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I am a Dish Network subscriber, and the majority of the time I’m pretty happy about it.  Aside from a few initial billing issues (mostly with getting a rebate setup) I hadn’t had any problems.  That was, until about a week ago when I decided to switch from my America’s Top 200 package to the DishHD package (only HD channels).

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Seems like it has been forever, but opening day is finally here, this year the Cubs seem to have a really good team.  A deep pitching rotation, solid bullpen, and a pretty respectable offense as well.  Should be a very fun season to watch.

Tonight on Baseball Tonight the Chicago Cubs were being picked as the National League representative in the 2008 World Series, lets hope the folks at ESPN got this one right…

Go Cubs!

I’ll start by saying I am a Bears fan… But, here are my current thoughts on the Bears (subject to change over the next 6-12 months).

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Here’s a question to think about…  If you are the Chicago Bears and you have a player like Devin Hester, and you also have many other positions you need to fill in order to get better next season (O-line, QB, Possibly RB, WR, maybe some misc D as well…) would you trade Devin Hester off for a couple players/draft picks?

An argument for the trade is Hester really only plays punt/kick return and other than that hasn’t contributed much else to the team.  That being said, he still has been one of the top scorers on the team; however do you really want to build your team around a kick returner?

An argument to keep Hester would be he’s still very young and has a world of potential.

What do you think?

OK, this is my last Super Bowl related post; I’m sick of thinking about it so this will be quick.

Let’s start off by stating a couple things I thought before the game. First, the Bears would win. I was wrong. Rex would have a good game. I was wrong again.

Going into the game I thought the Bears would have to score at least 30 points to win, I was right about that. So really the defense giving up the 29 points wasn’t too big a surprise. What was a surprise was how badly the offense stunk it up, Rex’s two fumbled snaps and numerous bad decisions when passing. I say numerous because it wasn’t just the two picks I thought were bad, he floated a couple passes that were incomplete/caught by a Bears receiver so they were mostly unnoticed.

Do I think the Bears need a new QB? I’m not sure. Should the team look into other options for QB competition in camp? Yes. I read something about possibly getting Jeff Garcia or trading for David Carr. All I can say about Garcia is a lot of teams will be looking at him, and I don’t really want him to be the Bears QB. He’s too old, and I think his Philly success was more of a fluke than something to realistically expect out of him for an entire season. I really don’t know enough about Carr to have an opinion on trading for him, and right now I’m more looking forward to the Cubs season than the next Bears season.

That’s it, this blog post is over! Now comes the hard part, trying to not post on the Bears until around the draft at the end of April.

To me, you’re just trying to sell papers,” Grossman said. ”It doesn’t matter.”

“It’s frustrating when some of you guys don’t put too much thought into it and you’re just trying to go off the fans’ reaction or you don’t know much about what we’re doing on offense. Just realizing how ignorant some of you guys are — and I don’t mean that necessarily in a bad way. I mean, like just understanding that you may not be correct and accepting that fact and not paying attention to it much.”

http://www.suntimes.com/sports/240367,CST-SPT-bear02.article

I’m glad that Rex said this. It gets tiring constantly having people dump on you the way every writer or person with a blog or fan that caught five minutes of Sports Center the other night. Add to that a week of every sports writer plus just the casual sports reporters at the Super Bowl media fiasco this week repeating the same question hoping to be the one that makes you “slip up” and admit to being terrible. Finally enough is enough and Rex got his chance to speak his mind, to an extent, and took it.

It seems like everyone brings up the five crappy games Rex had, but no one remembers the good games he had during the season. People will bring up that Griese or Orton should be playing instead. Lets not forget Griese hasn’t been impressive at all this year, and Orton’s terrible, QB rating last year of 59 and has thrown more career picks than TDs. Grossman is your best shot as he gives you some semblance of a real quarterback on average, but has the potential to be a deep threat at any time.

Anyway, I’m tired of the Rex stuff, this will be the last post on Rex hate/love ever (hopefully) or at least next season if you want to be realistic.

I’m not an American Idol fan, but I generally try to half pay attention to the first few episodes where they get “Joe Blow” on there that can’t sing worth a crap but thinks he or she can.  Usually it’s good for a few laughs…  The other night though I actually felt bad for the judges with the moron that admitted to being tone-deaf and a terrible singer but wanted them to teach her to sing to be some kind of great success story.  What an idiot, I found myself hoping Simon would have had the security people Taser her for being such an idiot, I even got sick of listening to her pitch.

