I could give a shit if our d linemen are thick skinned, thin skinned or whatever. On the field Hicks is a beast and a dam good leader. It is on the interviewer to be clear and to the point in his questioning to get a clear answer. Not the other way around. Waddle fucked up that interview. As a result Hicks bailed. If Waddle would have made his point better he wouldn’t have had to try and explain what he was trying to say. By then it was too late. He pissed off the interviewee and he was out. Players don’t need the radio stations, the radio stations need them. Sports media 101. I don’t think Nagy is thin skinned. Maybe you are confusing the meaning of the term. He can say some stupid shit sometimes but doesn’t let the questioning get to him. He remains his positive self. Which in a losing season can get annoying. He is more stubborn than thin skinned.
To be honest I don’t really recall many of the offensive players talking to the media much outside of Trubisky and Allen. Allen has been very professional. An anti diva. Mitch has been a broken soul. Having to talk game in and game out after his performances will do that to ya. Can’t be a leader in the locker room when you can’t lead on the field. Players I feel have been the most vocal about the booing have been E Jax, Trevathan and Hicks. It really doesn’t matter anyway. This season is lost. I don’t see the locker room fracturing.
I know what thin skinned means and Nagy defensively told the media "I'm not an idiot" when being questioned as to why he ran the ball only 7 times against the Saints. He's both stubborn and think skinned.
Thinking about this, I’m thinking Hicks was already getting upset because of the comments on the booing and Waddles poorly timed sarcastic comment (meant to support Hicks point) backfired. However on the topic of boos I gotta rant for a bit. I was put off when the boo birds reared their head early this season, but I have done a full 180 on it. And I didn’t love that Hicks is essentially calling Bears fans fair weathered if they boo. These are fans that have been through thick and thin and weathered far more embarrassing shit in our time. There are fans who have lived their entire life and never seen a Bears super bowl. Fuck you can be graduating high school and possibly not even remember their last Superbow APPEARANCE that happened when you were 4. Shit I was fucking 5 during the last (and fucking ONLY) Super Bowl win. They are booing very specifically the offense so when I see Tarik Cohen saying how it doesn’t bother him? It should bother you, because your side of the ball flat out sucks. And frankly be glad they still are because the next step is empty seats. And your ass and team mates in the unemployment line. Hicks was making the point they’re trying. No one doubts that (yet). It’s like Mitch, he’s a super likable guy, he just doesn’t have it upstairs and his coach is doing him no favors. At the end of the day, you gotta start winning, and not eeking our wins against some of the shittiest teams in football. Every game starting with multiple three and outs. Kickers missing field goals. Kicking an extra point of 48 fucking yards because you fucked up personnel. Worst in the league on 3rd and short. The list goes on and on. They DESERVE to boo. This team was supposed to turn the corner, not fall to Trestman levels of incompetence. These boos are justified, they’re not the Eagles fans pelting Santa Claus kind of shit. Chicago fans are some of the most loyal out there and have to be to put up with this shot show year in and year out. And we’ll be putting up with a shitty offense next year because they’ve shown this tiny bit of competence against garbage defenses. As a fan you know what they need to say? What Mitch does, “we need to play better”. Because that’s it in a nutshell.
im not sure if Nagy is thin skinned, but he sure as shit does get defensive to the media. Hoge and Jahns play the post game pressers on their podcast every week and man while I like that he sometimes gives honest answers he does get defensive about the stupid shit he does.
I didn't like it when Urlacher was upset about the booing at the time. Pro athletes have to understand and should be grateful that their opportunities for fame and fortune exist solely because of fan interest. Fans put a lot of time, money, and emotion into sports teams. When things don't go our way, it's fair game to voice displeasure. They get to make millions and play a game for a living. Show some self-awareness and humility please. I don't feel this way about booing college teams. I've sat through dozens of terrible Illini football games in shitty weather back in the day and never once did I consider booing the team.
Aahahahaha. Lets add in Nagy acting like a total jerk to the journalist after pussying out and losing the Chargers game, with his "what did I say. what did i say. Fumble. Lose yards". He was completely in the wrong about that but acted like a dick because he couldn't handle his competence being questioned.....because he's thin skinned. And arrogant.
A fine rant varder, well done! And you're right, "we need to play better" is the only thing they should be saying. Anything else STFU.
Ouch dude! I said as a second team, and I still haven’t been able to cheer for them. Though this weekend will be easy since they’re going to whip the Vikings. Gotta be clear on this: I will be a Bears fan first and foremost until I die. Probably while watching George McCaskeys kid telling us how they’re going to find a QB in 2050.
No need to explain bro. I was just kidding around. Didn’t mean it as a dig. When it comes to the whole booing and player reaction it really doesn’t matter. When the team is underperforming players reactions will mostly annoy the fan base. Especially with how kids are these days in general not just sports. The younger generations are just not as tough as the older ones. They are more sensitive and defensive. Easier to hate when times are tough. Harder to like when times are good. It’s a generational thing IMO.
