SORRY FOR THE DELAY, BUT I LIKE CHILLING ON THE BLOCK, SO MY INTERNET GAME SLIPPING A BIT. WE BACK LIKE WE NEVER LEFT THOUGH! I'M A STOOPID BEARS FAN AND ITS TIME TO KICK THE SEASON OFF RIGHT! HERE'S SOME EVIDENCE TO SHOW WHY THE BEARS ARE FUTURE SUPER BOWL CONTENDERS!
1. Chicago Bears
A cannon-armed new quarterback has raised the stakes, and now it's up to the wide receivers to raise their game
...Chicago has finally solved its long-standing quarterback problem. Now the Bears must find out if they have the receivers to meet his standards. Cutler is intensely loyal to Bennett, and he has gone out of his way to tutor Devin Hester, who was drafted by the Bears as a cornerback three years ago and has evolved into their No. 1 receiver. Hester has the speed to stretch defenses, and now he should have a QB who can take advantage of it. After pass patterns in practice, Cutler huddles with Hester and carefully deconstructs the previous play.
"I want him to be tough on me," Hester says. "That's the type of quarterback every wide receiver is looking for. If he tells you what you're doing wrong, that's how you get better. If he doesn't, you don't."
Chicago's passing game, dormant for much of the decade, ranked 29th in the NFL last season in yards per completion, a statistic particularly galling to Hester considering his reputation for big gains. He would run down the field, watch a pass fall incomplete, then run back and do it over again. "It was sad," Hester says. "It hurt. It was frustrating knowing what we were capable of but not being able to do it."
Given the shoddy quarterback play—Kyle Orton and Rex Grossman had a combined passer rating of 77.1 in '08—it was hard for the Bears to fully evaluate their young receivers over the past few years. Were the struggles of the offense completely the fault of the QBs, or were the receivers partly to blame? This season should go a long way toward answering that question. With Cutler in the fold, the wideouts have no excuses. "People can doubt them all they want," Cutler says. "That's fine. But those guys are going to come to play on Sunday, and I'm excited about the whole group." -Lee Jenkins
Read the rest of the story in this weeks issue!
BEARS WIN, BRONCOS LOSE!
CUTLER INTERVIEW
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