What Went Wrong?

[beardown3231]

25 minutes ago, JibjeResearch said:

Not many draft picks can come and dominate....  CB Johnson got lucky... we came to an awesome defense.

Apparently none of Poles' draft picks or free agents can come in and dominate

[blkwdw13]

What went wrong?

 

YES

[Ty21]

14 hours ago, dll2000 said:

Claypool is overrated.

By whom…? I think everyone has always been on the same page about him, at least in 2023. People tried to make him happen a bit in TC but that was mostly “you’re wrong about him, he’s better” but nobody was wrong about him. 

[Ty21]

9 hours ago, beardown3231 said:

Apparently none of Poles' draft picks or free agents can come in and dominate

Haha excuse me? Are we not watching the same sport? Did you not see Ngakoue flop behind Mahomes and hurt his ankle for half a drive? You can’t pick and choose what to notice. 

[dll2000]

1 hour ago, Ty21 said:

By whom…? I think everyone has always been on the same page about him, at least in 2023. People tried to make him happen a bit in TC but that was mostly “you’re wrong about him, he’s better” but nobody was wrong about him. 

He was getting hype in camp for about a week straight.

Practice I went to he was targeted a lot by Fields and made some plays, but he had a couple of drops too.  

[Bigbear72]

What went wrong this season? Let's see. They suited up and took the field with those players and that coaching staff.

Think I nailed it.

[dll2000]

We are down a lot of key guys on a very thin team to be fair. A lot. I don’t think they should be winning given that.

The Fields play is very disappointing still though.  

[BEAR FACE DOWN ARROW]

I was super optimistic about this season,  way way too high, but in fairness there were reasons to at least see a good team as a possibility. Mostly Fields getting year two in a system, adding players (we couldn';t possibly be WORSE, right?) and just hoping for some reversion to mean (for as fluky good the Vikings were last year, the Bears were their opposite in all those close games)  The injuries along the OL about amonth before the season are when I started to get worried.  Once the Bears looked so ****ty against the Packers is when I started to feel like the floor was very low.

Unfortunately there is no one thing to fix here.

Poles wasted a year of evaluation last year, completely wasted it, by providing a offensive roster that I really don't think a single QB would look good with.  Then it seems like the players he brought in are most crap.

Eberflus does not seem to have the skills or drive to prepare a team to win.  I've seen a lot of bad Bears team but this is sloppier than Trestman.  His best asset is that he looks like a coach when he's up in front of reporters saying how they're close and they need to try hard.

Fields. Man, I really love this guy, but he has some serious deficiencies that have gotten worse since he got here, and his head is a mess I believe.  If I had a time machine I'd make sure he got drafted by SF, or the Vikings, or anybody but the Bears. I truly believe he could have been a great QB by now if received into a stable system with an offensive identity and better players.  He might always be slow to process but his other talents very well could have still made him well above average if he wasn't dealing such a ****show.

The McCaskeys did everything backwards and out of sync, again.  Keeping Nagy and Pace messed this up, as now you have a GM who has given his (choice of three supposedly) HC and a QB he didn't want, then he kinda did, and now everythings a mess. I pray that they learn from how they handled Fox, and how they handled Nagy, and just start over.  If things don't turn around in the next couple weeks I would meekly instruct Kevin Warren to march into Poles' office and say absolutely no acquiring of players, and start accepting offers if anyone wants to trade for a Bear.  It'll still probably get screwed up, but if they start over clean at least you can't say they didn't try to get that part right for once. 

[Bigbear72]

5 minutes ago, dll2000 said:

We are down a lot of key guys on a very thin team to be fair. A lot. I don’t think they should be winning given that.

The Fields play is very disappointing still though.  

Then I will include Poles too (I should have in the beginning any). The roster needs to be constructed better and the medical and training staff need to do a better job of keeping the players as healthy as possible (yes I understand that injuries are inevitable but we seem to always have a surplus of injuries in key positions). 

[dll2000]

13 hours ago, beardown3231 said:

 

To be fair.

2022 pick 39: Kyler Gordon - Hurt
2022 pick 48: Jaquan Brisker - Hurt
2023 pick 53: Gervon Dexter - Rookie and raw
2023 pick 56: Tyrique Stevenson - Hurt
2023 pick 64: Zaach Pickens - Rookie 
4 yr $18 mil APY (50M guaranteed): Tremaine Edmunds 
1 year $10 mil APY: Yannick Ngakoue - Sat out most of offseason.  
3 year $7 mil APY: DeMarcus Walker
3 year $6.5 mil APY: TJ Edwards
2 year $6 mil APY: Justin Jones

And aside from Edmunds who is a MLB, one of least valuable positions in modern football  - none of those guys were or are thought of as big time elite talents.  They are pieces.

Brisker, Gordon and Stevenson could possibly be very good - but I don't think anyone is realistically saying they can be elite.  

At some point you need blue chip players on the field and the rest be good players.   Chris Jones, Kelce and Mahomes move needle for KC.

 

 

 

[Nads786]

It's just the roster construction that baffles me. Why did you draft two secondary players with a second round pick when the Oline has been bad and you have a second year QB?

Why spend all this money on LBs when the biggest need is DL. Poles is a rookie and he looks the part. Then the larger misses, how could you not take Mike McDaniels as a serious HC candidate? Why would you chose a DC with a young QB. Does he really have the ability to make the final calls?

