Hockey

Game #8 – Flyers 4, Hawks 1 – But You Knifed Me In My Dirty, Filthy Basement

By Rose Rankin 1824 0

The fact that the score isn’t two goals worse for the Hawks should be cold comfort. They got the benefit of the hockey version of VAR thanks to Captain Stairwell being offsides not once but twice and having goals called back for it, but make no mistake, the Hawks played like shit. And they got the result they deserved.

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

Corsica

–I wouldn’t necessarily say that the Hawks’ defense has been GOOD thus far, but over these last few games they were much less awful than what we’d become accustomed to. Tonight that all fell apart, with our Large Irish Son out with a broken crotch, Calvin de Haan taking his place with Duncan Keith, and Fetch Koekkoek back in because REASONS. With Adam Boqvist still putting his face back together we can’t be surprised that Koekkoek and Gilbert were the best the Hawks could come up with, but that doesn’t make tonight’s performance any easier to take. On the first goal (that counted), Keith got completely pantsed by Travis Konecny, and then de Haan just watched as Oskar Lindblom skated past him and scored. Seabrook did Seabrook things, including getting completely burned by Captain Stairwell on the third goal after Saad turned it over. Gustafsson had an atrocious turnover that led to van Riemsdyk’s goal—it was a hot mess.

And let’s be clear, just defensively in general the team was piss poor. Obviously the actual defensemen were shit but the forwards weren’t doing anything better, and the abject failure to handle their own blue line was remarkable. In a bad way.

–I wanted to say that the bright spot was Brandon Saad, and in a way it was because his goal was really good. Kirby Dach created the chance and Saad found the perfect opening, and he finally finished. He’d had another point-blank chance in the second but missed the net badly, so it was good to see him score and overall he played well. His line with Kampf and Kubalik even came out strong. But then his turnover that led to Hayes’ goal was pretty much the backbreaker. So even that silver lining has a cloud.

–Beto O’Colliton hit the blender pretty hard but it didn’t matter and it didn’t even make much sense. I think at some point Shaw was with Dach and Kane? 20-64-8 got split up, which, OK maybe we’ll need to do that but let’s think it through, not just plop Kubalik on the left side suddenly. Also can we never see Drake Caggiula and Patrick Kane together again? It wasn’t meant to be that way but it was still frustrating and sad. Tonight was all process and no plan.

–Robin Lehner deserved better. His .826 SV% looks terrible but it’s hard to pin any of the goals on him (I’m trying to decide on one and failing to do so). It’s too bad that after an excellent performance against Vegas on Tuesday and making some highlight reel stops again tonight on oh so many breakaways, he’s 0-2. At times he was visibly pissed and honestly I would have been too.

–Erik Gustafsson sucks. Get this, he had a 71 CF% at evens tonight and I feel like I’m taking crazy pills because I saw how badly he played, so why are numbers lying to me? Once Boqvist gets his teeth glued back in his head he needs to replace Gus and this bullshit needs to stop. Maybe we can still find a moron to give us something more than a bag of pucks for him since it’s still early?

Overall it was a flat, shitty performance and we have to hope that maybe getting the hell out of town for Saturday’s game will help. I’m not too convinced, but we’ve all got to tell ourselves something, right? Onward and upward…

 

Baseball

We Know Your Nature – 2019 Cubs Player Reviews: Jon Lester

By Sam Fels 1469 0

No one outruns time. We knew when Jon Lester signed this contract in the winter before the 2015 season, the end of it could get a little hairy. The Cubs have gotten just about what they could have expected, if not a little more. But the fear is that the END has come for Lester, and the Cubs and him are just going to have to survive the last year of it in 2020. Is there hope for better?

2019 Stats

31 starts  171.1 innings

4.46 ERA  4.26 FIP

8.65 K/9  2.73 BB/9  1.50 WHIP

1.36 HR/9  14.6 HR/FB%

102 ERA-  2.8 WAR

Tell Me A Story: Let’s start with the good stuff, just for funsies. Lester struck out more and walked less hitters in 2019 than he did in 2018. He had a better ground-ball/fly-ball rate. He gave up less line drives. So hey, that’s all good, right? Maybe he didn’t have as bad of a year as we thought?

