Chicago Bulls basketball is almost back, baby! It’s been one heck of a year, and for basketball fans in Chicago, it’s been too long.
If you are a Chicago Bears fan waking up and reading the headline of this piece, you’d likely recommend I have my head examined. On Sunday, the Bears lost their sixth straight game in demoralizing fashion to the Detroit Lions. Despite that embarrassing loss, there is reason for optimism this morning.
How could that be — especially after blowing a 10-point 4th quarter lead to a Lions team that scored 34 points a week after firing their head coach.
With the Chicago Bears currently on a six-game losing streak, it’s likely that the fate of Head Coach Matt Nagy is sealed. At this point, it appears as if the Bears are just waiting until the end of the season to pull the trigger on firing Nagy.
Good morning! This past week there was a flurry of activity in the winter leagues, as more Cubs prospects saw action. The schedule was in full swing down in Venezuela, while new players made it to the field in Mexico. For more, take a look inside!
Mexican Pacific League
Tomateros de Culiacan
Sunday was an intense contest between Culiacan and Jalisco, with the Tomateros losing 1-0. Cubs shortstop prospect Luis Verdugo started the game at second base and was 0-for-2. Switching between left field and first base, former Cub Efren Navarro was 1-for-4 in the loss. Jalisco 1- Culiacan 0
Friday saw Culiacan make short work of Los Mochis, as they jumped out to a 3-1 lead in the first inning and never looked back, winning 9-1. Luis Verdugo appeared as a pinch-hitter in the seventh and flied out, then took over a t second base. Efren Navarro was the Designated Hitter and had a big day. Navarro’s three-run homer in the first gave the Tomateros the lead for good, as he ended the night 1-for-1 with three walks. Culiacan 9 – Los Mochis 1
The Tomato-men closed out the week on an upbeat note as they doubled-up their runs on Los Mochis, winning 4-2. Luis Verdugo got another start at second base and was 1-for-3 but was caught stealing second base. Alberto Baldonado picked up his tenth save as he struck out two and gave up a hit in a scoreless ninth inning. Culiacan 4 – Los Mochis 2
Yaquis de Obregon
Obregon did not start off the week well, as they were ambushed by Guasave in the late innings, losing 6-3 on Sunday. Jose Albertos was at the top of his game, throwing 10 if his 15 pitches for strikes as he allowed a hit and struck out a batter in a scoreless inning. Former pitching prospect Mario Meza gave up an earned run on two hits as he tossed an inning of relief. Guasave 6 – Obregon 3
Venzuelan Winter League
Bravos de Margarita
It took eleven innings and a late rally for Margarita to lose on Sunday, as they bowed 7-6 to Lara. Cubs lefty Manuel Rondon entered in he sixth and eventually struck out the side, as he also gave up a hit in an inning of work. Margarita 6 – Lara 7, 11 innings
It was doubleheader day on Wednesday, as the Bravos pounded out ten hits in seven innings to defeat Magallanes 4-3. Manuel Rondon started for the Braves and was tagged for two runs (one earned), as he had a strikeout in four innings. Margarita 4 – Magallanes 3
Cardenales de Lara
Yapson Gomez
Lara only scored in two innings on Sunday, but they ended up being the right innings as the Cardenales beat Margarita 7-6 in eleven innings. Pitcher Yapson Gomez came on in the sixth and had a strikeout as he pitched 1.1 perfect innings. Lara 7 – Margarita 6, 11 innings
After a break on Monday, the Cardinals were back in action on Tuesday as they once again burned through Margarita’s bullpen to win 6-2. Yapson Gomez once again provided steady relief. Gomez entered with two-outs in the sixth and gave up a walk and had a strikeout as he tossed a scoreless inning. Lara 6 – Margarita 2
The Cardenales were able to let their pitching do the heavy lifting as the scattered six hits in a 4-1 victory over Magallanes on Friday. Yapson Gomez was able to notch his first win of the season by taking over in the sixth and striking out two and giving up a hit in two scoreless innings. Lara 4 – Magallanes 1
In what can be considered doubleheader Saturday the Cardinals swept a pair, beating La Guaira 6-2 in Game 2. Entering with an out in the fifth, Yapson Gomez only gave up a double as he shut down the Tiburones for 0.2 innings. Lara 6 – La Guaira 2, 7 innings
Caribes de Anzoategui
Rafael Ortega photo by John Adams/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
The week started with Anzoategui coming from behind and walking off against Caracas, winning 4-2 on Sunday. Pinch-hitter Erick Castillo singled to begin the ninth inning and came around on Rafael Ortega’s two-run home run. Leading off for the Caribes, Ortega was 1-for-4 with the game-winning hit. Anzoategui 4 – Caracas 2
