The craziest day: part I.

Saturday, April 24th 2010 was probably the best day I've had in a long time, and I decided to share it in this blog as somewhat of a narrative, but I have to split it up into 3 parts. So here is part 1, I hope you enjoy. Why is this in the NFL part, you ask? because this was the first awesome thing that happened to me that day...
Before I can even tell you why this is so important, I first must introduce you to a dear friend of mine, the Mid-American conference, or MAC for short (Now anyone that followed the Bears draft probably knows where this is going...). The MAC has 13 teams, split into two divisions. My Alma mater, Northern Illinois University, is part of this conference, so i have familiarized myself with it very much (especially since my Freshman year was 2003). ESPN started playing random MAC games on Thursday nights , and my boyfriend and I have affectionately referred to these random games as "MAC day". Since 2003 was the best year of Huskie football EVER, in the recent years when it hasn't been as good (except the running backs that followed "the Burner" have still been pretty good) I have been more focused on the best QB in the state of Michigan, Mr. Dan Lefevour. I have been keeping an eye on him and was happy to know that he was a very high rated QB in the draft, and I was really just hoping he would get drafted before Tebow, but that didn't happen...
Because of the ongoing love for MAC day, i was anxious to see where Dan Lefevour would end up. I can definitely tell you that I did not, I repeat, did NOT see this one coming,,,
I was at work at the Blackhawks game in the Stadium club, anxiously awaiting the start of a must win game for the Hawks. I am in charge of the TV's, and since the draft was on I knew I had to keep at least a few of them on ESPN. So as I walked two also anxious Hawks fans, I glanced up at the T.V. and noticed Mr. Lefevour being interviewed. My first thought was "oh man, he must be getting interviewed because he got drafted! I wonder what team he's on..." and then I kept walking the unsuspecting hawks fans to their table, got a glimpse of the other T.V., and saw the Bears logo next to his name on the graphic. I let out a large gasp and a "WHAT??" and the Hawks fans were curious as to why i would get so excited about this. The problem is, no one is a freak like me and cares about MAC day this much. But i was pretty much freaking out the rest of the day. Until later when I had some other things to freak out about... (see part II).
Now, I know that alot of people disagree with the pick. As the official MAC fangirl, it's pretty obvious that it excites me. I know we needed a safety and some O-line help, but I would have liked the bears to use their other few picks to take care of that but still get Lefevour. You never know how these MAC players will end up...(I miss you, Burner).
And that was just the beginning of my crazy Saturday...

Stupid Lovie

Like I said earlier on, it would be a very stupid move on the Bears part to get rid of Alex Brown. Lovie Smith has just shown me again, another reason why I get so upset sometimes with my beloved team. It just does not make sense to me why anyone would want to get rid of Alex Brown. Yes, Brown plays right end, but Julius Peppers is able to play either side, and with Israel Idonije's natural position being on the interior of the line, why would you want to force him outside. Sure, Smith believes in Mark Anderson, Jarron Gilbert, and Henry Melton but why would you want to have a less experienced D-line, which is no doubtingly less experienced because of the departure of Brown, in the same year that we are hurting badly in the secondary? True, our secondary has been less than stellar in the past few years, but with the release of Vasher the Bears are hurting for experience in their CBs and safeties. There is no reason why we cannot have serious depth in our defensive line to compensate for the lack of depth in other places. Especially with how the Bears players always seem to be injury prone. I'm expecting this year to end up with Tommie Harris playing a couple of games but then being injured, leaving the Bears with an outstanding end in Peppers that will be double teamed every play. We will then look to Idonije to make plays, but who knows where he will play once Harris is out of commission. Well the bright side is, Lovie and Co. will be gone after this next season.

NFL Free Agency

The biggest news about the Free agency in the NFL has been the Bears picking up Julius Peppers, as well as Chester Taylor and Brandon Manumaleuna. Now granted, these pickups have drastically improved the team and not to many people will argue that point, but lets look at the players that the Bears picked up last year. We have Jay Cutler, Orlando Pace, Frank Omiyale, Josh Bullocks, and Kevin Shaffer. Obviously the pickup of Cutler and Pace were the biggest news for the Chicago Bears and pretty much all around the league with the Bears finally snagging a great quarterback. Supposedly those two, in addition of the other singings made the Bears a much better team, and granted we do not know how the season would have gone with Orton as our quarterback, but I do not think it would have been all that much better.

Now although this is my first post and no way for you to know this, I have been talking about our offensive line for the past couple of years and how we need to improve it. Last year, the Jay Cutler was sacked 35 times. His last year with the Broncos he was sacked only 11 times. Kyle Orton's last year with the Bears gave him 27 sacks. It doesn't matter who the quarterback is trying to throw the ball too if he cant even complete a three-step drop and release the ball. So forget about talking about picking up a free agent wide receiver or even finding one in the draft, we have 5 wide receivers. And that's not including Devin Hester because he is not a wide receiver, he is a return man, that was tried to be made a receiver. But the Bears failed at that, just like they failed to see that Lovie Smith and Jerry Angelo need to be fired.

There are not too many names in the free agency list for offensive line, but one is Chester Pitts at guard. If we don't pick him up we should try for Darren Sharper for FS and then forget about the defense unless something else big falls into our lap. The addition of Peppers, and the return of Urlacher should greatly improve our defense from last year. We should focus our few picks in the draft and get some more players for the offensive line. While we might not be able to find starters for the O-line that late into the draft, its still a possibility and who knows, it might light a fire under the current O-lines to get themselves in shape and pick up a block or two.

Strength of Teams for Next Year

With so few players eligible for the free agency this year, there is not that much talent shifting around. So far there hasn't been too many trades either. So with that being said, most teams should repeat their performance from last year. Yes, there will be differences from last year's teams, mostly the teams that have had the biggest changes from last year, namely the Bears with their free agent signings, the Vikings, depending on Farve and which way he is going to sway this year, the Cardinals, losing Warner, Boldin, and Rolle but picking up Rhodes. The Bears will improve this year to a second spot in their devision behind the Packers, The Vikings will drop to third in the NFC North with or without Farve, and the Cardinals will not fare so well this year. The only thing that they are thankful for is their division. But they better watch out for the 49ers.

The Jets have improved their secondary with the addition of Cromartie, which pretty much means the only team in their division that might, and I repeat, might have a chance at beating the Jets are the Patriots, but Welker better rush that healing along, because then the Jets might just sweep their division.

The Ravens have also improved their receiving group with taking Boldin from the Cardinals. They also resigned Mason, so that should give Joe Flacco plenty to throw towards when he's not giving the ball to Ray Rice, who should have another great season this next year. The Baltimore Ravens will run into some small problems with the Steelers who will be motivated to get back to the top of the division and might hit a speed bump with the Bengals, but shouldn't have too much of a problem with them.

The rest of the teams did not make too much moves so far during this free agency period and we will have to wait until the draft to see what they do. But don't look for your team to change from the bottom of your division to the top from the draft picks that they have, because even though a great draft pick might be a very valuable player, they can only play one position. They can't bring you to the superbowl. Teams that were on the bubble last season or lost early on, lets see who you pick up and how they will make a difference for you.