That’s somewhat true. Lester was undone by a horrible BABIP of .347, 46 points worse than his career norm and a 57-point rise over 2018. That’s just luck…for the most part. Lester suffered from a bad hard-contact rate against, by far the worst of his career. Which followed ’18’s mark…which was also the worst of his career. That’s not luck. Lester gave up an expected average against of .282, which is some 60 points worse than his brilliant 2016 for comparison. It was a similar story with the expected slugging and weighted on-base against him, so though he probably could expect a few more balls to land in gloves, considering the amount of rockets he was giving up he can’t really depend on the good fortunes of BABIP Treachery either.

Lester tried to bat away the ravages of age by going less and less to his declining fastball and using a cutter more, probably to get in on righties a little easier. It did not go particularly well, as hitters went for a .294 average against it and a .506 slugging. Perhaps more worrying is this:

Whenever Lester threw that cutter in the zone, it got pulverized. And while Lester lives on the edges, he does have to throw a strike, y’know, occasionally. Whenever he did with the pitch he used most, it was plasma. This is a problem, and leads you to believe there will have to be a change in approach come the ’20 season. In previous seasons, Lester had found success by keeping that cutter up and in on righties. But even that, as you can see here, didn’t do much good this past season. Is he going to have to be Gio Gonzalez now, and just wager that hitters can’t stay patient enough to not swing at four balls before they get themselves out? It might be worth a shot.

It got to the point with Lester where the rotation was rearranged in September so that he wouldn’t pitch against the Cardinals in that series at home. Lester was ok in September overall, giving a good outing against the Reds in that Week-us Horriblus and holding the Mariners down on Labor Day. But he also got horsed by the Brewers and Pirates when the Cubs needed at least length against the latter and a win against the former. You always counted on Jon to somehow gut through a game the Cubs had to have, and either he didn’t at times or they stopped counting on him to do so. That’s probably the surest sign of age right there. Overall, Lester was blowed up in August and not much better in September, which again might have to do with age more than anything.

Contract: One more year at $20.0M, and a $10M buyout or $25M option in ’21 if he were to pitch 200 innings in 2020.

Welcome Back Or Boot In The Ass: There’s no boot in the ass option, and as Lester’s salary drops to $20M this year it’s not really egregious at all for what he will most likely be. You can do a lot worse in the #4 or #5 spot in the rotation than what Lester looks lined up to provide, and seeking it on the open market would probably still cost $12M-$15M anyway. So an extra five or so isn’t really killing the Cubs, though that won’t stop them from claiming so. Lester isn’t going to make 200 innings, as he hasn’t done so in three seasons now. He may want to, and he may try and pitch through some stuff to get there, but that will only make things worse. And maybe one bonus of having David Ross as manager now is Lester is less likely to either want to or be able to bullshit his way back to the mound if something on him is barking.

The question is whether Lester can be anything more than a competent seat-filler at the back of the rotation, and if the Cubs will need more than that depending on what they go and get to fill it out, if anything. The declining stuff can’t be gotten around, and it’s not like Lester is some loaf who can invent a new offseason training regiment or something. He’s already a tireless worker. This is just what happens to pitchers in their mid-30s who have logged these miles (2500 career innings). It would appear Lester’s plan of attacking hitters on their hands just isn’t going to work anymore, because he simply can’t get in there with the velocity or movement he has. At least he can’t in the strike zone. Maybe he can tweak that cutter to get a little more movement, but we’ll have to see on that one.

Lester has a decent enough curve, but he’s not going to be Rich Hill and snapping it off nearly half the time. Perhaps Jon needs to hone in on the outside corner, and as soon as hitters begin leaning out there can surprise them with the cutter in instead of using that as his main office.

Whatever for Vaughn. The Cubs can’t count on anything more than #4 production from Lester, and plan accordingly. That said, this being his last year in a Cub uniform should be something of a love fest for him. It was his signing that signaled the Cubs were ready for deep shit. It was he who pretty much dominated the 2016 playoffs, staring down Johnny Cueto first, keeping the Dodgers at bay twice, and then gutting out six innings of one-run ball in Game 5 against the Tribe when the Cubs had no choice. He’s been more than just a loyal servant and usually found a way to give you something even as his stuff and health have slipped. He was definitely a tone-setter in the clubhouse as one of the few players who had been around a lot.

Yeah, he got a lot of money. I doubt there’s a Cub fan worth a shit that would do that contract over, though.

