Now that the 2009 season is dwindling down towards an unsuccessful campaign, it's time to start looking at what we have in house that would be beneficial to carry over into 2010. We know that we have a lot of holes to fill, and that we will have to hit the next free agency period pretty hard, but it makes sense to first see who needs to weeded out of our current roster.
Brad Biggs does a good job of compiling some names of who will be RFAs and UFAs, and who he thinks might be worth bringing back in 2010.
Who does he think the Bears might bring back?
DE Adewale Ogunleye
DE Mark Anderson
DB Danieal Manning
LB Jamar Williams
LB Pisa Tinoisamoa
LB Nick Roach
From Biggs:
Defensive end Adewale Ogunleye, who leads the team with six sacks, is in the final year of his contract, and Angelo hasn't ruled out bringing him back. He's the only starter among six unrestricted free agents -- a list that includes Josh Bullocks, Cato June, Darrell McClover, Adrian Peterson and Pisa Tinoisamoa.
Strong-side linebacker Nick Roach will be a restricted free agent. Defensive end Mark Anderson, nickel back Danieal Manning and reserve linebacker Jamar Williams, members of the 2006 draft class, will be unrestricted if there is an extension of the collective-bargaining agreement before March. If not, they'll be restricted free agents heading into an uncapped year, and that will give the Bears the chance to control their rights.
From a defensive standpoint, we saw that Rod Marinelli seemingly made an impact at the beginning of the season with the pass rush, but in the latter weeks of the season has become ineffective. Is this a byproduct of the lack of talent on the DL?
Perhaps Marinelli just needs a full year under his belt before seeing the kind of improvements we hoped for, but we certainly have some personnel issues regardless.
As far as the linebackers go, seeing Urlacher, Pisa, and Briggs go down certainly hurt us, but having Jamar and Nick step up has been a good thing.
Looking at Biggs' information, who do you think would be expendable, and who should we bring back?