Da Dos

Author: ButchDeadLift

  • Camp, July 25th

    Camp, July 25th

    Tis the time of year to overreact to every dropped pass, every soft muscle injury, every INT, every obscenity a coach shouts…

    We all know the drill. I recall summer practices. They were brutal. We practiced on a field that was about as much dirt as grass. It was at least 90 degrees often, sun melting the helmets we inherited from the 70s. I can still smell the pungent stink from the sticky white padding.

    Our coaches made us do laps, hit the sleds, and if we screwed up, 100 yard crabcrawls which still makes my body quiver 30 years later.

    My position coach would line-up CBs vs WRs to box 3 times, or just hit each other as hard as possible for no discernible reason. I suspect they had bets going on.

    They barked at us to back-peddle uphill. My cleats snagged a rock, and I stumbled. Secondary coach, sporting his wrap-around Oakleys whilst chewing sunflower seeds, sneered, “Had to be a corner back…”

    One of the more memorable drills was our position coach [a former pitcher] standing about 5 yards away, making us put our hands up like a diamond, then throwing the football at our face as fast as possible.

    We had to take our off helmet for this drill, so if the football squeezed through your hands, it hit your face full force.

    Then we had hell week, aka, two-a-days.

    Good times!

    I sometimes wonder if the modern NFL player is put through all that misery. Not likely. They’re probably way more scientific, focused, and detailed than what mustachioed men in spandex shorts inflicted on us mere amateurs.

    One undeniable effect though:

    Trauma-bonding

    In Bears’ news…

    Word around the campfire is that Ben Johnson does not suffer tomfoolery. He seems to be getting frustrated at the offense not clicking how it should.

    That’s fine by me.

    In fact, I don’t really care about ‘coaching style’. The running joke is that if the former HC was fat, the next one will be skinny.

    Whether the HC is a hard-ass, player’s coach, cutting edge, or old school…

    I don’t really give a damn.

    These are pros getting PAID. Give fans results, and they’re not going to quibble if it’s Andy Reid, Bill Belichick or Ted Lasso.

    We found our new Dan Braverman!

    I’d be remiss to not relay that Raiders have shockingly cut Christian Wilkins. He’s definitely enticing, but apparently they disagreed on whether he needed surgery or not. Bears’ DT room seems full already, so I’m not expecting him at Halas anytime soon.

    Some Swift

    Misc. Cool plays!

    Hey, having Pope on Bears’ side can’t be bad, right?

    Alrighty then, enjoy your weekend, jabrones.

  • Camp Commences, etc

    Camp Commences, etc

    Things are ramping up. Camp started, and nearly all Bears have checked in. One notable absentee is Jaylon Johnson who is on the NFI [none football injury] list and will likely miss a few weeks.

    How injured JJ truly is, who knows? Maybe this buys Ryan Poles time to come up with a solution to a possibly disgruntled JJ.

    My solution?

    Pay him for turnovers. $500K per FF, INT, or even strip sack. JJ gets a bunch of those and suddenly his contract is…saucy.

    This won’t happen. Or heck, maybe Poles already bumps his contract based on TOs, but it would incentivize, that’s for sure; besides, given that JJ is not exactly Prime Time, Poles won’t have to worry much about breaking the bank.

    Bears made some corresponding moves:

    Tanoh Kpassagon is a big boy [6’7, 290]. I mean, how much Arby’s would Austin Booker have to eat to get that yoked?

    Tre Flowers is also big for a CB/S [6’3, 200]. We’re beginning to get a feel for the template both Allen and BJ prefer, and it seems to be, “The bigger, the better” [insert ‘that’s what she said’ joke here].

    Here’s a quick breakdown on the moves,

    Oh, and to top it off, the goal for Caleb is to hit 4k passing, 70% comp, scoring on drives, winning games, curing cancer, and finally releasing GTA 6…

  • Jaylon Johnson Wants a Raise?

    Jaylon Johnson Wants a Raise?

    So, all three Bear 2nd RDers are locked up. Only Burden negotiated a fully-guaranteed contract, but that seems to be what the market dictated.

    NFL is a deadline driven business. No coincidence all the dominoes started falling right before camp started. I’m sure every team acted independently in nearly a 24-hr window[wink wink].

    Maybe the agents received extra lap-dances to close the deals.

    However, just as one drama is closed, another possibly opens.

    Apparently, Jaylon Johnson is not content with his current contract and didn’t report to camp. [edit. JJ now now on NFI list. Won’t be expected for a few weeks].

    If you dig into the numbers, you can understand JJ’s gripe.

    I’m all for players getting paid, but even for me it’s hard to get behind players ‘holding out’ after they signed the dotted-line. A part of me grumbles, “You signed the fucking contract. Play it out.” though I know the opposing argument always follows, “Oh, and it’s ok when GMs dump players before their contract’s over?”