Speaking of TV, anyone else see the CareerBuilder.com ads for the commercial they are going to run during the Super Bowl this year?  I thought it was somewhat odd to have an ad for an ad, but I guess Super Bowl commercials are their own show too.  (I know I know, it was still a spot for CareerBuilder.com as well…)  It will be hard to top the monkeys so it better be good.  Anyone know if there’s a “Puppy Bowl” again this year on Animal Planet, or did they finally give up on that idea?

Looks like the Bulls are just about done with the game and are going to beat Dallas, which is pretty surprising, the Bulls haven’t been too good lately, and Dallas has.  Could be interesting to see what happens, if anything, with some of these trade rumors flying around regarding the Bulls.

Getting to watch the Bears destroy the Saints on Sunday has made my week so far.  It was a pretty entertaining game and I’m hoping the Super Bowl will be too…  I think one of the best parts of the win has been listening to all the “experts” on TV or the radio squirm and come up with all the reasons the Bears should have lost.

Something else that bugs me is almost immediately there were articles on Sports Illustrated or ESPN about how Rex Grossman is the worst quarterback to be in the Super Bowl in… …however many years it is.  My question is who cares?  The Bears don’t need to rely on a superstar QB (especially when your defense can force four turnovers in a game) so having one that is just decent will suffice for now.  Some people ripped Grossman for the 140-whatever yards he threw for, but didn’t mention his back had nearly 200 yards running.  Oh well, I still like Rex and hope he does well in the Super Bowl.

State of the Union address is on in a few, this should make it a little more interesting: http://www.drinkinggame.us/ looks like it could be fun, but doesn’t come even compare to the Spelling Bee drinking game or the 24 drinking game.

I was watching Sports Center earlier and I figured it was a mistake but nothing else was on. I’m so sick of Saints love I’ll just be glad when the game is over. Apparently, according to ESPN’s web poll, 69% of the U.S. expects the Saints to beat the Bears. Somehow a team that is 10-6 is now infinitely better than the 13-3 Bears.

I’ll agree the Saints have a good offense, but the Bears still have a pretty damn good defense, even if it hasn’t been as sharp lately as it had been earlier in the year. However I recall some stats showing the Saints play better on the turf than real grass, and the real grass in Chicago was beginning to look a little rough last week. Any of the snow that’s being predicted (anywhere from two to five inches) should have an adverse impact on the running game as well after the field gets a little sloppier.

Let’s not forget too the Bears offense, while it isn’t perfect it’s not bad either; and with the secondary of the Saints I’d expect to see a few of the Rex-tastic bombs he’s become known for. Overall the Bears still should rely on the run more than the pass to try to manage the clock better and keep Rex calm.

If Devin Hester can hold on to the ball during returns, I think the Bears will be in much better shape. Sure the Saints have Bush returning, but the Bears special teams should be able to contain him.

In any event the game will probably be high scoring, I’m guessing in the 60-70 point range (total). Final score 38-27, Bears.

Now that my prediction is out of the way a little rant is in order so here it goes.

I hope the Saints lose, not only because I’m a Bears fan, but because I’m sick of hearing the “feel good Saints” story. This past week has been painful enough hearing that garbage day after day, the game will add to it too, the last thing I need is to hear about it until (and possibly beyond) the Super Bowl. ESPN is already running the stories about all the Saints fans that came to Chicago for the game, some even paying $1,000+ for some sort of game package that doesn’t include tickets.

First of all, someone that pays $1,000 or more for some kind of “game package” that doesn’t include tickets is a moron. Go to a bar or go to a friend’s house, that can be had for the low low price of FREE (plus drinks/food, but still way less than the $1,000 package).

Second, I would tend to think these Saints fans that made it to Chicago for the game aren’t the people that were really hurricane victims, at least in the way they will be portrayed.

All I know is I’ll have a fun day of listening to Joe Buck rip into Rex, praise the Saints, and talk about “Bears Weather”. Maybe I’ll get lucky and Joe will (again) ask which is longer, the ½ inch cleat or the 5/8 inch cleat…

Bulls just got done blowing out the defending champ Heat, by 42 points, and all I can say is wow!

I thought the Bulls would be good, but they looked GREAT tonight. Big Ben looked good, Hinrich looked really good, and so did the rest of the Bulls. The youth and speed of the Bulls made the Heat look old and slow; the only one on the Heat that had didn’t look bad was D. Wade, and that shouldn’t come as a surprise.

There is still a long way to go, and all this win means is the worst the Bulls can finish is 1-81, but if tonight is any indication this should be a fun season.