Pitching betrayed the Caribes on Wednesday as the Tribe was doubled-up by Caracas 8-4. Lead-off centerfielder Rafael Ortega was 1-for-4 with a walk, a double, and a run scored for Anzoategui. Caracas 8 – Anzoategui 4
It was a good evening for Anzoategui on Thursday, as their offense was able to back up their pitching in a 10-5 victory over La Guaira. Rafael Ortega once again was in centerfield and led off, going 2-for-5 with a double, a stolen base, two RBI, and a run scored in the game. Anzoategui 10 – La Guaira 5
The Caribes took over first place on Friday as they held on for a 4-3 win against La Guaira, The Tribe scored all of their runs in the first inning as centerfielder Rafael Ortega was 1-for-5 with a run scored. Erick Castillo lined up at DH and went 1-for-4 in the game. Anzoategui 4 – La Guaira 3
For Game 1 of a Saturday doubleheader, the Tribe needed an extra inning to get past Magallanes 6-4. Centerfielder Rafael Ortega was walked intentionally in the eighth and came around to score as part of a five-run inning as he went 0-for-3. Erick Castillo came in as a defensive replacement at catcher in the eighth. Anzoategui 6 – Magallanes 4, 8 innings
Tiburones de la Guaira
On Sunday, La Guaira chalked up their first win of the season in destroying Aragua 9-1. Cubs infield prospect Nestor Heredia started as Designated Hitter and was 1-for-2 with a run scored before leaving in the sixth inning. La Guaira 9 – Aragua 1
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Alberto Baldonado, Efren Navarro, Erick Castillo, Jose Albertos, Luis Verdugo, Manuel Rondon, Mario Meza, Nestor Heredia, Rafael Ortega, Tom U, Yapson Gomez
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Winter Leagues Week 8on December 7, 2020 at 12:00 pm Read More »
The Chicago Bears were in complete control of their game against the Detroit Lions on Sunday. They had a double score lead all day long but they let it slip away in the final two minutes of the football game. Mitchell Trubisky fumbled the football within ten yards of his own goal line and the Lions recovered. They then took over and punched it right in to take the lead. When the offense got back on the field, lots of bad things happened to lead them to be unable to mount a comeback of their own.
Matt Nagy is proving to be just such a terrible coach. The team just doesn’t play well anymore and that ultimately falls on him. The defense was unable to stop the Lions when it mattered most and the offense had no chance to make a comeback. When the Lions took the lead late, you just knew for a fact that the game was over. Even the team’s former players all want Nagy gone in real-time and some of them made it known online.
After getting called out by coach Matt Nagy following a poor performance against the Packers — and accused of quitting by NBC analyst Tony Dungy — the Bears’ defense took its punishment and vowed to make it about pride and show what it’s made of Sunday.
And it wasn’t much.
Instead of bowing up and responding with a command performance befitting a unit that feels it’s one of the best in the NFL, the Bears’ defense instead imploded again in a 34-30 loss to the Lions at Soldier Field.
The Bears allowed 460 yards to a Lions offense that came in tied for 20th in the NFL in total yards — the most yards the Bears have allowed in regulation since 2016. They allowed 34 points to a team that was shut out by the Panthers two weeks ago.
“Yeah, we’re a proud defense,” nose tackle Bilal Nichols said. “We know we need to be better — point blank, period. We can’t have weeks where we’re not playing the ball that we need to be playing. It’s on us. We gotta be better as a defense.”
With the Lions down 30-20 and pinned to their 4-yard line with 4:33 to go, a proud defense had a chance to atone for another poor performance and put the hammer down — and instead allowed the Lions to drive 96 yards on seven plays for a touchdown in just 2:15.
Even mild resistance would have at least bled the clock, but the defense wasn’t up to it. After a first-down incompletion, Stafford was 6-for-6 — completions of 14 yards to tight end T.J. Hockenson, 22 and 17 to Danny Amendola, five to Marvin Jones, 13 to Hockenson and a 25-yard touchdown pass to Jones.
“That’s probably the one that we’ll look back at,” Nagy said, “and say, ‘Man, being able to get them to take more time off the clock’ and hold them to at least a minimum of a field goal.”
A defense that led the NFL in third-down conversions two weeks ago, allowed the Lions to convert 6-of-11 third-down situations, including Stafford’s 15-yard pass to Marvin Jones, Jr. on third-and-10 and Stafford’s 25-yard pass to Jones on third-and-12.
“I thought that was big there, with some of those,” Nagy said. “We got them into where we wanted them with third down but we weren’t able to get off the field. That right there is when you look back and see that.”
