Bear Essentials

For the sixth time in seven years former Bears defensive end Richard Dent, the franchise's all-time leading sacker, made it to the finals but not into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The final list of 15 modern-era nominees was pared down by the 44-member Hall of Fame selection committee that met Saturday morning at the Super Bowl XLIV media center. The selectors first pared the list from 15 to 10, and Dent made the first cut along with center Dermontti Dawson, defensive tackle Cortez Kennedy, wide receiver Andre Reed and tight end Shannon Sharpe. Each finalist had to receive a minimum positive vote of 80 percent to be elected.

The Bears have finally completed their coaching staff.

It's been a full month since offensive coordinator Ron Turner, offensive line coach Harry Hiestand, tight ends coach Rob Boras and quarterbacks coach Pep Hamilton were fired on Jan. 5, but head coach Lovie Smith's staff is up to full strength. At that time, Smith also said a defensive coordinator and play-caller would be added to assume the duties that he handled last season with little success.

"I know what I'm best at," Devin Hester said Thursday on "The Waddle & Silvy Show" on ESPN Radio-1000. "The return game is my bread and butter, so if I had to cut back on my receiving and go back to returning, that's something I would love to do."

No kidding. Who wouldn’t like to return a few more kicks if it meant becoming a part-time player, especially when you’ve got a four-year contract that will pay at least $30 million and could be worth almost $40 million.

The problem, Devin, is that the Bears are paying you like a full-time receiver, and a very good full-time receiver, not a kick returner who plays a little wideout. Hester’s already been paid $15 million in guaranteed money from his 2008 contract extension in addition to a $5 million roster bonus last season.

The seems to be a lot of concern regarding the potential for head-butting between quarterback Jay Cutler and new offensive coordinator Mike Martz.

But there is also a strong likelihood that the Cutler-Martz collaboration will produce positive results. While both are known to have strong convictions and opinions, sometimes to the point of being stubborn, they are both smart enough to realize that they provide each other with the best chance for success.

Cutler is by far the best quarterback Martz has had to work with since his days with Kurt Warner in St. Louis. And without getting into a Ron Turner-Mike Martz debate, Martz's affinity for and production in the passing game can only help Cutler.

According to ProFootballTalk.com, Colts defensive backs coach Alan Williams has thrown his clipboard into the ring as a candidate for the Bears' defensive coordinator job.

"If they call, and if that happens, when that time comes, it'll be neat to explore the opportunity,” Williams said Tuesday in Miami as the Colts prepare for the Super Bowl. “My time will come.”

As yet, there hasn't been any indication from the Bears that they are interested in interviewing Williams, which would have to wait until after Sunday’s game. But the 40-year-old former running back at William & Mary is experienced in the Cover-2 defense, having started in the NFL as an assistant with the Bucs in 2001 before joining Tony Dungy’s Colts staff the following year. Both teams play Cover-2.

His critics say new Bears offensive coordinator Mike Martz is too hard on players, especially quarterbacks.

His fans say Martz is an offensive genius.
His critics say he's arrogant and has a superior attitude.
His fans say he'll make good players great and great players superstars.

I'm really not all that concerned with what kind of person Martz is, but there are some numbers that you can't help but notice.

When Martz was the Rams' offensive coordinator in 1999, they won Super Bowl XXXIV after a 14-2 regular season. That offense averaged 33 points per game and was the first of three straight 500-point seasons with Martz at the controls, which is an NFL record.

If I were Lovie Smith and knew my continued employment hinged on making the playoffs next season, which it does, I’d have hired Mike Martz as my offensive coordinator yesterday.

Martz will never win any Mr. Congeniality awards because he’s too arrogant and self-centered. But he could win an award for assistant coach of the year, get more out of quarterback Jay Cutler than Ron Turner did and save the jobs of Lovie, Jerry Angelo and everyone else on the staff.

The Bears have been granted permission to interview Vikings quarterbacks coach Kevin Rogers, and he is scheduled to be at Halas Hall tomorrow for a meeting with coach Lovie Smith.

It's debatable how much Rogers had to do with Brett Favre's success this season, which was statistically the best of his 19-year career. But Tarvaris Jackson, one of the Vikings' pre-Favre starters, showed significant improvement under Rogers. Jackson was a raw, second-round pick out of Alabama State in 2006, Rogers’ first year with the Vikings after four years as Virginia Tech’s quarterbacks coach. Jackson struggled, as expected, when he got playing time late that season, including 2 starts.

Hue Jackson explained why he spurned the Bears for the Raiders on the Waddle & Silvy Show on ESPN 1000 today and the story is on ESPN.com.
http://sports.espn.go.com/chicago/nfl/news/story?id=4859821

Jackson’s explanation makes perfect sense, but it still doesn’t bode well for the Bears and Jay Cutler that the former Ravens quarterbacks coach chose to take the same offensive coordinator position with a worse team and a much worse quarterback (JaMarcus Russell).

Meanwhile, at nationalfootballpost.com, Matt Bowen agrees with a lot of us who think the Bears better sign Mike Martz now, or at least formally interview him, before they wind up scraping the bottom of the barrel after all the top candidates are gone.

Just when it looked like the Bears’ search for an offensive coordinator couldn’t get any more depressing, it did just that.

Former Ravens quarterbacks coach Hue Jackson had an interview scheduled for today at Halas Hall. But he has backed out at the last minute and will instead take the offensive coordinator job with the Raiders, whose head coach Tom Cable still doesn’t know for sure if he’ll be retained by wacky owner Al Davis.

It doesn’t say much for the Bears, when qualified candidates like Jackson blow them off to join the most dysfunctional organization in the NFL. The Raiders haven’t won more than five games in any of the past six seasons.