The Bears committed four turnovers, Rex Grossman played like his evil twin brother, the Patriots were the first team to gain over 300 yards of offense against the Bears all year, it was a road game, at Foxborough, late in the year, and …
The Bears lost to the mighty Patriots by four whole points. Ooooooooh.
Sue me if I’m not concerned.
One thing that bothered me about this game was the Brady play. Not because Urlacher missed the tackle, but because such a big deal is being made out of it. So what if Brady shook him? Brady had eight yards of space to make his move, Urlacher was standing still in a passing lane, Brady had a running start, there was no sideline to squeeze Brady to and there were no other defenders to help; plus, Urlacher has to watch for a quarterback slide and avoid a penalty. There’s no way Urlacher should have been expected to make that open-field tackle. An average college quarterback would’ve shook any defender in the league in that situation. But no, it was the play of the week. What a play by Brady. Forget that Brady threw two interceptions and looked unlike his normal self the entire game, despite not getting pressured the whole game and despite the fact Ricky Manning Jr. wasn’t playing.
One other question: if that was Randy Moss or Terrell Owens pointing at the first down like that, then taunting Urlacher afterwards, would it be because they were “so competitive” or because they were brass? I’ll stop short of throwing the race card, but just think about that. I hope Brady gets popped next week. Hard.
I expect Urlacher to have a big game next week.
Tim: Adewale Ogunleye was obtained from the Dolphins in the trade for Marty Booker. Moose was a free agent signing from the Panthers. Four year, 40-something million I believe.
Even for the most pessimistic of Cubs’ fans, this weekend’s signing of Alfonso Soriano has to be met with excitement.
Think about it. This is the splashiest free agent acquisition for any Chicago team since Andre Dawson in 1987. Don’t believe me? Let’s break this down.
Think of each Chicago team’s biggest free agent signings (trades don’t count, nor do re-signings) in the last 20 years.
The White Sox’ splashiest deal was probably Albert Belle, which at the time was absolutely huge. In the end, it flamed out quite spectacularly (and knowing the Cubs’ luck, so will Soriano, but that’s getting ahead of ourselves). Nonetheless, this was a big coup for Jerry Reinsdorf in 1996, inking the Indians’ slugger for $10 million large per year.
The Bulls were supposed to be big players in the free agent market following the breakup of the dynasty, but never actually signed anybody before nabbing Ben Wallace last year. It’s almost weird to say it, but Wallace qualifies as the biggest free-agent signing of the last 20 years. Dennis Rodman was obtained in a trade and virtually every other key player for the organization was drafted, except for Toni Kukoc.
The Bears’ biggest free-agent signing over the last 20 years was, oh gosh. I don’t know… sheesh… um.. Kordell Stewart? (shudders) … Brian Cox? John Tait? Thomas Jones? Muhsin Muhammad? Please help me out if I’m missing someone. It feels like there should be a bigger name in there, but I don’t think there is.
Don’t even get me started on the Blackhawks. Nikolai Khabibulin, maybe?
The point is, this signing steps beyond the umbrella of merely being interesting. It’s actually monumental. Free agents often use the Chicago teams as leverage before inking a deal with teams that have more money (i.e. New York), or a better location (i.e. Florida or West Coast teams). No one actually signs with Chicago. They toy with us. They play with our emotions, teasing us into having optimism for the future, then smashing us down and stepping on our hearts (see McGrady, Tracy; Bledsoe, Drew; Beltran, Carlos). It’s an absolute myth that free agents want to come here.
Apparently, that may change now.
Even if this deal flops and Soriano lays an egg for the Cubs (which as we all know, is very possible), it won’t change the fact that the BIGGEST name available on the market signed with the Cubs. I don’t care that the Yankees weren’t in the bidding, nor were the Red Sox, so the Cubs didn’t have to dive into a bidding war. That doesn’t matter. We got him. No one else. We did.
I also don’t care that the Cubs are going to play Soriano out of position by putting him in center field (which is kind of like buying a brand new dishwasher and putting it in the living room. Hey, at least you have a new dishwasher, right?) No, I won’t focus on that right now.
Right now, I’m just too excited.
