Follow Up To Now It Is Up to The Cut Volume II: Bye Bye Ricky Manning Junior

Boom Boom Boom, Another one bites the dust.

From the Chicago Bears Official Website:
"The Bears on Tuesday terminated the contract of vested veteran cornerback Ricky Manning, Jr."

Yeah, so far so good on my predictions.

Follow-up On Now It Is Up To The Cut: Volume I

Well so far, I have been correct on two. From The Bears Official Website: “The Bears on Sunday waived wide receivers Marcus Monk and Ryan Grice-Mullen, cornerback Leslie Majors and safety Josh Gattis.”

Let’s see how many more next weekend.

To Be Continued…

Chicago Bears: Now It Is Up To The Cut

“Clowns to the left of me,
Jokers on the right,,
Here I am, stuck in the middle with you…”

--Gary Rafferty of Steel Wheels from the single “Stuck In The Middle With You.”



Good Lord, the Chicago Bears looked awful Thursday.

I know I am writing this on Saturday Night/Sunday after Midnight, but that was because I was with Alice Cooper on Thursday (see my review here: ( http://sweetwoodsmetalmoments.blogspot.com/2008/08/alice-cooper-concert-review-from.html ) and I watched the replay from the DVR Friday.

Orton looked good, Bradley caught some passes, and Dusty Dvoracek actually played without a new injury resulting. Awesome.

I was looking at the Depth Chart and I have my cuts in line, so Here We Go:

QB: The Bears will cut none and offer Hanie a “practice squad” shot unless someone is hurt.

Running Back: Pope is gone and Wolfe should be as well.

Offensive Line: Poles is gone, Oakley should be, Reed and Barton might stick.

Tight Ends: Mines is gone and Davis will make the cut.

WR: This is the toughest to pick, but someone has got to go ad I assume Hass and Rideau are more than likely gone. I also think the Bears will give either Booker his walking papers as well. If they go speed and youth, Booker should not be out there. Lloyd has looked sharp, Hester is learning, Davis has been exceptional as he reminds me of a Dennis McKinnon type of player, Bennet will improve, and the Bears have too much money invested in Bradley to release him.

Kickers: Bye Bye Atterbury.

Linebackers: Wilson is out for the year, Okwo and LaRocque are more than likely gone as well.

Defensive Line: Osborne, Bazuin, and Baldwin are gone. The coaches are really disappointed in Bazuin.

Corners: Troy Brown, Majors, Bowman, McBride and Ricky Manning Jr. are all gone.

Safeties: Steltz (too small) and Gattis are also gone.

Keep your scorecards handy and see if I am right.

The Chicago Bears Name The Starting Quarterback

Note To Rex Grossman:

“Nobody likes you...

Everyone left you...

They're all out without you...

Having fun...”

--Green Day from the song “Letterbomb” from the album American Idiot, 2004.

The Chicago Bears have named Kyle Orton as the starting QB.

Thank God!

More than likely Caleb Hanie will make the practice squad and will be used if an injury occurs.

Even more than more than likely, Rex Grossman will not be a Chicago Bear after this season.

The starters are expected to play for three quarters on Thursday; I will be watching Alice Cooper in concert and taping the Bears game for Friday evening.

Here We Go Again: The Experiment Is Over Bears Fans

“Driven to the margin of error;
Driven to the edge of control;
Driven to the margin of terror;
Driven to the edge of a deep, dark hole.”

--Neil Peart of Rush from “Driven” from the album Test For Echo, 1996.

Ok, the experiment is now officially over.

I am sitting here, sober, as I was last evening watching the Bears blow it. I am sipping my Diet Orange Crush from my Ghost Rider New York Comic Con 2007 ‘Toon Tumbler glass, listening to Rush’s Test For Echo after just downloading the Sweeney Todd soundtrack (good movie by the way) and trying to gather my thoughts for my new classes on Monday.

And one thing is persistently bothering me.

No offense but Rex Grossman is just flat-out horrid. Whether he calls the wrong plays, whether he is gun shy, whether he lacks confidence, whether he just never had it, whatever “it” is one conclusion is clear from this experiment: the experiment is over and Rex is not the answer.