Why tear down the team, gather draft picks and make the team even worse?

[Bigbear72]

39 minutes ago, Nads786 said:

It's just the roster construction that baffles me. Why did you draft two secondary players with a second round pick when the Oline has been bad and you have a second year QB?

Why spend all this money on LBs when the biggest need is DL. Poles is a rookie and he looks the part. Then the larger misses, how could you not take Mike McDaniels as a serious HC candidate? Why would you chose a DC with a young QB. Does he really have the ability to make the final calls?

Why tear down the team, gather draft picks and make the team even worse?

This is the crux of the problem and has been the crux of the problem for all things Bears. There is always this "plan" that sounds good in theory. We, as an organization, are never able to execute what seems to be good plans. This is our plot in life.

[beardown3231]

1 hour ago, dll2000 said:

To be fair.

2022 pick 39: Kyler Gordon - Hurt
2022 pick 48: Jaquan Brisker - Hurt
2023 pick 53: Gervon Dexter - Rookie and raw
2023 pick 56: Tyrique Stevenson - Hurt
2023 pick 64: Zaach Pickens - Rookie 
4 yr $18 mil APY (50M guaranteed): Tremaine Edmunds 
1 year $10 mil APY: Yannick Ngakoue - Sat out most of offseason.  
3 year $7 mil APY: DeMarcus Walker
3 year $6.5 mil APY: TJ Edwards
2 year $6 mil APY: Justin Jones

And aside from Edmunds who is a MLB, one of least valuable positions in modern football  - none of those guys were or are thought of as big time elite talents.  They are pieces.

Brisker, Gordon and Stevenson could possibly be very good - but I don't think anyone is realistically saying they can be elite.  

At some point you need blue chip players on the field and the rest be good players.   Chris Jones, Kelce and Mahomes move needle for KC.

 

 

 

Having guys that end up hurt isn't exactly a feather in Poles' cap. Can he control that? No, but Kevin White was a bust because he could never stay healthy. Jones went in the 2nd round. Kelce went in the 3rd. It's not impossible to find great players in the 2nd and 3rd round. There is obviously still plenty of time for Gordon, Brisker, Dexter, Stevenson and Pickens, but Pickens and Dexter have 4 tackles in 3 weeks total

[dll2000]

3 hours ago, beardown3231 said:

Having guys that end up hurt isn't exactly a feather in Poles' cap. Can he control that? No, but Kevin White was a bust because he could never stay healthy. Jones went in the 2nd round. Kelce went in the 3rd. It's not impossible to find great players in the 2nd and 3rd round. There is obviously still plenty of time for Gordon, Brisker, Dexter, Stevenson and Pickens, but Pickens and Dexter have 4 tackles in 3 weeks total

I am saying they have a combination of injuries and circumstance that make it really hard from a coaching perspective to have things ready to go and compete.

 

[dll2000]

My biggest complaints so far:

2023 FA period.

We sold the farm to stockpile money for FAs.

We all know we needed help primarily on OL and DL.  Go back and read threads.   

We all had a new OT and new DT coming on board.   I am just going off memory as I am too busy right now to check, but most of us had Payne and Taylor.  They made perfect sense.   

Payne getting tagged made him impossible.   Understandable.

But we got outbid for Taylor.  That makes no sense.

We got outbid for Hargrave.  That makes no sense.

I am not even sure if we bid at all for Pocic.  That makes no sense.

When you are loaded in cap space the way to approach a draft is to shore up biggest holes in FA and then draft BPA.

If we signed Taylor - we don't have to draft Wright at 9.  We can take a swing at Jalen Carter or trade down and gain depth.   Again I get not drafting Carter - but he is a potential blue chipper.   You don't win games with just good players.   You need needle movers.

If we have Hargrave we aren't desperately drafting DTs. 

If we signed Pocic - we have solid and fresh depth at G in Whitehair when Jenkins potentially goes down and we aren't wasting all reps shoehorning Whitehair into C.

We should have cut Patrick.  

If we draft Pickens in 2022, like we all wanted to, we don't need to desperately trade for Claypool later that year.  Pickens is proven now to be a very good player.  And we would have had 32nd pick in draft.  

You can't be all stand offish about Pickens and Carter and then trade for red flag players like Claypool and FAs like Davis.   And your DC - whatever his deal is.

So what did we do with our 2023 FA?

We signed 2 best off ball LBs.   This is a luxory, not a necessity to building a team.   Look at what Philly does.   They know how to build a roster there.  You build front to back and bring in dynamic playmakers on outside.

We could have signed the linemen I wanted and still signed Edmunds to make Flus happy.  

Speaking of Flus - why do we have defensive HC who doesn't know offense to lead our team.   Hoge and Jahns have a clip were they make fun of Fox saying he could be an OC, DC or special teams coordinator.  But you know what?   He could be.    Flus only knows defense.   Only way he keeps an offensive staff is if he sucks (mission accomplished).  If you are any good then you lose continuity.   This makes no sense.  

These are my biggest complaints about Poles off top of my head.

And Kevin Warren.   His big thing is master deal making right?   I don't see any digging in Arlington, do you? 

 His biggest accomplishments so far is all our lawn equipment was stolen on his watch and the press box has better food.  Whoopee.