Baseball

All The Boys In The Band Know How To Get Down – 2019 Sox Player Reviews: Dylan Cease

By Adam Hess 1267 0

In some ways, the future success of this Sox rebuild could end up depending on just how good Dylan Cease ends up being. There are legitimate questions about his ceiling, and he probably is not going to end up being a true ace, but he could very well be a top of the rotation starter. With Giolito asserting himself as the ace and Michael Kopech only having a ceiling placed on his potential by TJ surgery, the Sox don’t need Cease to be a world beater, but they do need him to be good. 2019 served as a decent starting point. Let’s dig in:

2019 MLB Stats

14 starts  73 innings

4-7 Record

5.79 ERA  5.19 FIP

9.99 K/9   4.32 BB/9  1.55 WHIP

45.7% GB-rate  68.1 LOB%  21.4% HR/FB

128 ERA-  0.7 fWAR

Tell Me A Story: After tearing a hole through AA in 2018, Cease was pretty close to MLB ready at the start of the season but still started out in Charlotte. I actually didn’t mind that approach because we all know TINSTAAPP, and that really was less about service time (they left him down until July, after all) and more about him finding a groove with his stuff before coming to the bigs. He was solid through his 15 starts for the Knights, though not nearly the dominant pitcher he had been in Birmingham last season. Still, he struck out 24% of his hitters and posted a 3.79 FIP, though his actual ERA was 4.48 and he walked 10.5% of batters.

Once he got to the majors, those K- and BB-rates were nearly identical. He actually struck out batters more frequently, with a 24.9% K-rate, but still had that 10.7% walk rate. The walk rate might just always be a thing for him – even in 2018 with the Barons he walked 10.8% of batters, he just had the fastball and curveball to beat guys after the fact, and ended up with an 85.8 LOB%. It’s not exactly surprising that moving up to AAA and then MLB resulted in him getting away with the walks far less often. That’s just going to be something he has to overcome moving forward if he can’t stop walking guys, and right now there isn’t really a reason to believe he will.

Luckily, the fastball is still electric and his curveball is one of the best in baseball, at least by average break. As he hones those in more and hopefully starts to throw more strikes, hitters aren’t gonna be able to wait him out as much, and he is going to keep them off-balance.

Perhaps strangely, I think one of the best things Cease has going for him is that by all reports he is one of the mentally strongest dudes in the Sox organization. He is a super-zen yoga guy who literally traveled to meet a yoga guru and wears #84 because that’s how many poses there are in yoga apparently. There’s almost always been reports on him being very calm on the mound and being someone who can easily keep his focus. He also has apparently invested himself briefly in the brain training Lucas Giolito did to help himself get back on track mentally, which should just help with all that even more.

Contract: Team control through 2025, likely arb eligible in 2023.

Welcome Back or Boot In The Ass: Easy call here that you’re keeping him. Overall, Cease absolutely has a high ceiling, but the control is a legitimate concern going forward. He won’t necessarily have to sort it out entirely to succeed, but he’s gonna need to improve at least a little bit to force hitters to not wait him out so much moving forward. He also needs to find a way to keep guys in the yard, although I am not wildly concerned about those considering that he gave up 15 homers in 14 starts last year after only surrendering 16 in his entire MiLB career. I’m confident (perhaps irrationally) that he isn’t going to live in the 20+% range on HR/FB. With Giolito and Kopech likely to be an elite 1-2 punch going forward, Cease being able to be a #3 in this rotation could be a huge advantage for the Sox in the years to come.

Hockey

Game #8 – Flyers vs Hawks Preview – Burn After Writing

By Matt McClure 1712 0

vs

RECORDS: Flyers 3-3-1   Hawks 2-3-2

PUCK DROP: 7:30PM CDT
TV/RADIO: NBC Sports Chicago, ESPN+, WGN-AM 720
BAM, LEAVE YOUR FATHER ALONE: Broad St. Hockey

The homestand at the United Center turns down the final stretch for the Hawks with tonight being the 6th of their seven straight on West Madison, and they’ll welcome their Prague travel mates the Philadelphia Flyers, wrapping up the season series between the two of them before the calendar hits November in another brilliant bit of NHL scheduling.

Since returning home from Europe, things have been back and forth for the Cold Ones, at one point losing four straight (three in regulation), and did so on a Western Canadian swing to boot, so at least they have a plausible travel excuse for their uneven play to this point. Most recently they pretty easily disposed of the Knights on Monday night prior to Vegas being here, though they did so early and often on Oscar Dansk appearing in his first NHL game in two years. Regardless, points in October and against overmatched goalies still count, and the Flyers are going to need every win they can get in a suddenly ultra competitive Metropolitan Division.

