“Ooh, what a feeling, when we’re breakin’ down positions…”
Previous Five Starters: Cornerback – Bryce Callahan (2016), Tracy Porter (2015-16), Tim Jennings (2010-2014), Charles Tillman (2003-13), Zackary Bowman (2009)
Man, the Tillman/Jennings combo was probably at least close to the best in the league at the time, and one of those things that makes you look back and realize some of those old Lovie Smith-era teams were better than you had remembered, and they squandered it all, and now I want to sit out back and die. Anyway, Tracy Porter was pretty much one of those “withered husk of a once-decent player” signings that the Bears like to do at least one of every year, but I rarely had to complain about him, so he overachieved, I guess. Bryce Callahan was just a backup who had to come in when Kyle Fuller went down for the season, and Zack Bowman was just absolutely frustrating. He played a tiny bit his rookie year and looked like an absolute superstar, like he played in one game, got an interception and returned a fumble for a touchdown in a game that the Bears won by seven points, then got hurt and missed the rest of the year. The next year, he got the starting job and got six interceptions, but he did so by being so bad that quarterbacks absolutely abused him, and the six picks were just sort of “law of averages” shit from the other team throwing to his guy twenty times a game. I can literally remember seeing Aaron Rodgers looking over to his side and grinning real big more than once before the snap, followed by big gains and/or touchdowns. Awful, just awful. anyway, forgot all the previous sentences, because I’ll probably reuse them at some point, during the all-time team thing, if I ever finish it.
Safety – Harold Jones-Quartey (2016), Antrel Rolle (2015), Chris Conte (2011-14), Ryan Mundy (2014), Major Wright (2011-13)
Safety has been a depressing slog through hell for a while now, just wandering the desert, trudging past the bleached bones of failed mid-round draft picks, practice squad bodies thrown onto the field out of dire necessity, and the occasional player old enough to have theoretically saved twice his annual salary for retirement by now. Worth noting that Ryan Mundy should’ve been listed as a failed one-year starter for 2017, but got hurt in preseason. Fortunately, the “how long, O Lord?” question maybe have been answered in 2017, and I’ll get to that after all this dumb shit.
Last Five Six Pro Bowlers: Charles Tillman (2011-12), Tim Jennings (2012-13), Mike Brown (2005), Nathan Vasher (2005), Mark Carrier (1990-91, 93)/Donnell Woolford (1993)
The funny thing I keep noticing here is that there are always plentiful Pro Bowl level guys in the Ditka and Lovie time periods, but there’s usually a huge gap once you hit the Wannstedt/Jauron era. Those were some bad, bad, terrible, awful, bad teams, and a big part of why the period from about 1996 to 2002 seems like such a forgotten blur to me. Marcus Robinson deserved better.
TECMO LEGEND: Rod Woodson (Tecmo Super Bowl III)
What’s that, you say? “Rod Woodson was never a Chicago Bear,” you say? Well, there’s a funny thing that happened in 1995’s Tecmo Super Bowl III. The Bears default corners were Donnell Woolford, who was a 200-point superstar, and Jeremy Lincoln, who was almost as useless in video game form as he was on an NFL football field. HOWEVER, I don’t know what madness causes this, because I’m not a programmer, and even if I was, I’m extremely lazy, but any time you propose a Lincoln-for-Woodson trade, it always gets accepted. I mean, just look at this shit, I swear to Allah, this GIF only took one attempt to make:
Meanwhile, Rod Woodson was absolutely godlike on Tecmo 3, just flying around the field and picking off everything, but with the hitting power of a safety (most corners had a 13, Woodson had a 56) to keep him from being knocked over by most running backs, the way stupid Deion always was. Also, honorable mention here goes to Toi Cook, who was a free agent by default, but way better than Lincoln and almost always available when you were doing a joint season with someone who was using the Steelers and would get pissed if you stole Woodson from him. Now, if only my “Steve Walsh for Steve Young, just to strip him down for the 520 free agent points” trades would go through this easily.
