Chicago -
By Jim Coffman
In the aftermath of the Bears essentially bowing out of the 2015 season with Sunday’s loss to the 49ers, dropping to 5-7, should a fan re-assess the job general manager Ryan Pace did getting spare parts for the defense and the work John Fox and Vic Fangio did coaching them up this season? In a word, no.
The guys on the field during the Bears’ loss were the same Bears who somehow found a way to hang on against the Packers 10 days prior.
Posted on December 7, 2015
By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes
Trap game ahead. Plus: Everyone Mad Bulls Just 11-5; Patrick Kane, All-American; We Were Promised David Price; and The Chicago Fire Did Something This Week.
Posted on December 4, 2015
By Carl Mohrbacher
Though they kept it close, bad penalties and an inability to make big plays in the clutch prevented the Bears from a stunning upset of the Green Bay Packers in Lambeau last week.
Just when we thought that Jay Cutler had turned the corner, the Bears’ signal-caller was again plagued by bad turnovers in the key moments of the second half . . .
Hrrrrmmmm?
The Packers did all that stuff?
Whaaaaaaa?
Guuuuuuhhh?
Drrrrrrr???
Fapfapfapfap???
Posted on December 3, 2015
By Steve Rhodes
“Wendell Phillips Academy, the landmark Bronzeville high school that boasts Nat King Cole and Sam Cooke as alumni, can now claim the first state title by a public league football team,” WLS-TV (and others) reports. “Phillips won the historic championship by beating over Althoff Catholic from Belleville, 51-7.”
Let’s learn a little bit more about the school, the football team, and the man the school is named after.
Posted on December 2, 2015
By Jim Coffman
Same old Bulls – in a good way.
It was fun in the preseason to talk about opening up the team’s offensive scheme. But it has proven much tougher to execute the change in real games, especially with a veteran core that has been awfully good at playing defense-first basketball for a long time now. And that was exactly the way the Bulls pulled out their 92-89 victory over the Spurs on Monday night.
Posted on December 1, 2015
By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes
It’s clear that coaching is occurring. Plus: Blackhawks Bounce Back; Bulls Find More Ways To Win; and Warm Stove League.
Posted on November 27, 2015
By Carl Mohrbacher
Oh, how expectations have changed.
You needn’t look any further for evidence than the reaction of the average Bear fan following Sunday’s loss to the visiting Denver Broncos.
Fire John Fox.
Fire him.
Fire him NOW.
He undermined all of the confidence this team built the last eight weeks by going for it on fourth-and-goal. There were 10 minutes left.
Fire him.
Then re-hire him.
Then punch him in the balls.
Then fire him again.
It wasn’t always like this.
Let’s take a look at how our feelings have evolved following each of the season’s losses.
Posted on November 25, 2015
By Dan O’Shea
I’m dispatching with the usual week-in-review Fantasy Fix template this week for this very special announcement: It’s time again for the Pope’s Nose Awards.
To summarize, to the biggest turkeys of an almost-finished fantasy football season I award one player at each position the fattiest, least desirable, but most symbolically appropriate part of any Thanksgiving turkey – its ass.
This year, the job, which I know many of you must envy, was the most difficult in the many years I’ve given out the award. In part, I think that has something to do with how many star players have ended up with season-ending injuries. My policy is not to kick these guys while there down, though I don’t always extend the same courtesy to players who have played badly through apparent nagging injuries, as I will now demonstrate.
Posted on November 25, 2015
By Jim Coffman
You can hear it echoing across the alleyways of Chicago in the aftermath of the Bears 17-15 loss to the Broncos on Sunday – the distinctive cry of the species known as the meatball sports fan.
With other animals, you have to listen close to catch the intricacies. Not so with the meatball, who caws “If the idiot coach would’ve just done this, our team would’ve won that,” over and over and over again.
The meatball (and a bunch of commentators in this town for that matter) believes that all the separate little parts of a game exist in their own little vacuums. If you could, you would just go back and change what you see as the mistake, enjoy the short-term benefit, watch the rest of the game play out exactly the way it did and then bask in vindication when your team pulled out the win thanks to the adjustment you made.
Posted on November 23, 2015
By Steve Rhodes with Evan F. Moore
Progress has been grudging – and it shows.
Posted on November 22, 2015
