build in a year or two around Cutler.

Orton is a stop gap QB at best.

The Bears have at the best of times been mediocre at QB since Sid Luckman.

When your best 3 QBs in 60 years are Rex Grossman, Erik Kramer and Jim McMahon that says a lot.

Sometimes the brass ring is there and you have to grab it. Finally a Chicago team has grabbed that brass ring.

Man I was just watching some video of Cutler throwing, and the kid has a cannon. I do not think we have to worry about him underthrowing Hester.

I wonder how his arm strength compares with Favre and Elway? Do they have any way of measuring such things?

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

One of the guys who is saying the Bears made a bad deal just said Orton won playoff games. Oops.

It's fun to see the Bears lead Sportscenter and have multiple segments throughout the show. Now "NFL Live" is on. Woo hoo. More Cutler talk. I like when national shows say "Cutler is a Bear."

I'm still on an emotional high. We've gone from the nothingness of QBs to Cutler. What a feeling. Poor a drink and sing a long with me...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeZ5R3C5bzs

Just watched NFL live, man those guys were really annoying. Talking about the love in Chicago for Orton...blah blah blah.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

I concur... there's nothing quite as nice as an original sig line.

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

I know. Those NFL guys really are stupid. I hate when those ass holes talk about my team when they don't know anything about it. STOP TALKING ABOUT NEXT YEAR you short sited dummies. My God, it's about 10 years, not just next year. These guys don't seem to get that.

Fuck their "next year" thoughts too. The Bears will win the division next year.

Look at these "NFL Live" guys saying Aaron Rogers is great and Cutler isn't. I like Rogers too but didn't the Packers go 6-10 last year. Why do they bring up Cutler's record and not Rogers'? They just have a hate for Cutler for some reason.

Good point. This franchise is defined by its failure to get a QB the way Charlie Brown is defined by his having the football pull out from under him by Lucy. This move may work out, and it may fail. But if it works out, it means the end of a long era. It would leave the Bears with the ability to build a team around a QB they haven't had in at least a quarter century. This trade is big on risk, but it's correspondingly big on reward.

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You can't see me because of internet.

The landowner effectively owns part shares in millions of part-time slaves called, "taxpayers." -Roy L
A Personal Relationship with Jesus?

Seriously, what is the risk?
If Cutler fails, Angelos outta a job.

Cup- Looks like a win/win to me

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Peter King was on Mike and Mike this morning and said that McDaniels had decided, that out of all the teams interested in Cutler, that Orton was his guy, and that's what got the deal done.

It looks like we'll have a case study of whether a good QB makes so-so WRs better or good WRs make so-so QBs better.

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I found it amusing that Schlereth talked about Cutler's sense of entitlement. Didn't Eli Manning basically force his way out of San Diego to the Giants when he was drafted?

Didn't Schlereth's buddy Elway basically blackmail his way out of Baltimore and into Denver back in '83. Or bitch about his coach and get him fired (Reeves) back in the early 90's?

Yet both QB's won Super Bowls. I guess their sense of entitlement didn't hurt them.

And funny how much better Orton seems to be in the national media's eyes now that the Bears traded him. I don't think he earned this much praise when he was playing for the Bears.

I think this move also improves our receiving core. Didn't Bennett have Cutler throw to him for his pro day? Maybe the familiarity will make Bennett able to get on the field. Hester can now run like Forest and have someone to get him the ball. Field is streched, Forte is smiling. O-Line is now a bunch of monsters, even if they are too hurt to move, they can get in people's way.
Draft a WR in the 2nd, pass rusher third and OL fourth and I am happy!!!

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But Forest was smarter

I heard Randy Cross on NFL Radio say this morning that Denver can hang their hat on the fact that, at the end of last year, in the last 3 games, Cutler had 2TDs and 4 Ints and went 0-3 and Orton had 3TDs and 4 Ints and went 2-1.

His concluding statement from these stats - If Denver had Kyle Orton last year, they make the playoffs. I guess Orton would have neckbearded the Denver D from giving up 37 points per game at the end of last year.

I am dumber for having listened.

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You know me like that.

We gave them our 3rd rounder this year if I am not mistaken. They can get a good
wideout in the 2nd and then try to patch some holes on defense with most of the
other picks. Getting a young offensive lineman in the later rounds would likely be a
waste.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

I can't really understand how anyone could think this was a bad trade. Even if Cutler ends up not being as good as people claim he is, it was worth it to atleast take the chance. The bears imo were starting to decline and were soon to be (if not already) in rebuilding mode and what better place to start then QB? Sure giving up those picks is costly when there are alot of holes to fill but its so hard to find talented QBs, I'd rather roll the dice with Cutler then with whoever we would have gotten with those picks.

During the initial breakdown of the trade on the mothership they had an interview with some chach from Denver sports radio on and he actually compared Kyle Orton to.....Joe Montana.....because of his intelligence on the football field. If thats what they are thinking of this trade in Denver I wish them all the best.

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According to my draft study (http://score670.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=90&t=27958&start=0)



The according to Hoyle, by the numbers, perfect draft would be an OT in round two, a WR in round three, a DE in round 4, with guards and defensive tackles thereafter. Of course, you don't just draft positions, but actual players, but that's what the numbers say in terms of value.

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Fire Phil Emery

They are going to need to address the secondary at some point in the draft.

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I cannot think of a better teacher to our LT of the future than one of the best LT in the history of the game. That certainly played a role in this signing.

When Pace is done, Williams moves to LT. Even if it is next year, Schaffer can immediately play RT. He started 16 games there last season. Even better, RT is a MUCH easier need to fill than LT. You can find starting RT below the first round in a draft every year. So I think you have exaggerated the need.

Anyway, as I said somewhere else, this is a draft rich in OL talent. The Bears can get a RT of the future in the 3-4 Rd this year, if the choose. I, on the other hand, would go a different direction. I would take one from the group of highly rated C (this is a great year for centers). Let him move to RG for the next 2 years, replacing Garza. Then, you have a great prospect just waiting for the day Kruetz retires.

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