Posts tagged TommieHarris at FanHouse

I was actually surprised that this many Bears fans thought their team was going to win Sunday night in Indy. There isn't much optimism emanating from the Windy City these days when the topic of conversation is their beloved Halas Hall residents. So I looked around to see if anyone without bias thought the Bears could win.

No one at sportsline even thinks they can cover.

ESPN, while not ballsy enough to pick against the spread, doesn't have a Bears pick.

Peter King, while obviously putting a ton of time into his analysis, has the Colts -- and check out the side poll. Over 95 percent of the voters have the Colts winning.

FanHouse's own Will Brinson has the Colts in blowout fashion.

And so it goes, on and on and on ... no matter where you look. There are a few people who think the Bears can cover, but I didn't find a single entry where the Bears were the predicted winner.

It makes sense. To illustrate why, let's first go over what the Colts have to do to win.

With attention spans dwindling, we forego full game-by-game previews to give you the essentials you need to know about every contest this glorious NFL weekend. Click here to go back in time.

The Season Opener

Redskins at Giants: "Wah wah wah, we get no respect." The Giants can prove they really deserve that respect starting now. Not that the Redskins are world-beaters, they've got a few issues of their own, but the G-Men need to show everyone they can play like champions for more than just a small stretch of the season. I don't think they'll have a problem tonight.

The 1s

Cincinnati at Baltimore: Ed Reed is iffy for the Ravens, but Chad Ocho Cinco is literally insane, so that's a wash. The Bengals will be starting a converted tight end at fullback, so I hope Ray Lewis doesn't load up on pre-game carbs; he'll have a chance to eat Chris Perry on the field. Despite a new coach and rookie quarterback, the Ravens have had a more stable offseason than the Bengals, which I guess doesn't say much but could make a difference.

Jets at Dolphins: I think the storylines of this game have been discussed to the point of inducing nausea, correct? OK, good, let's just move on before my eyes start to bleed.

---

---

Until yesterday, the Bears never mentioned the fact that Tommie Harris hadn't practiced since August 21st to the media. He didn't play the final preseason game, but it was said to be precautionary -- like, "we can't possibly risk heading into the season without our defensive line's anchor." Unfortunately, it looks as though the Bears may have to cross that bridge, despite being in a state of denial:

A source said the Bears' medical staff has expressed concern Harris' knee injury might be more serious than the team first thought, but team officials rejected that idea Tuesday night.

We'll know more when the NFL injury reports are released -- they are due to the league today -- but a dark cloud is looming over the team right now. Tommie Harris is a stud, simply put. If you are Lovie Smith, leading a team with so many question marks heading into the season, you'd like to be able to not worry about your pro bowl defensive tackle.

Training camps are underway, the NFL season is a month off, and to get you ready for 2008, FanHouse previews all 32 teams, "heat index" style. We'll rate each club in 10 categories on a scale of 1 to 10, high score wins.

Quarterback: It's an open competition between Rex Grossman and Kyle Orton. Cue the laugh track. I'll try to be positive. In 2006, Grossman led the team to a 13-3 record and an NFC Championship to boot. He led the NFL in 100+ QB rating games (yes, I know he led in games below 40 and also had a zero rating once ... remember I was being positive), and threw for over 3000 yards with 23 TD passes for a running-and-defense team. Orton went 10-5 as a starter in the previous season with atrocious numbers (seriously, he didn't even throw for 2,000 yards or ten TDs in 15 games). Look for Grossman to start, unless the Bears want to completely take away the threat of Devin Hester. And they can't do that. Heat Index: 2

The Chicago Bears have been lambasted by everyone this offseason for their offensive personnel, specifically the air attack. QB wasn't really addressed in the off-season, and letting Bernard Berrian walk to division rival Minnesota made the receiving corps the most maligned in the NFL.

Well, General Manager Jerry Angelo shed some light on the subject today with the inclusion of pro-bowler Lance Briggs:

''It would have been Berrian or Briggs,'' Angelo said. ''We made a decision. We tried to do Bernard; didn't work."

Look, it's pretty obvious the Bears aren't being cheap this off-season in keeping their own guys after splurging to ensure Brian Urlacher, Devin Hester, and Tommie Harris are happy campers. Angelo also stated within the same piece that they believed Hester could replace Berrian's production.

The real question here is, do you make sure your strength remains just as strong as ever while sacrificing an important cog to your weakness? The flip-side would be allowing one of the most important members of the strength walk while retaining an important part of the weakness.

With the external factors being as they are, I'd definitely keep Briggs over Berrian in a heartbeat. The QB situation isn't resolved, so the possibility that Berrian would be wasted is real. The way the Bears are going to have to try and win football games this season is by grinding the clock with the running game and playing stellar defense. You need Briggs on the field alongside Urlacher to make sure this happens. Offensively, the threat of Hester going deep is enough to stretch the defense. He did catch two long TDs last year in limited duty.

