the G sides

The Bears meltdown last year could be linked to one thing and one thing only - the quarterback position. They went from being a couple plays out of the Super Bowl to the bottom of the NFC North. How? They couldn’t hold on to the ball, couldn’t move the ball, couldn’t put points on the board (until they played Denver) and it was all because they didn’t have a leader on offense.

Some will point to the defense but you can’t hang your defense out to dry for 40 minutes a game and expect them to win that battle. Rex Grossman, Brian Griese - none of them worked. Everyone knew it. Had to be addressed.

What did they do in the draft?

Round 1 (14): Chris Williams, T, Vanderbilt
Round 2 (44): Matt Forte, RB, Tulane
Round 3 (70): Earl Bennett, WR, Vanderbilt
Round 3 (90): Marcus Harrison, DT, Arkansas
Round 4 (120): Craig Steltz, S, LSU
Round 5 (142): Zackary Bowman, CB, Nebraska
Round 5 (158): Kellen Davis, TE, Michigan State
Round 7 (208): Ervin Baldwin, DE, Michigan State
Round 7 (222): Chester Adams, G, Georgia
Round 7 (243): Joey LaRocque, LB, Oregon State
Round 7 (247): Kirk Barton, T, Ohio State
Round 7 (248): Marcus Monk, WR, Arkansas

Didn’t see a QB in there either did you? Didn’t see them try to move up in the draft to get one or trade for one. It’s not that they had a BAD draft. It’s a good draft with some real nuggets in there. It’s just they didn’t do anything to address the biggest elephant in the room - the quarterback.

Organizations do this all the time. Instead of tackling the biggest elephant in the room, they’ll come up with a thousand other stop-gap ideas. The ideas in and of themselves may be good but they don’t touch the biggest problem and by not tackling the elephant, they hamstring themselves for long term improvement. Any improvement will be negated by the elephant.

Why not tackle the elephant? Mainly because it’s an elephant - big, noisy, and unpredictable. Takes too much time, too much energy and risk to do it. Maybe a lack of skill is a reason. But there he sits and he sits anywhere he wants because he’s an elephant.

If you’ve tried the ‘ignoring the elephant’ approach, you already know how that ends. It doesn’t. It’s like getting eaten to death by a duck. It just goes on and on, a painful, slow fade to black. It’s misery is only doubled when after a year or two or longer, you’re right back in the same situation you were earlier except now you’re older.

It’s also miserable tackling the elephant. Egos, personalities collide with tradition vs. risk and besides that - it’s gut-wrenching on friendships and job-security. The difference is - it’s only in dealing with the elephant will it ever go away or get fixed.

We have a 5-week observation period for any volunteer who wants to work with students. After that 5-week time frame (and if there is a green light from both sides) that volunteer will spend 6 months to a year ‘interning’ with one of our veterans. This process has rescued us from many elephants.

Of course, I haven’t always had the 5-week observation or the intern process. Had to learn the value of those the hard way and eat a couple of elephants along the way.

My hunch is the Bears aren’t going to be all that much this year than they were last. Next off-season they’ll once again have the elephant in the room. We’ll see if it gets tackled this time.