While Carter Hart hasn’t gotten off to a fantastic start (.907 at evens, .890 overall), which also included getting the hook in a 6-3 ass waxing in Edmonton, he’s going to get the bulk of the starts in net even if The Terminal Case Of Brian Elliott has been solid in his two starts. If the long term goal is to finally develop a stable goaltending presence in Philly, Hart is going to have to work through some of this stuff, and Alain Vigneault and the Flyera brass will have to resist the temptation of chasing spurious playoff hopes behind the aging and always flattering-to-deceive Elliott. It will he Hart’s net tonight, based on reports from the Flyers’ skate.

In front of him, AV seems to have figured out his defensive pairings with all three of them solidly in the black. Ivan Provorov is the defacto #1 here, at least when pointed towards the other net, though he’s not totally helpless in his own end. He’s paired with Matt Niskanen, whose cowboy days are probably over, but is still smart enough with the puck to keep things moving. Shayne Gostisbehere has been relegated to the third pairing with Robert Hagg, and getting the choice zone starts and matchups has helped give the Flyers push on all three pairings. That’s been possible with the emergence of Travis Sanheim as a legit top-4 defenseman, and he’s baby sat by Justin Braun on the second pairing.

Up front, the Flyers have been jumbling things around recently, and they at least worked against Vegas for a night fairly solidly. Claude Giroux has moved back to the middle with his familiar running mate Jakub Voracek on his right and JVR on his left. Neither Giroux or JVR have scored yet this year, but they’re both certainly in a position to break that bubble given how that line is constructed. Sean Couturier slots behind Giroux and will take whatever AV deems as the toughest matchup on a nightly basis. He’ll have Travis Koneckny on his right, who hasn’t stopped scoring since game 1 in Prague, and leads the team with 10 points. Oscar Lindblom is on the opposite side, and as a unit this line is currently sporting a 65 share of attempts in 50 minutes of even strength time together. Offseason acquisition Kevin “Captain Stairwell” Hayes has found himself as the third center already, which is probably where he ideally slots in on a good team anyway regardless of his paycheck. 2018 first rounder Joel Farabee is ahead of schedule on Hayes’ wing, and made his NHL debut against Vegas on Monday. Chris Stewart somehow caught on to the Flyers’ roster on a PTO, so he and Michael Raffl will assuredly contribute a very irritating goal at some point this evening from the fourth line.

As for the Men of Four Feathers, though the process against a better Vegas team on Tuesday was quite solid for 58 minutes, the results still need to be there, and Coach Kelvin Gemstone will now have to do some regrouping of things now that once again Connor Murphy is having crotch issues. With Murphy out, Slater Koekkoek will get his spot in the lineup, and Dennis “I Have The Name Of A Grandfather” Gilbert has been recalled to take the roster spot. Given the tools available, moving Calvin de Haan to the right side with Duncan Keith is about the only reasonable move here, as de Haan’s game is equally as positionally sound as Murphy’s though not quite as mobile. The hope is that trust can still be maintained from Keith, who has looked sprightly in cutting off entry attempts at his own blue line since being paired with Murphy, reminiscent of four or five years ago. Olli Maata will continue to bail water for Brent Seabrook, the only pairing that will remain unchanged. Koekkoek will play with Erik Gustafsson, whose play in a contract year has been unbelievably bad. Viewers at home with leftover pairs of eclipse glasses from two summers ago would be wise to throw those on when these two are out there.

The forward lines for the Hawks will stay the same, and while these groups haven’t been offensively bad at any juncture, they’re certainly not getting home as much as they need to. Alex DeBrincat is fighting it for the first time in his young career, and as was covered on the podcast last night, he’s still within the margins of getting his normal looks/attempts/chances, so it could be just a case of being snake bitten. But ADB is one of two “bad shot makers” that the Hawks have, and if it one of them isn’t finishing, then the results look like they have so far this season. That’s not likely to change tonight, as Coach Vinny Del Colliton would be very wise to keep Kirby Dach away from Coots as much as his humanly possible before he extinguishes any desire the rookie might have in continuing a career in the sport. Robin Lehner gets the net again tonight after another strong performance, though let it be said that Corey Crawford hasn’t exactly been benched, as Crow currently has a .930 mark at even strength, but the .615 while shorthanded might just be torpedoing that a little bit, and SHOULD rebound a little the longer the season progresses.