Now I know the argument is the line gave him little time; but come on. Orton comes in during the last two minutes and executes. In 28 previous minutes Rex is on his back often, throws an interception, misreads defenses, overthrows two open receivers, has an intentional grounding call, and seems more confused than my freshman will tomorrow. His dump off passes even show a lack of authority.

In the press conference, I have to give the man some credit. He takes his hits from the reporters after having taken them from the Seahawks as his nose looks cracked and his arm is bandaged up. The kid has class and maybe that is to his credit more than we think. However, he is not a starting quarterback.

I want to play music; very badly I may add. I, after numerous “experiments” however admit that I cannot. I simply do not have the ability to do it; I cannot sing for anything, my fingers did not work on the guitar and my brain just does not function in the manner of a musician. No amount of training will break me; and even if it could, my mental block is obvious and detracts—a bit of learned helplessness. Grossman is at that point in his career. Maybe he is a good back-up and needs to be regulated to that role.

It is absolutely unfair to the Bears faithful at this point to deny a chance to Kyle (Don’t Call Me Cowboy Bob) Orton.

In other bright spots, Brandon Lloyd had a great game with passes from Orton; Earl Bennet made some decent catches; Caleb Hanie proved he can play; and rookie 6 foot seven inches of Tight End Kellen Davis (pictured above) had a remarkable game with catches out of nowhere. With a possible injury resulting in a high/low knee hit to Desmond Clark, perhaps this is not as much of a worry as it could be. I happen to be a huge Clark fan, so I hope the best for him. The Defense played well and my boy Hunter Hillenmeyer was back in action. Peanut Tillman was great, Vasher played well, and Mike Brown looked good. Urlacher played ok, and rookie DT Marcus Harrison was fantastic. He showed his talent and will be a force.

Besides the dismal QB situation, Matt Forte ran OK at times and nothing spectacular. Back-up Adrian Peterson did not have much of an opportunity and Garrett Wolfe, who looked very sharp last week, may just have proven that he is too small. The jury is out on him. Mark Bradley sucked as usual and really should be off the team at this point. Safety Payne looked great and then “surprise-surprise” he was injured AGAIN!

The punting was inconsistent and Robbie’s Gould last second field goal that could have, should have, would have won it; missed. That “Uhg!” you heard was not Charlie Brown when Lucy pulled the ball away—it was me.

Marty Booker was basically not utilized and Rashid Davis was at home taking care of his wife and new-born daughter. Congrats to him.

Tune in same time next week for the recrap…uh…recap of the game.

School Is Here: Time For New Supplies!!!

“Well the dawn was coming,

Heard him ringing on my bell.

He said, ``my names the teacher,

That is what I call myself.

And I have a lesson

That I must impart to you.

Its an old expression

But I must insist its true.

Jump up, look around,

Find yourself some fun,

No sense in sitting there hating everyone.

No mans an island and his castle isn't home,

The nest is for nothing when the bird has flown.”

--Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull from the song “Teacher” form the LP Living In The Past, 1972.

School starts this week, and Jen was teasing me about school supplies, as we bought some Saturday.

I have bought school supplies for over 39 years, to be honest.

I bought some paper, some note books, some post-it notes, and some yellow #2 lead wooden pencils. It must be a yellow, #2 lead pencil, or I do not want it. Jen laughed at me for my traditions. I have tried the graphite clicking pencils, and the cheaper versions of them, and all to no avail: they suck.

IT MUST BE A #2 LEAD PENCIL, YELLOW, WOODEN, and preferably TICONDEROGA. I also picked up some flat erasers, pink, with the pencils.

Most of the time, things come and go with school supplies, as I watch kids buy graphing calculators (mine has plus, minus, multiply, divide, and square root which I never use and it has a memory—It is all I need), tons of these five class binders (although we offer six classes per student), and folders and the like. They no longer need the watercolors, the paste, the clue, and the tape. They may need a compass, they may need a dictionary thing, but considering computers do spell checks and use a thesaurus, they are fairly safe.

Guys are pretty sloppy and they use the same folder for all classes and cram everything in their text book. Whereas I am sympathetic to the cause because I did the same, I am now a department chair and I have to watch the money, so I charge kids for destroying bindings. Hypocrisy at its best: that’s me.