Stubborn? Very. Right now, even in a sunken season, what Nagy needs to be banking his job on is that he can grow through adversity. I don't believe he's shown that, and his playcalling is vastly inconsistent. He still loves to chuck the ball around with Blake Bortles 2.0---sorry--Mitch. He took far too long to realize the run is necessary and very effective if he uses it (he abandons running from the I formation after success). What nauseates me is that Nagy hasn't changed since he was in KC. Andy Reid at the end of 2017-18 said he turned over playcalling to Nagy the last few games of the season and the playoffs. Now, we don't know if that's true or if Reid was touting one of his guys knowingly going to be hired away to 'buff the resume'--which the bears did after shitcanning Fox and Frodo. I look back at their loss to the Steelers in the divisional round. What stuck out? 9 total run plays to RBs (11 total if you count 2 runs by Alex Smith which weren't designated QB draws). 34 passing attempts by Alex Smith. That's just under 4:1 ratio pass/run. Sound like anything we've seen here? The league is clearly gravitating back towards running game, and what bothers me is Nagy seems to run out of spite versus imposing the offense's will, balancing an offensive attack to keep defenses confused and spread out as part of a balanced game plan, or even doing it to give his defense a breath as opposed to them being on the field all damned game. That has to change, or I can't defend Nagy. Now thin skinned? No. On a few occasions, when bears PR people are trying to whisk him away from press conferences through tough questions, and he stays, saying 'let them go,' even in shitty, indefensible losses. As Rob says, he's always positive.
As a member of the younger generation, I just can't get down with that. Your parents would've said the same thing about you, and their parents the same about them. It is and always has been horseshit. How we communicate and how visible we are on a minute-to-minute basis has changed. We, as people, have not. Myself and many my age work harder than a lot of our elders ever did - speaking with my bosses from over the years, for example, the "tough times" they tell me about from earlier in their career (before they "earned" the right to work less) sound at most as hard as I work all the time. Perspective is important. There were plenty of divas, mentally unstable players, and general fuck ups in football generations of old. There are plenty of tough guys in football now. It's not different - it's just seen differently.
I agree with you about what previous generations think. And i recall once thinking much as you do now. Thing is the older i get the more i realise they were actually right. Funny how life works. You may feel differently too one day? Working hours which you cited is something that has changed but thats not a relfection of toughness, imo its simply a reflection of the ever increasing competitive nature of business. Players of generations past would NEVER have whined to the refs calling for flags every other play like WR's & QB's in particular do today. Guys flopping and trying to con penalties around the pile or after the whistle simply never used to happen. In historical terms this is a recent development. Its not a matter of perspective. It looks different because it is different.
And you didn’t even scratch the surface of how social media has had arguably the biggest hand in changing said environment. Tech too. Back in the day, said mentally unstable player could get into a bar fight and with no cameraphones, no charges will be brought up in a word versus word, and most importantly nobody would know. I’m not a UFC person, but Connor McGregor (think that’s his name) a few months back was caught on camera phone sucker punching somebody who told him he sucks or is soft, whatever insult at a bar. It blew up like wildfire. Many former athletes all agree they wouldn’t have lasted if social media wasn’t around years ago, so you didn’t have a magnifying glass to how big of a jag off, racist, or asshole they were. Now it gets taken too far, chastising guys who said/did dumb shit at 16–the age where you tend to say and do dumb shit, because they put it on their twitter or facebook. That didn’t happen with boomers. And most time it was kept under wraps if they did get caught. Fans didn’t know. I’m in the same generation as Dline, and can confirm much boomer nonsense is vastly out of touch, particularly modern perspective. Perfect example: Chris Chelios’ DUI years ago in Westmont where a judge threw it out because even though he couldn’t stay in 1 lane driving at 4 AM (you know, when great things happen) for “lack of probable cause to stop.”
I will say this, many kids today don't respect the importance of being on time. Although it's not entirely their fault when they are allowed to get away with it and face no consequences. Of my three amazing grown daughters, only one of them has the same ethic as me when it comes to being prompt and on time and never taking days off work, my youngest. Sadly enough she used to claim growing up beaming with pride that she looked like me, that poor delusional fucking kid, but I digress, my middle girl uses the phrase on-timish with frequent regularity. I've seen it with a bunch of my vendors many times before when they turn the keys over to open a business to a kid in his twenties that came to work with one of and I was waiting to make a delivery that far too often that business would open late. This one kid more recently with one of those twat knots on his head came to work one time in sub-zero weather and hour and a half late because as always he claimed his phone had been keeping the wrong time. I mean come on kids you need to be more creative and come up with something better than that. These phones today have the accuracy of an atomic fucking clock. Just come clean, and admit that the bed was just too damn comfortable, and screw all the employees that got their asses out of bed and took public transportation and are out there standing in the cold with theirs. Okay stepping down off my soapbox and let me have it.
While Pat makes a great point on the nature of social media bringing way more shit to light (in the past you'd never see Akiem Hicks voicing support for ripping off a guy's helmet, or Miller talking smack, etc), I've gotta agree with Ev here, which is funny as I think we're in that slightly older than dline/patg group. My old man's old man (my grandfather) is terrifying as shit TO THIS DAY. I know for a fact he was tougher on him, than my dad was on me, even though my dad was pretty damn tough on me. And there is no question I am not as tough on my son as my dad was on me. Maybe not by much, but it's the reality. Fuck my grandfather was alive during the depression, pretty sure he had it tougher. As I get older, I'm thinking it's the nature of life, we continually want each generation to be better off than the last. So future generations reap those benefits but might get called soft in the process since they didn't have the same struggles. But to be clear here, it's not to say any generation is better than the other, it's all a matter of what we as individuals do. All that said, I don't get Hicks interaction here as a "young" or millenial thing at all. It's more frustration, I could see an older generation person doing the same shit if they though someone was making light of an injury.