Alain Vigneault might be a lot of things (a penis and a crybaby for starters), but he’s not a moron, and he basically pioneered the usage of drastically unbalanced zone starts in Vancouver, and he has such a weapon in Couturier now here in Philadelphia. This stretch at home has shown that Beto O’Colliton is at least willing to get elbow deep into matchups when he’s got last change, but tonight he’ll be playing chess against a guy who has a lot more experience in doing so. There are matchups to be found against this Flyers bottom six, but he’ll need to be diligent in finding them. And stay out of the goddamn box (looking at you, 65). Let’s go Hawks.

Hockey

Game #8 – Flyers vs. Hawks Spotlight: Cooter, Spud, Get Off That Hog

By Sam Fels 1351 0

Around these parts, we’re familiar with the concept of a unicorn center–i.e. one that takes the dungeon shifts and yet continually turns the ice over to the good end of things. Not like you’re thinking, Beverly Brewmaster, you weirdo. Marcus Kruger was the backstop to two Cup teams doing it, and David Kampf has taken the torch from him and is currently filling the role in exemplary fashion.

But neither of them, nor really anyone, does it as well as Sean Couturier.

Couturier stuck with the Flyers right out of his draft year, becoming one of the league’s best checking centers as a teenager. He routinely drove centers nuts from the dawn of his NHL career with his high-speed, instinctive game that always had him in the right spots. He was the anchor to that team that beat the Penguins in the playoffs where neither team had a goalie, nearly causing Sidney Crosby to start painting with his own bodily fluids. Jonathan Toews has found Couturier to be a complete pain in the ass in their limited meetings per year. They’re not the only ones.

But Couturier has been more than that of late. When the Flyers lacked a #1 center, or Claude Giroux was better utilized on the wing, Couturier slotted up there the past couple seasons. That led to back-to-back 76-points seasons, while still providing his possession-dominant ways.

Couturier has slotted back down this season, but nothing’s changed. Over the past five seasons, only five centers have had worse zone starts than Couturier. Two of them are now out of hockey in Dominic Moore and Ryan Kesler, Jean-Gabriel Pageau, Mikael Backlund, and Luke Glendening are the others. None of them have matched Couturier’s Corsi-rating or expected-goals percentage, and no one’s even really close on the latter. You have to get down all the way to find Patrice Bergeron to have a significantly better number than Couturier, and he gets 10% more shift-starts in the offensive zone.

Of course, Couturier didn’t get any Selke consideration until he started putting up those 76-point seasons, because that’s just how these things work as voters really have no idea what they’re looking for when it comes to that award.

Couturier’s $4.3M cap hit per year might be the biggest bargain in the league, considering all the things he can do. If Nolan Patrick is ever able to fill in higher up the lineup (or even healthy), Coots can be the second or third center simply erasing other top centers out of the game. He can be the #1 and score just enough to justify being there. He is the league’s best Swiss-army knife, basically.

So far this year, his line with Oskar Lindblom and Travis Konecny has been the Flyers biggest threat, and that might be the case going forward. Claude Giroux and Jakub Voracek have crossed into their 30s, and James van Riemsdyk isn’t too far behind. These three kids are right in their prime or just about to be, and the Flyers path forward is that trio making it easier on the older guys as they start to lose their fastball. That appears to be the plan, and the one the Hawks have to watch out for tonight.

 

Hockey

Game #8 – Flyers vs. Hawks: Hedley Lamarr’s Mugs, Pugs, And Thugs

By Sam Fels 1330 0

Chris Stewart – Seriously, how does this dunce keep getting work? And how wasn’t he a Flyer before this? An empty vessel of charges and pointless yapping, it’s like he was bred a Flyer. Stewart hasn’t been able to do anything relevant since he somehow spasmed 20 goals for the Blues once upon a time (and any player who has been a Blue and Flyer you know is truly special) but has been able to carve out an NHL career because he hit someone once in training camp. He also looks like he was illustrated onto your screen separately.

Captain Stairwell – Two points, seven games, $7M please.

Claude Giroux – Since the Hawks were unable to deal with him as a rookie in the ’10 Final, has any player scored more goals that didn’t matter in the least? The Flyers have won two playoff series since and none in the past seven seasons, all with Giroux anchoring the top line. He’s done enough talking and posing over that time, while the team he leads hasn’t done shit. Maybe there’s more to it than just usual orange-clad incompetence?