HISTORICAL GREATEST NAMES: Prince Amukamara (2017-present) and Young Bussey (1941)
I’ve loved Prince Amukamara’s name ever since he got drafted, because I always imagine I’ll look him up, and he’ll look like Akeem from Coming to America. Although now I guess America’s cultural touchstone for African royalty is Black Panther, and I still haven’t seen that movie, but I’m assuming T’Challa never works at a burger joint to find a woman who’ll satisfy his intellect as well as his loins. I bought Young Bussey’s first mixtape out of the back of his Nissan Stanza hatchback in 2003, and it’s cool to see him blowing up on Soundcloud lately. Proud of that dude.
FANTASY BOOTLEG JERSEY
I know this is a place where I usually let my imagination run wild, like a less racist version of Hulkamania, but it’s really hard to not be a basic bitch and go with a Charles Tillman “Peanut” jersey. But man, cashews are so much better than peanuts.
~~~~ 2018 EXPERT ANALYSIS ~~~~~
Reckoning With What We’ve Lost: Quentin Demps, Chris Prosinski (both safeties, both still free agents)
Embracing What We’ve Gained: Some undrafted free agent types, I think? Maybe?
What Happened in 2017: This was the year of “oh yeah, gonna bench ME, motherfucker?” where Quentin Demps and Marcus Cooper were brought in to get Adrian Amos and Kyle Fuller off the field, and it backfired delightfully. Demps never saw the field after getting injured early, and Amos stepped back in and was solid as hell. I’m pretty sure that Punter Formula Focus site literally had him as the best safety in the league or at least close to it, which didn’t really pass the eyeball test and was probably an indictment of a Safety Formula that values basic competency over actually making plays, but he was still good enough to not be a concern going forward. Cooper wasn’t a total loss for the year, but Fuller stepped back in and was goddamn transcendent, and suddenly leapt from disappointing 1st rounder status to actually being damn near the best corner in the league. I’m sure actual stats disagree, but it felt like every pass that came near him got batted down, and feelings are more powerful than stats. “Hooked on a Statistic” never would’ve been a hit song from a mouthwash commercial, you know? At the other corner slot, Prince Amukamara was at least conpetent, which is better than what we’re used to, and outside of losing his starting job and becoming the Leon Lett of 2017 on that bit of dipshittery against the Steelers, Marcus Cooper wasn’t terrible. At the other safety, Eddie Jackson came in and started as a rookie, and man, I just have a feeling about that guy. Like he just seemed to be everywhere at once, making plays all over yhe damn place, and I’m getting huge Mike Brown vibes from that guy, like he could end up being the best player on the team, but in a weird, secret way. Either way, the Bears were better in the defensive backfield than they’ve been in a long, long time, and three of the four guys being really young gives me a lot of hope, which will get hilariously dashed against the rocks of reality someday.
What Will Happen in 2018: Hopefully, a better version of what happened in 2017. The real question marks could be if Fuller and Amos just had fluke years of sudden competency, boosted by outrage over their mutual demotion and Kyle Fuller’s contract situation, and whether or not this will be the year Amukamara suddenly gets old. Maybe I shouldn’t worry, because Amos’s deal seemed to be more about always being where he’s supposed to be, rather than lights-out ball-hawking, and that’s rarely the sort of thing that just goes away after a year, and Fuller was just so goddamn absurdly good that it’s really hard to imagine it being anything other than a dude taking the next step. If they can pull a Tim Jennings and actually teach him how to catch some of those batted balls, he could be an All Pro this year. If Eddie Jackson follows the standard “one year to get up to speed and be a fully-realized NFL player by year two” progression, he could already be there. A looming problem is that there is absolutely no safety depth, so if something unforseen should happen, we’re back in a Fox/Trestman-era “just throw a guy out there” situation, like I can’t even name one of the backups. Corner, though, has two borderline starters in Marcus Cooper and Bryce Callahan, plus pecial teams psycho Sherrick McManus and Crevon LeBlanc, who really seemed like a dude with potential in 2016, but barely got to play last year. Either way, this whole situation was probably the strength of the defense last year, and barring a disaster, should continue in 2018.
