Still Gotta Come Through Chicago

Hard Knocks, For Bears and Cubs

Happy Friday Chicago!

I hope you all had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend, and thanks for coming back for another newsletter. A gentle reminder here that you can refer the newsletter to a friend to subscribe in the space below.

The Bears will be featured on the HBO show Hard Knocks this year.

If my Dad had come into the computer room in 2006 to tell me that the Bears had been selected for Hard Knocks… boy would I have quickly exited out of Bubble Trouble, acted like I wasn’t signing along softly to Akon’s Lonely, and then jumped right into his arms.

The Liev Schreiber-narrated Hard Knocks is about as close as you can get to my ideal form of TV, so much so that it was once a dream of mine to work for the show.

I actually interviewed for an NFL Films job after college, and was told that I was one of the final candidates in consideration. That was once what I fell back on to assure my friends that I had something going for me after school ended — the fact that I didn’t get a job, but almost did, from what the recruiter told me.

For two decades, Hard Knocks has sent a signal directly to my brain that summer was nearing a close, and that football was upon us. More than the day in the month, more than Labor Day, and more than the cicadas singing at sun down.

That time period has meant good or bad throughout my life, though I still can’t shake the feeling that I have to run gassers next week when the Hard Knocks theme song comes on for the first time.

Technically, the Bears have been a candidate for Hard Knocks for the greater portion of this century. It goes to a team that hasn’t made the playoff in one or two years (they’ve changed these criteria) and doesn’t have a new head coach. Sans coaching changes, the Bears have been squarely in position to land on HBO most seasons.

But, yes, you’ve always heard “the McCaskeys won’t allow it.” The McCaskeys will do what they’re told. At this point, they’re a mini cog in a much greater machine that is the NFL. They may have obliged by a “No” or two from the Bears, but eventually, it would be time to pay the piper.

Now is that time.

I’m no longer playing Bubble Trouble, and Akon’s Lonely may be buried further down on playlists (but still lingers). But I am still filled with a shade of ecstasy.

It’s a shade, and not unadulterated ecstasy, just because of the year.

The reasons why the NFL chose the Bears this year are the exact reasons why I hold some slight reservations.

A brand new quarterback, and a brand-new no. 1 overall pick quarterback at that. We just can’t fuck this up.

This all coincides with a team on the way up, but not at the beginning of a rebuild.

I don’t just want Caleb Williams to show promise. I want the Bears to win. They’re really in Year 3 of a rebuild, but the new QB muddies the water on that.

It’s not that I believe Hard Knocks cameras will be a distraction in camp, but more so, that the media attention derived from the show will be a distraction. There will be an overload on Bears “hype,” whether we fans push it or not. And there will be subsequent dancing on our graves if — no, when — the Bears falter.

That media attention may not be an influence one way or the other, and there’s a great chance that the things we believe matter as fans don’t matter at all to the players and coaches.

Having said all of that, Week 1 against the Texans just feels like a must-win game to me now.

But, does Hard Knocks have a genuine effect on teams? We’ve heard from players that hated it, but are actual win-loss records affected?

Let’s take a look.

The Jets last year fell short of their steep 9.5-game win projection, but Aaron Rodgers got hurt on the first drive of the season.

The Lions did start very slow, but eventually hurdled their win total by three games in the 2022 season.

The Cowboys won 12 games in 2021, with an over/under of 9.5 games.

I’m not even going to count that awful COVID season here, which featured the Chargers and the Rams. Awful television. Want football? Too bad, here’s more COVID.

The Raiders were projected to win 6.5 games, and won 7.

The Browns were projected to win 5.5 games in 2018, and won 7, too.

The Bucks and the Rams went 3.5 games under their season win totals in 2017 and 2016, respectively. The Falcons, too, went under by 2.5 games in 2014.

But, in between, the Texans won 9 with a 8.5 game over/under. The Bengals in 2013 — their second time on the show under Marvin Lewis, however — won 2.5 games more than projected.

The Dolphins pushed in their year, and the Jets missed their win total by a game and a half in 2010, in what was one of the best Hard Knocks seasons ever.

In the end, the results are predictably all over the map.

When I read books, I get wildly frustrated when I don’t know every single word that’s in them. In fact, sometimes I write them down and try to learn them. What that amounts to is me learning a word or two and then using them in regular conversation, only for one of my friends to call me a douche bag for using intransigent in a sentence.

The Hard Knocks issue, too, will be on my mind more than it should be prior to Episode 1. And then, in all likelihood, the players and coaches will perform as they were going to anyway.

And I, with those douche bag friends, will be definitively fucking fired up when Episode 1 drops.

Matt Eberflus is undoubtedly going to come across, in a documentary style show, like a bad actor trying to play a head football coach.

