Bears Preseason Is In The Books
The Chicago Bears concluded their preseason last night with a 21-20 win over the Cleveland Browns. The starters were out there for pretty much all of the 1st half and the offense – *gasps* – put together 3 touchdown drives. QB Justin Fields finished 14/16 for 156 yards and 3 TDs. He was able to improvise and extend plays based on the threat of him running. On the first scoring drive Fields hit 5 different receivers. The offensive line looked somewhat better but that had to do with Myles Garrett & Jadeveon Clowney not being on the field for the Browns.
The task for head coach Matt Eberfleus will be to trim the roster from 80 to 53 players by Wednesday. This year for the Bears will be about trying to find out who will be the building blocks alongside Justin Fields as new GM Ryan Poles looks to rebuild from the disaster left behind by Ryan Pace. Make no mistake – this is going to be a very long season for the beloved. The non-division schedule includes games against the Eagles, 49ers, Cowboys, Patriots and the team many feel will be playing for the Vince Lombardi trophy – the Bills.
All three teams in the NFC North will be better than the Bears this year so wins will be very hard to come by. We’ll see what happens when the season kicks off September 11 vs. the 49ers.
The Dumpster Fire That Is The White Sox
Let’s go back to August 16th. The White Sox rallied from 2 runs down to steal one from the Astros 4-3 and win their 5th straight game. Their record was 61-56 and they were just one game back of the division leading Guardians. It was the best stretch of baseball the Sox had played all season and it looked as though the Pale Hose had finally turned the corner. They were getting good pitching, picking up the baseball and getting key hits in important situations. They had finally arrived… or so we thought.
Just when it looked like the White Sox could be on the verge of finally overtaking the Twins & Guardians all the things that have infuriated White Sox fans all season long reared its ugly head once again. Since August 16th, the White Sox have dropped 9 of its last 11 games while scoring 4 or more runs only 3 times during that stretch(all of them losses). They’ve gone back to not being patient at the plate, not picking up the ball and not playing with any damn sense of urgency and hustle. Worse yet, manager Tony LaRussa has done nothing to light a fire under his players. After today’s loss to the Diamondbacks, who despite being 8 games under .500 swept the Sox, they are sitting 5.5 games back of Cleveland for the division and 6.5 games back from the 2nd Wild Card spot with 35 games to play. Injuries or no injuries this team is too damn talented to be playing mid baseball day in and day out.
Maybe it’s time the White Sox did its fans a favor and just give up and put us all out of our misery.
Wrestling Musings
- The Triple H Era is well underway. Triple H assumed creative control of WWE programming after the shocking retirement of CEO Vince McMahon on July 25. What has transpired since has been a breath of fresh air. For the 1st time in years RAW & SmackDown are not only watchable but actually entertaining. Triple H is also determined to right a lot of Vince’s wrongs by bringing back several released stars. It all started at SummerSlam when Dakota Kai joined forces with a returning Bayley and Io Sky to form a dangerous stable that seems intent on taking over the entire women’s division. Karrion Kross, Scarlett Bordeaux, Dexter Lumis, Hit Row and Johnny Gargano have all made their returns to WWE since SummerSlam.
- Another change that Triple H has made has been restoring the mid-card titles back to prominence. Both the US Title and Intercontinental titles have been defended on WWE TV over the past few weeks and have produced some bangers. With Roman Reigns holding both the Universal & WWE championships the mid-card titles will have to be on center stage and Triple H has taken important steps to restoring the prestige of those titles. Also making a comeback are the Women’s Tag Team titles. There is a tournament under way and the finals of the tournament will be on RAW tomorrow night as Io Sky & Dakota Kai go up against Raquel Rodriguez & Aliyah. The winner will be crowned the new Women’s Tag Team champions… but something tells me that celebration will be short lived with two familiar names rumored to be returning to claim the titles they never lost.
- While WWE seems to be gaining momentum, AEW seems to losing theirs. After the wildly successful Forbidden Door PPV it seemed AEW was poised to take it to another gear after the PPV. What has happened though has been some curious, confusing booking decisions and a lack of focus on the main AEW product despite the returns of CM Punk, Bryan Danielson and Kenny Omega. While the working relationships with TNA, ROH, NJPW, AAA and other promotions have given way to some interesting dream matchups, the lack of focus on AEW has left some wondering what direction the company is going in. When you count ROH, AEW has the following championships featured in some way, shape or form on AEW TV:
- AEW World Heavyweight Championship
- AEW TNT Championship
- AEW All-Atlantic Championship
- AEW World Tag Team Championship
- FTW Championship
- AEW Trios Championship
- AEW Women’s World Championship
- AEW TBS Championship
- ROH World Championship
- ROH World TV Championship
- ROH Women’s World Championship
- ROH Pure Championship
- ROH Tag Team Championship
- That’s way too many championships on AEW television. That’s taking only 5 hours of TV(not counting Dark & Elevation on YouTube) and trying to spray to all fields. There needs to be some course correction and storylines tightened. That though seems to be the least of AEW’s troubles right now.
- With All Out PPV set for next Sunday in Chicago(actually Hoffman Estates, IL), there still seems to be a question of what the main event will be. This past Wednesday, Interim AEW Champion Jon Moxley squashed the returning AEW Champion CM Punk in less than 4 minutes to unify the titles. This match was supposed to be the main event of All Out but two weeks ago CM Punk reportedly went into business for himself by shooting on Hangman Page during his promo for the match against Moxley. Reports that Punk was unhappy with what was going on backstage surfaced and it eventually led to the Chicago native responding to the rumors. Why would AEW give away a top tier PPV main event for free? Are backstage politics at play when it comes to Punk? Is CM Punk still not 100%? Is this all a work? Will they run this back at All Out as it has been rumored to be and if so how do you sell that CM Punk will be ready when he sold re-injuring his foot?
- Eddie Kingston was recently suspended after backstage heat involving Sammy Guevara.
- AEW Women’s Champion Thunder Rosa is out with a legit injury so there will be a Fatal 4-Way for the Interim Women’s title featuring Britt Baker, Jamie Hayter, Toni Storm and Hikaru Shida. Speaking of Rosa, reports surfaced of backstage heat on Thunder Rosa with some of the other talent in the locker room.
- Tony Khan, along with Tony Schiavone, Chris Jericho and the Young Bucks held a mandatory talent meeting before last Wednesday’s dynamite. The mood was said to be overall positive but some talent also felt it was heavy handed.
- I will have last second previews for WWE’s Clash at the Castle and AEW’s All Out either late Friday or early Saturday morning.
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