There was a pretty stark contrast between the way Tommie Harris negotiated his deal with the Bears and the way that his defensive brethren Brian Urlacher and Lance Briggs have dealt with the team. There were no threats, Harris even said if he were franchised it wouldn't be a big deal, and a lack of ill will which undoubtedly led to the quick resolution of his contract.

I'm not the only one who's noticed that. Harris himself pointed out the different way he handled things.

"We didn't try to go out there and talk about one another or dispute different things, and I feel like we did it all in-house. I would never go out and talk about the Bears in front of the media or disrespect my team."

The Bears don't have the best reputation when it comes to dealing with players but I must say they were pretty true to their words here. They've said, in relation to Urlacher, if you want a new deal then you should come to practice and negotiate one in good faith. That's what Harris did. He turned down an initial offer but didn't draw some arbitrary line in the sand and wound up with an offer more to his liking.

Urlacher, on the other hand, scoffed at an offer and has done very little to create common ground with the team. Harris's deal has provided the path, it's up to Urlacher to walk down it.

Obviously, Tommie Harris is the big winner after signing a four-year, $40 million deal, but the Bears have to be pretty happy to lock up one of the most important cogs in their defense. One of the players Harris protects, middle linebacker Brian Urlacher, should be ecstatic over the news.

Not only does he have one of the league's best defensive tackles in front of him, Harris' new contract should free up some money for Urlacher to get that extension he's been bellyaching about all offseason. Cue ESPN's John Clayton:

Urlacher may end up being all right with the Tommie Harris deal because it does give the Bears room to enhance the linebacker's contract. Urlacher makes in the $7 million-a-year range and clearly needs to be the highest paid defender on the team. There could have been a camp holdout if he was going to make $3 million-a-year less cash than Harris. The fact Harris put close to $10 million of his $40 million in things he has to earn, the Bears can give Urlacher a couple million dollars-a-year more and make him the highest paid Bears defender. That deal could be worked out before camp.

So one less thing the Bears have to worry about. Hooray for progress.

Bears defensive tackle Tommie Harris signed his four-year, $40 million contract today, and afterward he met with reporters to give an admirably humble view of an eight-figure payday:

"It was the principle of the whole deal. I wanted this deal done because the NFL gave me a price tag. I don't believe any NFL player deserves the amount of money that we do get. But in the business that we're in, they give us tags and say, 'This guy's worth this, this guy's worth that.' We play a game-a kids' game-and get paid a king's ransom.

Fans and the media often complain that pro athletes are overpaid, and I've never agreed with that: After all, if you can fill a 60,000-seat stadium and get millions to watch you on TV, don't you deserve to be well-compensated? And yet I respect Harris for saying what he said.

Still, somehow I'm guessing Harris's agent, Drew Rosenhaus, wishes Harris would knock it off with the stuff about no NFL player deserving what they get.

The Chicago Bears and defensive tackle Tommie Harris have agreed to a four-year, $40 million contract extension that will keep Harris in Chicago through the 2012 season, when he will be 30 years old.

Harris had been skipping voluntary practices because he was upset with his contract, but he has now ensured that he'll spend the prime of his career with the Bears. The extension was first reported by the Chicago Sun-Times and the value of the extension was first reported by Pro Football Talk.

Harris is the perfect defensive tackle for the Lovie Smith defense. He has been chosen for the Pro Bowl in three of his four years in the NFL, and he's coming off an eight-sack season.

The next priority for the Bears will be determining how to handle a couple of other players who want contract extensions, Devin Hester and Brian Urlacher.

Tommie Harris's quest for a new contract has gotten overshadowed by the drama surrounding his teammate Brian Urlacher this spring. It's a more pressing issue, Harris's deal is up following this season, but it has had little of the hand-wringing and acrimony that brought Urlacher so much attention.

It doesn't figure to become a bigger issue, either. Speaking to reporters over the weekend, Harris admitted he'd like to get a new deal but if one doesn't come his way, well, that's okay too. He acknowledges the likelihood of a franchise tag before the 2009 season and is willing to take what comes his way, whether he ends up with the Bears or another team.

''I know they're going to tag me [after this season]. I'll just play that out. I can live with $7 million...I can do just what Jared Allen did in Kansas City. I can have a great year, and [they will tag me and then] someone will give two first-round picks for me or a first and a third. That's why I have to ball out. That's what I will do.''

Despite his contract issues and despite still recovering from injuries suffered last season, Harris still was an active participant in Bears minicamp. He was deemed healthy and skipped only team drills to be sure that no lingering wounds were made worse.