There are no mitigating factors this time. Defensive end Akiem Hicks was back after missing the Packers game. While Matthew Stafford is good, he’s not Aaron Rodgers and he doesn’t have the Packers offense at his controls.
And so much for the idea that the Bears defense suffers from so rarely playing with a lead. The Lions ran 65 of their 66 offensive plays while trailing Sunday — down 9-0, 16-6, 23-13 and 30-20. But with an opportunity to unleash the full fury of a defense loaded with expensive play-makers, the Bears could muster only two mild sacks (for zero and two yards) and a fourth-quarter interception by Nichols.
The good was far outweighed by the bad. Cornerback Buster Skrine made a fabulous play to close fast and stop Jamal Agnew for no gain on fourth-and-one on the Lions’ first possession. But he later committed an illegal use of hands penalty that nullified a Khalil Mack sack.
Nichols interception with the Bears leading 30-20 with 9:22 left seemed like a finishing touch. But it wasn’t.
“You alway got to play to the end of the fourth quarter,” Nichols said. “It’s the NFL. They have great player, too. It’s never over until the clock hits zero — that was may thought process. It’s not over. We gotta finish it.”
Defense pours gasoline on Bears’ fireon December 6, 2020 at 11:39 pm Read More »
As the reward for information about the fatal shooting of former Chicago firefighter Duane Williams jumped to $34,000, a parade of activists, officials and attorneys responded Sunday to the latest flashpoint in a gruesome year of violence by offering a range of responses to the city’s endemic crime problem.
Community activist Raul Montes took a hardline approach, pushing for more cops and even calling on President Donald Trump to activate the National Guard to tamp down citywide violence.
In contrast, state Rep. La Shawn Ford, D-Chicago, presented the pervasive violence as a public health crisis and urged Gov. J.B. Pritzker to take executive action to designate it as such.
“We have press conferences every day about the COVID-19 pandemic because people are dying from it, they’re getting sick from it. But just as important is the violence that we see in Chicago and the state of Illinois,” Ford said, pointing to a non-binding resolution passed last year in the Illinois House that labeled violence as a disease.
For over an hour, speakers took turns addressing the media just steps from Let’s Get Poppin in Morgan Park, the popcorn shop Williams exited Thursday afternoon before police said he was confronted by four carjackers. A memorial of fresh flowers had been neatly arranged near the scene of the exchange of gunfire that ultimately left him dead.
Attorney Benjamin Kelly’s unconventional pitch to “save lives” in Chicago and beyond centered around a proposed class-action lawsuit against the major car manufacturer Fiat Chrysler. Kelly claimed the carmaker’s vehicles — including the Jeep Cherokee that Williams drove — could be hacked and stolen without a key.
While Kelly noted “this issue of being able to hack into vehicles” has been ongoing for years, he said his firm Vrdolyak Law was still conducting research. Nevertheless, he assured reporters that a suit was coming “pretty soon.”
Amid the flurry of proposals, police had little information to share about the ongoing homicide investigation.
As Deputy Chief Migdalia Bulnes pleaded for the public’s help, she acknowledged that no one had been questioned in connection with Williams’ seemingly random killing. Though Bulnes acknowledged the “new trend” of carjackers and thieves hacking into vehicles, she couldn’t confirm whether Williams’ Jeep was targeted that way.
His high-profile slaying comes as the city grapples with spikes in both carjackings and homicides.
Chicago had recorded 726 homicides by Sunday, up from a total of 503 homicides in all of 2019, according to records kept by the Sun-Times. Since 1998, the grim milestone of 700 homicides has only been reached one other time.
Cops have also responded to 1,254 carjackings so far this year, according to data maintained by the city. That’s a sharp increase from the 514 carjackings reported all of last year.
“Until we come at this and cage this monster right, we’re going to get what we get,” said Pastor Anthony Williams, who spoke alongside Ford and also pushed to declare violence a public health crisis.
“None of us are safe,” he added. “We can’t continue to live like this.”
The start of the DePaul men’s basketball season hit another snag Sunday as the school canceled its matchup against Iowa State under COVID-19 protocols. It’s the fourth consecutive game that the school has called off after members of the program tested positive for the virus last month.
The Blue Demons’ season was supposed to start Nov. 25 against Chicago State, but school officials canceled that game as well as two others – Nov. 28 vs. Alcorn State and Dec. 3 vs. Northern Illinois – after multiple tests from members of the program came back positive in mid-November.
“Flexibility and patience will continue to be paramount this season as we navigate these unique times,” athletic director DeWayne Peevy said at the time.