Football

The Vault: Bears vs Chargers, 2003

By Tony Martin 1404 0

Welcome back to THE VAULT, the much celebrated weekly history column where I try to remember why I still care about this team in spite of the many heartbreaks they’ve given me. I’m going to spend these next couple weeks while I’m between jobs rewriting Kanye’s magnum opus “808s and Heartbreaks” to make it about the Bears, so look for me in the FFUD “Album of the Week” section crooning over some reverb-drenched synths. My version of “Love Lockdown” is gonna be about Nathan Vasher. Million dollar idea right there.

Potential album titles:
“85 Bears and Tears” (doesn’t rhyme but I’ll make it work)
“Jim Miller is a Homophobic Idiot” (true but not as catchy)
“One Night Stands and Josh Bellamy’s Hands” (there it is)

2003, week 9 of the NFL season. The Bears limped in to this home tilt against the San Diego Chargers at 3-5, and the Chargers somehow hobbled into Soldier Field at 1-7. Bear in mind this Chargers team had Drew Brees at QB and LaDainian Tomlinson in the backfield, with noted PED user and future “Crime in Sports” episode subject David Boston lining up outside next to perennial “undersized with a big heart white WR” Tim Dwight. Tim Dwight was always one of those wideouts that announcers described as “a student of the game/a gym rat/sneaky fast” which for some reason are only superlatives given to white wideouts. Whereas receivers who are nonwhite are always considered “freak athletes.” It’s weird.

Casual racial bias aside, the wildest thing about this game is the fact that DREW FUCKING BREES was benched in this game for DOUG FUCKING FLUTIE, who massively outperformed the QB who would go on to define this generation (screw Tom Brady, he’s just the best system QB of all time- Brees is the GOAT). It’s almost a fever dream to think about a Bears team led by Chris Chandler, Anthony Thomas, and David Terrell sticking it to the Chargers with two future Hall of Famers in their backfield so severely that they thought it prudent to bring in Doug Flutie.

The 2003 Bears were, you guessed it, a fucking mess. The QB carousel featured the aforementioned Chris Chandler coming in to start for Kordell Stewart for his 3rd game in a row. The 2003 Bears had hotshot Rex “Sex Cannon” Grossman on the bench as a rookie, which is kind of like having the opportunity to re-watch a movie knowing how the tragedy is going to unfold. They also drafted useless defensive lineman Michael Haynes in that first round. After that nightmare first round, they picked up Charles Tillman in the 2nd and Lance Briggs in the 3rd, which is almost “Sayers-Butkus” levels of draft success. As much as it sucks to see that the Bears could’ve drafted Troy Polamalu instead of Haynes, at least they didn’t pull a Detroit Lions and draft Charles Rogers with the 2nd overall pick, he of the multiple failed drug tests. Fun Charles Rogers fact: three career failed drug tests, four career receiving touchdowns. Trust me, I’m not trying to shit on a dude that would’ve maybe had a chance in the NFL a few years from now, when players are finally allowed to use marijuana to help with pain relief. I feel bad for those players who can’t medicate with something that isn’t a habit-forming painkiller that actually shortens people’s lives.

The Bears went on to hold off the Flutie-led Chargers 20-7, keeping LT to a measly 82 total yards on 16 carries and four catches. Drew Brees went 7-15 for 49 yards and an interception in this game, with his pick lobbed into the hands of Charles Tillman before Peanut was suplexed to the ground by the aforementioned David Boston, who looks like those cat memes where people sketch in preposterous muscles on pics of napping kitties. Tillman also downed a punt at the 1-yard line, which is always a play that gets me going. His downed punt led to a game-sealing interception of Flutie by Jerry Azumah, a regular here in THE VAULT.

Anthony Thomas led the team with 31 carries (!), 111 yards, and two scores. Honestly, as bad as those teams were, it’s refreshing to watch the old highlight videos of the Bears lining up in the I-Formation and running up the middle with success, instead of watching the offense line up in the shotgun and send the smallest player on the roster up the gut on 1st and 10 when the other team has 36 men in the box. David Terrell and Dez White each had seven catches, which would be a career day for most of the players on the 2019 squad. Bobby Wade, Justin Gage, and even my all-time favorite Bears undersized useless WR Ahmad Merritt caught a pass from Chris Chandler. Man, I miss Ahmad Merritt, who didn’t do anything in the NFL but was a BEAST in NFL Europe, catching 6 TDs for the Berlin Thunder. What a weird fucking sentence.

The Bears in 2003 finished 7-9, before finishing 5-11 in 2004 with what is considered one of the worst offenses in NFL history. Welcome to heartbreak.