    I suppose the easiest solution might be [shorter?] fully-guaranteed contracts.

    Say 3-yr fully-guaranteed.

    Players take on the risk of injury, but the payoff is that 3 yrs later, the market will pay more.

    An extreme version of this was Derrell Revis who, if memory serves, basically signed one year deals [for like three seasons] betting on himself and made out like a bandit.

    Of course the flipside to that is a player’s achilles going out or an awful season, then next year his market value won’t be as high, which is why most prefer those longer 5 year deals.

    The GMs tend to protect themselves in the last two-ish years of such deals, so if they cut said player, cap penalty is minimal.

    That’s the GM-Agent dance as of now, but maybe that model needs to change.

    Either way, it seems most of the team is reporting for camp, so that’s great news for the Bears and if Jaylon Johnson shows up to camp, it’ll be much-a-do about nada.

    As always, stay tuned…

  • News! Trapilo and Turner Finally Sign

    News! Trapilo and Turner Finally Sign

    So, actual Bears’ news, and it’s 2/3rds good!

    I’m sure you heard, but Ozzy Trapilo and Shemar Turner both signed, leaving only Luther Burden III unsigned

    [update. Burden is now signed to fully guaranteed contract].

    This was more or less expected. Still, it’s comforting to finally lock ’em down and not worry about some prolonged camp hold-out for three rookie prospects.

    Most surmise guys like Burden are waiting for Tyler Shough to sign to create some precedent or benchmark to go off, but who knows? Wide receivers tend to be prima donnas, and Burden in specific may believe he’s a 1st RDer.

    One reason Luther fell though was ‘character concern’, as in ‘Burden seemed entitled and loafed his final college season’, so it’s understandable Halas may be reluctant to fully guarantee his contract especially after Quinshon Judkins was arrested on a misdemeanor battery and domestic violence charge.

    Guess us fans will have to wait, but hopefully it gets done before he misses any camp.

    Boy, almost makes me miss the good ole days when Cliff Stein would wrap up the entire rookie class lickety-split.

    There’s actually lots more NFL news dropping. Here’s a brief synapsis.

    Lloyd Howell, corporate hack, has resigned. That’s not going to make a lot of waves, but I think it’s a great move for the players going forward. To say Howell had some ‘conflict of interest’ is an understatement. Hopefully the NFLPA hires a real executive director who cares more about the players than own bank account.

    This meme is flooding the interwebz. Apparently this CEO got caught with his sidepiece at a Coldplay concert. Maybe they were more embarrassed being caught at a Coldplay concert…

    Beep Beep…Beep beep…
    BREAKING NEWS [7/18/25]

    Luther Burden III now signed, fully guaranteed, meaning he’ll report to camp [if healthy].

  • Zen 5

    Zen 5

    The birds always find their way to their nests. The river always finds its way to the ocean.
    – Zen Proverb

  • Ghassan the Nut-man by Guest Reg IBNO

    Ghassan the Nut-man by Guest Reg IBNO

    In grad school I had a fellowship to study Arabic in Syria. Even for a seasoned Middle East scholar like myself, it was an eye-opening experience.

    I lived near a couple little corner shops–basically Syrian bodegas–right next to each other. For some reason, I mostly patronized the shop owned and run by Ghassan, who was one of the nicest people I’d ever met – not just in Syria. Snow-white hair combed straight back, with a charcoal grey mustache; he was a gentle grandpa type. His shop was in the Christian quarter, but I wasn’t sure if he was Christian or Muslim, and he didn’t give hints one way or the other. He always had a smile, and and displayed Jobian patience even with my stumbling Arabic.

    Ghassan’s shop had bins by the counter filled with various roasted nuts, and my colleagues and I had fallen into a routine of climbing up to the roof of our building in the evenings, having a beer and snacking on nuts. So most days included a stop to buy from Ghassan the Nut-man.

    One day I walked into Ghassan’s shop to buy something small, but I didn’t have enough coinage while my next-smallest denomination was a bill worth about $40. Ghassan couldn’t (or wouldn’t) break the large bill for such a small purchase, and instead he told me to go ahead and take the goods–maybe a dollar’s worth – and I could pay “next time.”

    “Tomorrow,” I agreed, thanking him, and left.

    The next day I was in, again buying something small, and as I put my money down on the counter for him, I added in the amount I owed him. He pushed those coins back at me, smiling shyly, repeating the price for today’s purchase. I reminded him I owed him from yesterday, thinking maybe he had forgotten. He smiled kindly and just replied, “Next time.”

    This ritual continued for a few weeks. I’d come in and buy something, try to give him what I owed, and he’d just smile and shake his head, “next time.”

