We let this happen.

[WhoKnows]

6 minutes ago, thennek said:

I am of the opinion that no HC would be successful in the current environment. The Panthers are owned by a meddling owner who does not let his football people make decisions without him being involved. 

I’m of the opinion that Tepper has sucked at hiring but IMHO, the single most important problem is Fitterer. I think Tepper “could” be fine if a GM was drafting, signing FAs and trading well. Look at Rhule’s first year. You can laugh, but it was a much better team. I don’t want Rhule back, but we were expected to be awful in 2020. We lost Cam, Luke, Olsen, TD, Bradberry and we had a QB whose career high in TDs was 1 per game. We played both #1 seeds that year (GB and KC) and lost by a total of 10 points including Teddy fumbling at the goal line. Rhule wasn’t a good coach but damn, we were at least competitive. What do you think we’d lose to SF and Baltimore by this weekend?

Our drafting, FA signings and trade decisions have been consistently similar and horrible in Fitterer’s 3 offseasons whether Rhule was blamed or he got more power when Rhule was on the hot seat or when Reich was hired and we blame every decision on Tepper.

One tidbit to remember is Fitterer is on record after the draft saying that Young was his top guy for 2 years. Tepper sucks but the talent black hole for this team is Fitterer regardless of who gets blamed. It feels icky for me to even remotely back Tepper but I do think he and his wife getting blamed for all these personnel moves is funny. We even heard of Fitterer and other coaches going to Tepper behind Reich’s back. IMHO, I think Tepper is a dumb rich kid who has gotten snowed quite a bit by yes men who blame others for their clear failures.

I think Tepper is fixable in that a good GM/coach would have a lot more free rein than most people think if they do well. Reich was not good at all as many parts (like the OL) fell apart under his watch just like it did at Indy, but my god is the talent level atrocious for any coach. That said, I’m not optimistic at all that we find a good coach/GM pairing and I see us being a bottom dweller for a while. I do know that I won’t watch this team next year if Fitterer is not gone. It would take a freaking miracle to get a good team under him like a coach who makes all the offseason moves and makes amazing calls. I don’t believe in unicorns. 

[WhoKnows]

50 minutes ago, Billy Goat said:

Nothing wrong with the trade really, they just picked the wrong QB. If they had picked Stroud and he played like he has been Chicago wouldn't be getting the no.1 pick and we wouldn't care about what we gave up.

I disagree. The trade was bad value for us knowing our 2024 pick would be very high and thinking Chark could replace Moore.

We were clearly a rebuilding team after 2022 and it was clear we wanted a QB. We should have traded Burns and Moore when we traded CMC. Get full value and lots of picks (3 firsts, 2 2nds, etc.) and “tank” the rest of 2022 to get a top 3 pick not pick 9. We half assed it yet again. Even though I’m sure Fitterer would have fuged it up somehow, we still did the QB trade up completely wrong. Wouldn’t it have been great to give the Rams 1sts instead of ours and still have Moore? In the 2023 draft, the Rams picks would have been more valuable because we were considered a better team before they had a great draft and we had a shitty one.

Edited January 1 by WhoKnows

[Wanderlai]

Tepper and Fitt turning the team into a playoff contender…only it’s the Bears. Passed on Fields. Gave them a #1 WR and a top 10 pick last year. Now giving them the #1 overall pick this year. Incompetent from top to bottom. 
 

It’ll be very interesting to see what Chicago does. While Fields is ok and elite at running he is not a franchise QB imo. Do they go for Maye or Williams and trade Fields, Trade down for more draft capital and MHJ? Fun times for Bears fans. 

[Billy Love]

18 minutes ago, rayzor said:

[GoobyPls]

The bears will continue to suck 

[mrcompletely11]

15 minutes ago, GoobyPls said:

The bears will continue to suck 

Maybe but we just moved them 5 spaces ahead on the playing board 

[strato]

3 hours ago, Waldo said:

They not we.

And that humiliation isn't going away until draft day and then they will still talk about how bad of a trade it was for years during the draft.

Which deserves to happen. Infamy for those responsible. 

[Wanderlai]

2 hours ago, GoobyPls said:

The bears will continue to suck 

Their future is at least bright. The Panthers future is a black hole of despair 

[raleigh-panther]

3 hours ago, WhoKnows said:

I disagree. The trade was bad value for us knowing our 2024 pick would be very high and thinking Chark could replace Moore.

