Bears paid for first-rate defense but aren't getting their money's worth
November 5, 2008
BY MIKE MULLIGAN Staff Reporter
Nothing seems to spur righteous indignation as much as the massive sums of money paid to pro athletes, especially when there isn't any bang for the buck. Salaries are often described as obscene or absurd and the men who earn them regarded as pampered and unmotivated.
Money determines expectations. Production is supposed to match salary. When you field a team of millionaires many times over, winning is the only acceptable result. Not that you can simply buy a championship -- just ask the New York Yankees about that one.
Things are a bit different in the NFL, where the salary-cap forces -- in theory, anyway -- hard decisions about what kind of program you want to run and in what areas you want to invest your resources. The Bears are a defense-driven team because the majority of the money they spend goes to players on that side of the ball.
And despite a 5-3 record and a one-game lead in the NFC North, the Bears have a serious problem in the area where they have invested the most money. The defense is ranked 18th in the 32-team NFL despite the fact the Bears have allocated a higher percentage of their salary cap to that area than all but one other team.
The Bears have put 47 percent of the $116 million salary cap into their defense for this season. It's a massive amount of money when you consider they have just 32 percent of their salary cap -- the 26th-lowest amount -- invested in an offense that ranks 15th in the NFL. The Bears also have the second-most money in the league invested in special teams (4 percent). Special-teams spending includes only money paid to the kicker, punter and long snapper. Return man Devin Hester's salary ($1.6 million cap hit) falls under money invested in the offense.
Where does the rest of the cap spending go? Most of it is tied up in dead money lost in big-money contracts given to released players such as Cedric Benson and Brian Griese. The rest is part of a reserve fund teams keep to cover themselves in case of disaster.
How does the Bears' bang-for-the-buck on defense rank league-wide?
The Bears are one of five teams that have allocated top-10 cap spending on defense without producing a top-10 defense. Two of those teams have had decent results. Arizona has invested 42 percent of its cap (No. 8) for the No. 12 defense, while Houston has invested 40 percent (No. 10) for the No. 17 defense.
The other teams that haven't gotten much back for their investment are No. 4-spender Green Bay (45 percent for the No.20 defense) and San Diego, which is tied with Tennessee at No.5 (44 percent) in spending but has produced the No. 26 defense. The Chargers recently fired defensive coordinator Ted Cottrell and replaced him with former Bears defensive coordinator Ron Rivera.
It will be interesting to see what Rivera does in San Diego because he got his training as a coach under Jim Johnson in Philadelphia. Johnson's defense ranks fifth in the league and two of his disciples, Steve Spagnola with the New York Giants and former Bears cornerback Leslie Frazier in Minnesota, oversee defenses ranked fourth and 11th, respectively.
All of which leads us back to the scheme the Bears are running. Lovie Smith insists there is nothing wrong with his scheme and defends Bob Babich, the man running it since Rivera was run out of town. This creates a slippery slope. If it's not the scheme and it's not the coaches' play-calling, there's not much left to blame for the defense's problems. It must be the players. And by extension, it's management's fault for signing them.
Talk about landing in a trick box. If the defense is being put in the right position to win but can't find success, then it's a combination of age, injury and ineptitude that's causing the fall to mediocrity.
One thing is clear halfway through the season: The defense has created some momentum, but it is all of the negative sort. The Bears field six starters who have made the Pro Bowl, including Brian Urlacher, a six-time honoree, and Lance Briggs and Tommie Harris, who each have made the Pro Bowl three times. Mike Brown, Nathan Vasher and Adewale Ogunleye also have appeared in the Pro Bowl.
How many of those players will go to the Pro Bowl this season? Odds are none of them, although Briggs still has a chance. He is one of five defensive players to record an interception, a forced fumble, a fumble recovery and a sack this season and one of only four who also have scored a touchdown. But he will need to pick it up significantly in the second half of the season to assure the Bears have a defender in Hawaii.
That's not the kind of payoff the Bears need from their high-priced defense.
Mike Mulligan and Sun-Times colleague Brian Hanley host a sports-talk show from 6 to 10 a.m. Monday through Friday on WSCR-AM (670).
WITH MIKE MULLIGAN e-mail: mmulligan@suntimes.com