    The summer didn’t last. Israel started bombing Lebanon and Syria. Everything exploded. Ghassan, ever the smiling cipher, had a Hizbullah flag hanging outside his window – as did most of the businesses and some of the homes in the Christian quarter. A photography studio across the street exhibited big pictures of Bashar al-Assad and Hasan Nusrullah (the leader of Hizbullah) in the window as well.

    Damascus was still relatively safe even as refugees poured in from Lebanon; nevertheless our program managers and bosses recommended we all leave, and offered to pay our bills to get home early. The nascent war had jammed up flights going West, so for me and my colleagues, this meant we could get paid to take the Long Way Home. A couple guys went to Cairo for a few weeks. My office-mate went to the Gulf to get a head start on some dissertation research. I was going to take the train to Istanbul and hang out for a while before flying home.
    So on my last day in Damascus, I stopped in Ghassan’s shop to buy some almonds for the bus ride to Aleppo, where I’d pick up the train to Istanbul. Again we did our routine.

    I put extra money on the counter, and he pushed it back to me, refraining, “Next time.”

    “I owe you this money, but you keep saying ‘next time,’ “ I replied.

    “Yes, and you keep coming back? I’m a smart businessman, no?” he laughed.

    I laughed, too, and pushed the money back across the counter. “But I’m leaving tomorrow because of the war, and I owe you this.”

    His smile fell, but he pushed the money back to me, saying, “Next time, God willing.” He put his hand on his heart, adding, “Safe journey, my friend.”

    “God willing,” I repeated, with a lump in my throat, taking my almonds and Ghassan’s money, and left.

  • PFF Grades the Bears Oline as #4. No, you’re not high, you read that right

    PFF Grades the Bears Oline as #4. No, you’re not high, you read that right

    Pro Football Focus [PFF] seems to be omnipresent when discussing the NFL nowadays. For some reason, humans crave an ‘objective’ framework from which to interpret life. Something ‘outside ourselves’ to course-correct what our senses are inputting. What do you think the 10 commandments are?

    The general public assumes that RenĂŠ Descartes concluded, “Cogito, ergo sum” [I think, therefore I am], but actually, he proclaimed, “Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum” [I DOUBT, therefore I think, therefore I am]. Something to ponder.

    I envision Descartes staring intently into the flame of his candle, emersed in total darkness, desperately fumbling for some objective proof, a Mathematical God, some Unmoved Mover, to save him from his Evil Genius, to slip him the red pill to awaken from the Matrix…us football fans must settle for PFF.

    So here’s PFF grading the entire league. If you want to skip to the Bears’ portion, fast forward ≈1hr1min

    Shout out to Bodhran:

    https://www.pff.com/news/nfl-2025-nfl-offensive-line-rankings

    Some thoughts…

    A scout relayed that he graded an olinemen low coming out of college. Then that Olinemen ends up on the Peyton Colts; he mutters, “Fuck. now I’m going to look stupid when he makes the PB.”

    The Bears oline talent is now sufficient. It takes years of a smart GM [which Bears don’t currently employ] to properly get return on investment in the trenches. Ryan Poles had to apply some Gorilla Glue to patch up the gigantic holes he created through ineptitude.

    That being said, like the scout expressed anecdotally.

    1. A smart QB can make the oline look a lot better than it otherwise might be

    2. A creative HC/OC can scheme around weaknesses [basically do the opposite of what Mike Martz tried with Webbnation]

    3. A talented HB can hit the optimum holes and/or break tackles

    Unfortunately, we don’t quite know if we have a smart QB, HC/OC, and Bears definitely don’t roster an elite HB [NTM it’s a brand new scheme], so for this Oline to dramatically improve, mucho must synergize [including staying healthy].

    But hey, tis the off-season of hopium.

    EDIT. I’m burying the lead as the Bears unwisely extended Ryan Poles‘ contract. That will get its own post soon, but for now, I can characterize how I feel about the move through a flick I’m watching for the 100th time. Halas plays the German Soldier while Bear fans are Mellish…

    “Gib’ auf, du hast keine chance. Lass’ es uns beenden. Es ist einfacher fĂźr dich, viel einfacher. Du wirst sehen, es ist gleich vorbei.”

    Translates to:

    “Give up, you don’t stand a chance. Let’s end this here. It will be easier for you, much easier. You’ll see, it will be over quickly.”

  • TBT. Hester-v-Rams

    TBT. Hester-v-Rams

    Still slow, so enjoy some HOFer Devin Hester.

    I always liked Kam Chancellor. He’s one of those safeties MB loved. Yuge, athletic, and mean. I’m surprised he didn’t suffer as many severe concussions as Brisker.

    Speaking of which…

  • Barroom talks Bears’ D and misc

    Barroom talks Bears’ D and misc

    Greg Gabriel examines the Bears’ D while Aldo updates us on basically everything.