We were clearly a rebuilding team after 2022 and it was clear we wanted a QB. We should have traded Burns and Moore when we traded CMC. Get full value and lots of picks (3 firsts, 2 2nds, etc.) and “tank” the rest of 2022 to get a top 3 pick not pick 9. We half assed it yet again. Even though I’m sure Fitterer would have fuged it up somehow, we still did the QB trade up completely wrong. Wouldn’t it have been great to give the Rams 1sts instead of ours and still have Moore? In the 2023 draft, the Rams picks would have been more valuable because we were considered a better team before they had a great draft and we had a shitty one.

Hey, they (Fitterer and scouts) had CONVICTION

and that, is the simple reason why the whole kit and caboodle need to have their happy asses on a fast train out of NC 

[Selltheteamtepper]

They should have benched Bryce like the coaches wanted. 12 weeks with a healthy Dalton and this defense and we get to 4 or 5 wins and save face. 

[SmokinwithWilly]

4 hours ago, Billy Goat said:

How was it 3 first round picks? They swapped 1st round picks and gave them a 1st in the next draft. If you class DJ Moore as worth a 1st it's still only two 1st rounders. I stand by my point that the majority of people wouldn't care about the trade if Stroud was here and had thrown for 4000yds and 21 TDs.

Because all 1st round picks are not equal. While we could say the 1st and 32nd pick are both 1st round picks and should be considered equal in value, we all know that they aren't. 

A more accurate description is we traded the 9th, 24' 1st overall and DJ Moore (who we'd been offered a 1st for) for the number 1 pick in 23'. 

[Steelo]

4 hours ago, WhoKnows said:

Reich was just as much a problem. His coaching was terrible. Even with Sunday, the team almost winning two in a row is better than anything Frank did.

Also, what kind of balls does he have to not convince Tepper that Stroud is the guy? If you know Young cannot win, you convince the rest of the staff. Every article and interview from February to right after the draft had the staff on Young. It wasn’t until the preseason poo went straight into regular season that the CYA started.

Reich was 100% a part of the issue.  IDK how someone can be so rigid and stuck in his ways yet such a pushover.  Mind blowing.  

Bryce Young was a Scott Fitterer fever dream, he gave us all the answers we're putting on other people.  He was in love with him for 2 years.  Early reports had Dave interested in will Levis.  If Dave was really forcing picks it would have been for Levis then.  Scott sweet talked Dave into it and then pretty much told Reich he was going to coach Bryce Young.  We've had the playbook all along but the pre-draft jazz with the S2 and all that stuff really helped the fanbase get comfortable with the idea of picking the former Bama Heisman winner. 

Circling back to how Reich is implicit; the playbook and gameplan we trotted out there showed there was no confidence in BY.  He essentially wanted to make him the highest drafted game manager in the league. Even with the terrible display on Sunday, look at BY passing charts from when Reich called plays until the recent string of games.  Not to say hes some godsend, but they were trying to get the ball downfield, stopped throwing the slip screens to Ian behind the LOS.. etc. 

Just looking forward to the future now. No other choice.

[Harbingers]

5 hours ago, Wanderlai said:

Tepper and Fitt turning the team into a playoff contender…only it’s the Bears. Passed on Fields. Gave them a #1 WR and a top 10 pick last year. Now giving them the #1 overall pick this year. Incompetent from top to bottom. 
 

It’ll be very interesting to see what Chicago does. While Fields is ok and elite at running he is not a franchise QB imo. Do they go for Maye or Williams and trade Fields, Trade down for more draft capital and MHJ? Fun times for Bears fans. 

I’m guessing they trade down but I don’t know who is good on the draft meter this year. The bears have a lot of holes they need to cover outside of a serviceable QB. 

[strato]

Reich was not as bad as he looked here, he got the shaft and responded with a shaft of his own. Took it to Tepper for fuging him over in his last HC opportunity. Good for him. 

No coach in his right mind takes that player at that price, if they take him at all. That player was forced on the coach by whoever, because I will never believe an ex QB and lifer in the NFL wants to deal with the expectations for, vs the shortcomings of a Bryce Young.