Thread: Chances of Julius Peppers being traded?

Originally Posted by WindyCity

I agree with what your saying and on top of the financial side Peppers is still playing at an incredibly high level.

The defense needs to be re-tooled we have been on these boards for months saying we need to get younger on defense and that the defense was againg. This is what happens and it is going to hurt, but it has to happen.

2013: Izzy, Urlacher
2014: Peppers, god I hope McClellin steps up.
2016: Briggs, Tillman

It is not a witch hunt by Emery, but the realities of age and decline.

Never called it a witch hunt but rather an overboard attempt to do too much with too little too fast. He's had some short term success and he's feeling his oats but his plans are beginning to outstrip the realities of running the team well on both sides of the ball.

He's becoming the offensive contra to Angelo's defensive obsessions. He's beginning to d-nude the defense before he has the players, picks or money to replace what he's tossing away. The pattern is developing already so just keep watching and you'll see what I mean. Dollars to donuts Peanut and Pep are next because he could have save mucho cap space doing something about those cap hits if he planned on keeping them around beyond this year. By the looks of it he doesn't. Those aren't his guys and they'll soon be gone.

There's a very delicate balance here between maintaining a competitive balance and dropping down a notch or two to rebuild and lower costs. They can say what they want about a desire to win now but with a new coaching staff the odds of a championship are not good so he's gonna clean out players and cap space now and hope he can hang in there just well enough to not lose ground.

That's his plan as I see it and I think he's gonna fail because he's moving too far too fast. Part of the problem of Bears ownership is that they've never been very good at correcting a problem until it smacked them straight in the face and I see somewhat the same thing happening again. Phil was restricted as far as what he could do last year by being saddled with Lovie and now he's out to make up for it. But..........he's moving too far too fast.

We're in a transition mode (I won't use the "R" word here, so I'm politically correct ). This means we're going to go through a number of challenges over the next two years. Of course the Bears WANT to win now. Hopefully they do. But I expect we won't have 10 wins this year. Not due to any diabolical evil on the part of Emery. It's just where we're at right now. A lot of mediocre players. A number of key players who are old now, and will have to be replaced over the next two seasons. And we don't have the cap to bring in a lot of studs. We also don't have the draft picks to fix everything this season in the draft. I do wish we had that 3rd round pick this year. We could use it.

I really believe this is not going to be an easy transition. Ultimately, it will be good. But it may have some rough bumps as Emery tries to dig us out of a hole here.

I'm not convinced he is as bad as he played last year. He might be, but he was not 100%. He is not going to be BU of old, but I don't think last year was a fair representation. I'm certainly open the the fact he's done, but I'm not sure we know that yet. Projecting how he was last year is not fair. We should have let Webb and Carimi go then if we do it on that basis. Carimi was hurt and we want to see if he is going to get better. Sure, he is not old like BU, but we know he wasn't 100% and going to see how he plays this year. Does anyone think that if they knew Carimi would play like he did last year he would still be on the team this year?

Before everyone says that the body is dead, a mirror to the mouth might be in order. Why the rush to say he's done? Plenty of time to say that after you see what the guy can do. A contract with incentives would do that. Maybe something at 1.5M but that would go to 3M if he played well. Point is, I'm not sure they really gave him a fair shake. If they didn't want him, that's fine but don't tell me what he's not worth because no one knows until you know what he can and can't do.

I don't want a guy that can't play either - BU or not. Too many people have made decisions and not enough data is there to support the decisions. The safe decision is to assume he can't play any more. And I go back to -- hasn't he earned the right to prove he can or can't play? Not to give him that ability is not right. None of us would appreciate being treated like that. No one is saying take the guy no matter what. Just do it the right way or tell him right up front that it doesn't matter what his level of play is - we think your time is gone and want to move in another direction. I just don't like people that hide behind words while their actions say something else. Say what you are going to do and then do it.

Anyway... enough of this stuff. Until something changes, no point in rehashing it....