Caleb Williams is going to explain the inspiration behind his painted nails and it’s going to be the talk of the town for seven days, until the football-throwing porn supersedes it.

Rome Odunze will be a fan favorite.

I want to learn about the Big Uglies, though. I don’t need Teven Jenkins showing off his “goofy side,” but I do need Montez Sweat pass rushing highlights in slo-mo and some insane story about Darnell Wright that’s going to make me a fan for life.

I leave you with this: picture the Chicago skyline, Caleb Williams, Walter Payton, D.J. Moore, Papa Bear Halas, Matt Eberflus, Ryan Poles, Montez Sweat and Jaylon Johnson all in a video compilation to the below. I promise you it will make your day.

Let’s go.

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It’s late May, and yet it was another week full of “I can’t do this anymore,” “I’m done,” and “they fucking suck” texts.

Your frustration is mine as well. None of the Cubs can hit, the catchers are particularly worthless offensively (and Miguel Amaya can’t play the position either), and the bullpen — despite their recent stretch — still does not inspire confidence.

The Cubs are now below .500 for the first time since the first series of the year, and are now in third place in the less-lowly NL Central.

They are 9-17 in May.

To put things into context, Ian Happ has been the player that has probably drawn the most ire from fans this year. He’s also leading all position players on the team in WAR at 1.1.

Pete Crow-Armstrong is already one of the best outfielders in baseball, and was a fine hitter at the MLB level. He’s back up now, but I have no idea what he’s doing down in AAA when there’s guys like Nick Madrigal — defensive specialists — blowing games with errors.

The Cubs wasted a fantastic Justin Steele start this week, and almost wasted a 7-inning, no-hit bid turned in by Ben Brown. Side note: 14-year-old me cannot fathom that Brown was taken out of that game, even if 28-year-old me understands it. 14-year-old me also hates that he wasn’t credited with a win.

Christopher Morel hit his first homer in 15 games Thursday, and it really felt like it may be the swing that catapulted the Cubs — and him — to a new page in this season.

Alas, we’re not there yet.

Craig Counsell teams always have a way of emerging at the right time of the season, or at least it felt like it when he was in Milwaukee.

For now, I’ve developed a positive self-talk mantra: It’s May, It’s May, It’s May.

But tomorrow it will be June.

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I spent a lot of time this week reading and listening to eulogies for the late, great Bill Walton.

Walton is known much more now for his wackiness on broadcasts than he was in the earlier stages of his basketball life, but I personally could not — and cannot — get enough of the guy talking about basketball.

The way he talks about the game is how I grew up wanting to play it. It’s beautiful, if everyone decides to play it the right way. When that flow state is achieved through teamwork, there’s nothing quite like it.

“Happiness begins when selfishness ends,” he said of Nikola Jokic, drawing from his former coach John Wooden.

As I was doing this deep dive, my mind of course wandered to the Bulls.

No one approaches the game in a less Waltonesque or Woodenesque way than our highest-paid player, Zach LaVine. Think of Walton waxing poetic about the beauty that basketball can be, and then think of Zach LaVine dribbling up top unsuccessfully with a minute left to go, complaining over a non-foul, and then failing to get back on defense.

Then think about the fact that he was, for some reason, at Bronny James’ pro-day the other week. I can’t think of someone I’d less want go to battle with in Chicago right now. But Lord knows he’s not here, and won’t be here until checks are about to be taken away from him.

His value is low, but the Bulls can get creative.

For instance, in a historically bad draft, the Bulls could trade the 11th pick and LaVine for Donovan Mitchell, who is entering the last year of his deal.

Here’s the deal I was thinking, specifically:

Bulls give: LaVine, Caruso (also in last year of deal), the 11th pick (maybe)

Bulls get: Donovan Mitchell and Georges Niang

The sad front office gets what they want: they remain competitive. They’d also have an outside shot of re-signing Mitchell, who isn’t my favorite, but who is approximately 5x better than LaVine at this juncture.

The Cavaliers, on the other hand, would be able to save face before losing Mitchell for nothing.

Most importantly, the Bulls would get off the rest of LaVine’s $200 million in dead weight. And yes, it sucks that Caruso would have to be a part of any deal.

I don’t love it, but I’d do it. This is where the Bulls heads should be at, though — finding highly-paid players looking for a new home and the ability to dump LaVine on their former team.

Every year, there are desperate NBA teams ready to make bad decisions. The Bulls just need to find one that can convince themselves that LaVine can help (he can’t).

I may drop a new trade idea here every week for fun, but just remember, I’d trade him for a bag of basketballs if the NBA rules would allow.

The 7th unique NBA champion in seven years will be crowned here in a couple of weeks. The Super Team era is officially dead, and I couldn’t be happier.

Well, I could be, if there was any hope for the team I hold dearest.

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