Girls buy these puppy dog notebooks and the freshman will put their name plus a boy’s name in a heart on it. You know: Suzy and Johnny, Suzy and David, Suzy and Billy, and by the end of the semester, guess what? Suzy has a bad reputation.

Anyway, all joking aside, the ritual has not escaped me of buying new school supplies for years.

I remember being at Shepherd Junior High in Ottawa and buying Shepherd notebooks with the school logo on it for 50 cents in the library and then buying pencils for 5 cents. I think I still have a Shepherd Junior High Logo pencil. I certainly have a few Pontiac High School ones. And do not laugh, but ISU does the same thing.

I keep a notebook per class, as I write down ideas to be used. What lessons worked, which ones sucked and never are to be repeated, and how well the kids responded. I like to use different styles, for example Batman notebooks are usually used for psych and sociology and other characters (Spider-Man, Superman, Hulk) are used for the other classes. It usually depends on whatever movie came out that summer as to which character I use. Using different characters for the classes, helps me sort things. It brings the fun into the classroom for me.

Personally, I sympathize with all of the parents, because we teachers are so officious about what we use. Math teachers demand the kids have a black pen and a blue pen for their classes. Some of us demand specialty types of notebooks (no spirals in my room) or special calculators, or even special folders (it must be red (or name your color here and have three rings and fifty sheets of paper and all of that kind of crap). I mean if you think about it, expecting the kids to buy specialty poster board and have PowerPoint at home with internet access, might be a bit much given the economic climate of the country at this point.

I make it easy for my kids and their folks. Have something just for this class, something you feel comfortable with, and I will adjust. Oh, and please bring a pen on normal days and a #2 lead pencil on the test days because I use scan-tron (fill in the circles) tests scoring cards.

That said, the pencil must be A YELLOW, WOODEN, NUMBER TWO LEAD TICONDEROGA one. Jen would say I am anal about it.

The First Pre-Season Game And The Same Old Questions

“Won’t you help me now, I’m falling…”
--Ray Davies of the Kinks

I know, first pre-season game does not mean much; HOWEVER, the former starting QB named Rex Grossman now deserves to be the former QB—period. The quote above was for him.



Kyle Orton seemed much more at ease running the Bears offense. He remained poised (except for a lousy fumble as he scrambled) and he seemed more confident.

Less than Sexy Rexy overshot Marty Booker on an otherwise terrific route for big yardage. That said, Grossman was almost last seen walking off the field yelling at himself.

Perhaps the most telling evidence of who will be leading the team was when Orton was seen during the third quarter talking to offensive lineman. Rex, on the other hand, was sitting with the defense. Now perhaps I am reading too much into that, but Rex seems likely to be regulated to second string because I think the offense privately values Orton more.

Further, when Caleb Hanie (who played a fine game--see picture above) was at the helm, it was Rex signaling in the plays—a job for the second stringer.

I think it is a foregone conclusion that the Bears realize that Grossman simply does not have it. Erik Kramer was doing the announcing for the Bears network last evening and made patronizing comments about “what Rex needs to learn.” Sorry but four years of league experience and working on his fifth, REX SHOULD ALREADY KNOW. He should be much ahead of the curve at this point. Sadly, I mistakenly thought Rex had something, but I think I need to reassess those thoughts. Rex showed me nothing, and even though he had the highest QB rating last night (seriously) it was less to do with him and more to do with Garrett Wolfe’s running ability.

The first string defense looked horrid on the opening drive, but a Hunter Hillenmeyer-less Defense who was also missing some intensity and Dusty Divorchek. I guess they do not grow too keyed up on the first pre-season game. Kind of a fault of Lovie to be honest, but I digress.

Nice tackle from Anthony Adams on a sack; great rushing from Alex Brown and Mark Anderson. Let’s see who wins that spot.

Garrett Wolfe shows some glimpses of speed and skill. Matt Forte looked good in his debut. It was nice to see Mike Brown out there as well.

Unfortunately the receiving corps did not look too solid, as Bradley dropped an easy one and the rest all caught a pass for mid-range yards.

Truman McBride after two penalties and blown coverage will not make the roster; nor will Ricky Manning Junior and Danielle Manning just looked awful.

Football season is just starting and I am keyed up. I only wisht he Bears were.