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Today in his Monday Morning QB-Tuesday edition, Peter King of Sports Illustrated took an email question from Joseph of Chicago that started out like this: If you're the Chicago Bears' management, who are you more inclined to fire, Lovie Smith or Ron Turner? He goes on to get more in detail with his question, bashing both Turner and Smith, even bashing Lovie for being an ineffective drafter, a point King immediately corrects. |
First, Smith is not the drafter. Jerry Angelo is. Is it a teamwork thing in Chicago, and does Smith have a major say? Yes. But don't lay the draft failures at the feet of Smith. Lay the failures on defense on Smith. Lay some of the disciplinary failures (Tommie Harris acting up, and subsequently being only a shell of the player he once was) on Smith.
I like to see Lovie called out on his "disciplinary failures". I wonder if Mike Singletary would have these same issues? You have to love what he's done with the career of Vernon Davis, after his rocky start with Samurai Mike, he's now a captain in San Fran.
King goes on to say;
I knew there'd be trouble when Brian Urlacherwent out for the year, because the Bears were going to use Urlacher as a pivot for everything they did on D, and he had come back healthy and in the best shape he'd been in since the Super Bowl season.
I haven't seen to much written about the loss of Urlacher, since it came so early I think it's kind of lost in the shuffle of other stories surrounding the Bears, but I believe a healthy Urlacher would have made a bit of difference.
He notices the same problems the rest of us see;
When I watch the Bears, I think the offensive line is a major problem. The running lanes for Matt Forte aren't there, and the pocket too often collapses around Cutler.
And I do agree with his final assessment;
What I'd do is see if Smith can get the team playing more competitively. If not, I'd consider firing him and the staff and starting over in January.
They may consider it, but does anyone really see the penny pinching Bears eating any salary?