Ya burnt, BH. Next time just choose to root for the team with the two superior players.

Yeah, he fell apart due to the pressure of his insane fans and the overwhelming burden of fame. It had nothing to do with his rookie season being a lucky aberration completely out of line with his minor league numbers and an easily predictable regression back to mediocrity.

I don't give two shits if I'm a pollyanna homer meatball, I'm fucking excited about this Bears draft class.

DPD, but worth noting that Carl Nicks was 5th RD pick who spent two years at New Mexico State and a JuCo (and TEC will tell you NM State is worse) and was a top ten guard as a rookie and has been an All-Pro guard since. Jahri Evans was a 4th Rd pick who was a projected 7th Rd pick that the Saints drafted out of a Division II school, and he also started from day one of his rookie year and is a four time All-Pro guard. Jermon Bushrod was a 4th RD pick from FCS school Towson and he developed into a good starting LT on one of the most pass-happy offenses in the NFL. Zach Strief is a very solid starter at RT and he's a 7th rd pick from Northwestern.

All this adds up to Aaron Kromer having a pretty solid track record of developing raw, project offensive linemen into good starters, and in the case of the two guards both played, and played well, right away. Long is the most inexperienced of the group but also the most physically gifted, and playing in 11 games and starting half a season without even being part of spring practices for a top five program has to count for as much as being a multi-year starter at a Division II or FCS school.

Yeah, he's going to start, only question is which spot exactly. I think the rawness is overstated. He's gotten professional coaching, he played a couple years in JuCo..with his combination of strength, size, and athleticism he'll be alright despite his inexperience. Certainly good enough to beat out his competition on the interior of the line where he's less exposed. I mean  he has more OL experience than Lance Louis had, considering he was a TE in college.

I honestly don't know, Sterling. A lot of people wanted Sharrif Floyd because he was the best player available supposedly (because he was supposed to go at #2 and didn't go till #23...which gives absolutely no one any pause that maybe he wasn't actually the best playe available?). Otherwise Ogletree would probably have been my pick, but Arthur Brown is still on the board (and gasp, Te'O, who really wouldn't piss me off that much as a second round pick) so I'm not really upset about it. The consensus from Mayock and the like is that Long is potentially the most physically gifted lineman in the draft and could play any spot on the line but center. How this is a bad thing, I don't know. I mean, he could be a bust, naturally, but other than the inexperience factor (which would seem less important on OL than anywhere else) I don't see why he's caused so many red flags, other than that he got drunk an flunked out of FSU five years ago.

I just, Jesus...the 20th overall pick in the rookie wage scale makes roughly 2 million a year. The franchise is zero % fucked if Long bombs, and the NFL sent a clear message with the fewest skill position players in a first round in recent memory that the crop is generally considered to be weak. Phil decided to err on the side of caution in terms of drafting someone with a ton of potential at what is, free agent additions considered, still the weakest group on the team. I have zero problems with this. I'm not buying a Kyle Long shirsey, but Phil Emery's made enough moves for the franchise that I'm more than willing to wait and at least see how this plays out.

Things I learned tonight:

1)Kyle Long will suck because how did the last two first round linemen the Bears drafted work out? Even though Emery didn't, you know, draft them.
2)Bears fans have every right to blame Emery for the Bears having shitty drafts for the last fucking decade because DA MCCASKEYS STILL RUN DA SHOW.
3)Even though the Colts at 24 and Cowboys at 31 supposedly wanted him, every fan on twitter has inside information that the guy would have been available for the Bears in the second round, or something.
4)Sharriff Floyd is a better pick even though they have a Pro Bowl DT and an above average young NT in Stephen Paea, because he went really high in mock drafts and fell hard, so he must be awesome.
5)Despite bitching for five years that the Bears haven't done enough in the draft to fix their o-line, the one time they do so it was a bad fucking idea.

In short, I hate all Bears fans, and you people, and probably myself.

TEC's good, though.

Well, now I'm never sharing my thoughts, opinions, or feelings on the internet again. Thanks a lot, CT.

I have just two fears: that Ricketts is somehow as stupid as Chuck makes him out to be (probably unlikely) and gives Theo and Jed a premature Dallas Green-esque boot, or that Rizzo/Almora/Soler fail to pan out and no young core to build around develops. Otherwise, it's not hard for me to accept that things were so poorly mismanaged and the farm system neglected for so long that the rebuild's going to take a while.

The organization was sold by the group that ran it into the ground and overhauled on every single level, there's a new GM in place who isn't responsible for the bad contracts or the dearth of talent in the farm system. What's he supposed to apologize for?

Chris Harris used to retweet me sometimes. Sigh. Andy could sometimes get some butthurt reactions from Greg Olsen.

Actually, my biggest beef with he, Yellon, and several of the more popular ones is that if they get the tiniest amount of access it goes straight to their heads. Someone discussing Urlacher leaving said they thought leadership was overrated and the guy responded with "No offense, but I KNOW SEVERAL BEARS PLAYERS and they would laugh you out of the room for saying leadership is overrated." That kind of starfucking is irritating regardless of who it is.

Too late. Totes asshurt. IT WAS MY CHOICE.

And yes, I'm mostly just saying this because the main editor of Windy City Gridiron is a horse's ass.

Their staff writers are excellent, but the individual team blogs that are still just farmed out have very different standards. As bad as Yellon is, he's not much worse than the guys that run a lot of their meatball-attracting team sites. He's just our oldest nemesis.