    NFL may have blocked them from embedding, so click here if can’t click below.


    Few points stood out:

    #1. Gabriel states he’d cut anyone who reports out of shape [who is healthy].

    I tend to agree. You got ONE job. Well, maybe more, but staying in shape is #1.

    #2. OK [for now] about the 2nd rounders not signing. Pick #33 and #34 have signed getting four years guaranteed. Gabriel thinks Luther Burden MIGHT get a fully guaranteed contract, but doubts that the later 2nd rounders Ozzy Trapilo and Shemar Turner get same deal. It could be a tiered result. “I’m not worried about it until they don’t show up when the vets must report.”

    #3. Tremaine Edmunds might play some WLB which Gabriel contends might suit him better. Only thing I can think is that Flus wanted his Lach gobbling up passing lanes in the middle while Dennis Allen might prefer a more attacking MLB.

    #4. Za’Darious Smith and Matthew Judon are essentially the same DEs. Would be solid depth, but shouldn’t get more than a 1-yr deal.

    #5. Xavier Carlton doesn’t impress Gabriel. He likes fast players. Carlton runs a 5.05 forty which doesn’t bode well for specials

    #6. Doesn’t seem too concerned about the safeties. Doesn’t believe the Bears are as shallow as some fans may feel. Basically mirrors Poles’ nonchalant attitude on the position. Guess both assume safety is relatively easy to replace in this system.

    #7. Doesn’t know if Gervon Dexter will take the next step, but Gabriel knows he’s a legit football player who takes his body and career seriously [Can’t say the same about Zacch Pickens]. Not sold Dexter could play DE. Supposedly Allen shut the door on that option, paraphrasing, ‘Dexter needs to first learn how to play inside before even thinking about moving outside.’ Aldo was surprised as am I since I figured Allen would have no issue moving em around, but perhaps he’ll be more strategic about it.

    #8. Shemar Turner reminds Gabriel of…wait for it…Tommie Harris. Wow. I didn’t see that first step explosion, but I guess he does. Let’s hope Turner is another [healthy] T-Harris.

    #9. Bears’ CB should play more press. We all know this already, but I for one am thrilled I am no longer going to see our CBs give 5 yard cushions for WRs to do whatever the fuck they want. Hit em in the mouth like Peanut did. Make those speedy little suckers earn it.

    #10. Acknowledges many fans want to give Das Boot to Tyrique Stevenson, but he’s still better than Terrell Smith behind him. Wonders if Terrell Smith can play man-press. Hope so because I’m one of those fans who wants that knuckle-head gone; though if he turns it around, good on him.

    Still, Chicago has a VERY long memory.
    Just ask Cody Parkey, Conte or Steve Bartman…

  • Mike Alstott

    Mike Alstott

    Still quiet on the Northern front. I think I read that once the Bears lost Khari Blasingame, their season went down hill, so that just gives me an excuse to post Mike “Juggernaut” Alstott highlights. I do wonder if Ben Johnson will utilize a full-back, or if he’s trying out linemen to do spot FB duties like Doug Kramer last season.

    Random other sport’s thoughts.

    The other football – U.S. vs Mexico was entertaining. I never played much soccer growing up, so like many Americans, didn’t give it much thought ’til the World Cup hit Pasadena in 1994; then I experienced first hand the electric atmosphere it could generate. I saw a bunch of Germans, Brazilians, etc getting on top of lampposts waving their flags, just jubilant having a good ole time. Of course if they do that now they’d likely get deported, but I digress…

    Something about soccer lends itself to international pageantry. The low scores might turn-off a lot Americans, but I think they build up tension. I mean, imagine shouting “Gooooooooaaaaallll” 15 times a game…just not the same.
    Besides, hockey and some baseball games can be just as low-scoring, yet equally entertaining as long as the teams are good. Just takes a bit more nuanced appreciation like a stout beer.

    One thing that caught me off guard. [spoiler alert]. Mexico scored a goal, but was flagged “offsides,” so goal didn’t count. In the past, this would’ve been an international incident and in some countries motivated rioting and conspiracy theories.

    However, soccer now implements replay. It’s a rather fast process too. I wish the NFL would streamline its replay system like soccer instead of showing us every angle in slow-mo like it was the Zapruder film.

    Still, it’s hard for me to get TOO invested in soccer because of one MAJOR flaw.

    FLOPPING

    I mean, sometimes it’s like a whole team of Vlade Divacs out there, and it just kills it for me. Hard to respect “world class athletes” who go down faster than Mia Khalifa.

    But when there’s not too much flopping, international soccer games can be a lot of fun, though I’m not waking up at 6AM to watch matches – that’s for damn sure!

    I was also surprised that Alexi Lalas looks like this now.

    Giddy up.