DePaul and Iowa State were supposed to face off at 5 p.m. CT in Ames, Iowa. However, the school announced the game was off less than an hour before scheduled tipoff.
The Blue Demons’ next game is set for Dec. 11 at Seton Hall.
Mitchell Trubisky was under center for a second-straight week, but the Chicago Bears lost their sixth-straight game after a strong opening half. The Detroit Lions stormed back to beat the Bears, scoring twice in the final two and a half minutes.
This is now the new rock bottom for head coach Matt Nagy and his Bears. At 5-7, the Bears are just about completely out of the playoff race (as if they’d do any damage if they got in) and Nagy’s future is in serious doubt.
That’s putting it nicely, by the way.
There are very few fans who want to see Nagy back after this year. After all, we’ve seen his inability to adapt all year long. The offense has sputtered. Sunday’s 30 points were the most points the Bears have scored in nine weeks, and the only time they’ve hit the 30-point mark in that time frame.
It’s clear the defense has quit on Nagy, for the most part; maybe more than just the defense, in fact. Whether it be disgruntled receivers Anthony Miller and Allen Robinson getting into it with fans on social media or even former players lashing out, Nagy clearly overstayed his welcome.
After the loss on Sunday afternoon, a couple of former Bears teammates took to Twitter to express their displeasure with Nagy. It started with former guard Kyle Long, who said a few things one after another, with this one being the most notable.
Long is right. The Bears don’t typically fire a head coach mid season. But, at what point does history get re-written in Chicago?
This is flat-out embarrassing. To have lost six in a row, with a championship caliber defense, is a gut punch. It’s unacceptable.
In addition to Long, former fan favorite running back Matt Forte chimed in via his Twitter account.
It’s pretty apparent how Forte feels, and fans are right there with him — at least the majority of fans.
It is far past time for Nagy to be fired, even if the Bears don’t historically act in such a fashion. Nagy must go, along with Bill Lazor and, heck, even Chuck Pagano. The defense hasn’t been perfect, and Pagano’s scheme doesn’t fit well with the aggressors up front.
Beyond the coaches and coordinators, Forte is dead on with calling out Ryan Pace. He’s had three chances to get the quarterback position corrected, and each one of them has turned out to be a miserable failure on his part.
Trubisky ain’t it. Nick Foles ain’t it. Mike Glennon sure wasn’t it.
It’s time for Pace and Nagy to go. Waste no more time with the decision. The Bears need to make a statement, immediately.
With under three minutes to go, the Chicago Bears were up by 10 on the Detroit Lions. It had been a long time since their last win, and finally, they were about 150 seconds away from victory.
With 2:18 to go, Matthew Stafford hit Marvin Jones on a 25-yard strike to pull within three. On the following Bears possession, Mitchell Trubisky coughed up the football and the Lions scored seconds later. Just like that, a 10-point lead became a 4-point deficit — and ultimately, a sixth-straight loss.
The tables turned in a big way, and it was almost comical. Like Week 1 when the Bears pulled off a late comeback, the Lions returned the favor. Only this time, instead of Trubisky playing the hero, it was his fumble which proved mighty costly.
Now officially in a downward, never-ending spiral of six losses in a row, fans have no idea how they should feel. On one hand, this team isn’t going to do anything in the playoffs if they sneak in. So, they may as well play for the best possible first-round pick they possibly can. The collapse has been epic — hilarious in a way.
On the other hand, it’s pathetic. The way this season has turned for the Bears has a lot of fans upset, angry, and sure, sad. It’s quite the turn of events after a 5-1 start. Like some national outlets said a month and a half ago, this Bears team was, in fact, the worst 5-1 football team in NFL history.
Head coach Matt Nagy should know his impending fate by now. There is no chance he survives past early January. The six-game losing streak is enough to put a nail in his head coaching coffin here in Chicago.
The fact that Chicago’s defense has looked uninspired for a couple of weeks now should be one of the biggest clues that much of the team has quit on Nagy. There’s been a visual lack of passion and effort from several players, and a fourth quarter collapse just proves Nagy’s deficiencies in terms of his leadership.
Are you sad? Angry? Or is this some cruel, twisted type of entertainment? All emotions are acceptable at this point for Bears fans. The season has gone from inspiring and promising to being the laughing stock of major sports media.
There seems to be zero light at the end of the tunnel for this 2020 version of the Bears. The good majority of fans are looking ahead to 2021 — for what we hope includes plenty of major change.
Nagy needs to go. Ryan Pace needs to go. The entire coaching staff should be built from the ground-up. For now, though, fans can sit back and try to enjoy commiserating collectively.
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