Bears Beat Writers vs Basic Competency at their Jobs: A War for the Ages
Last week, there was a whole bunch of talk about time to throw ("TTT") as a stat, of course in the context of Caleb Williams, of course also in bad faith. I made the wild claim on the podcast back when the season started that none of this was in good faith - the ranking of Caleb Williams as the 32nd best starting QB in the NFL (behind JJ McCarthy, a man whose entire NFL resume is tearing his ACL and putting on way too much eyeblack while he recovered), the claiming that Caleb was more of a scrambling QB than a pocket passer, the idea that he was already considered a bust - all of it, I was sure, was in bad faith. A performative dance from national media ball-knowers who understood the game, and understood that to drive clicks, the most surefire play to call was one that involved rage-baiting Bears fans with obvious bullshit, and watching the biggest fanbase in American sports media lose their goddam minds.
I was wrong. Assuming the idiocy was intentional, planned, the work of people even remotely capable of doing their jobs was, incredibly, still overestimating their competency. It doesn't explain, say, Troy Aikman spending an entire broadcast projecting his self-loathing onto Caleb at a frankly embarrassing rate. It doesn't explain Adam Archuletta pounding the table again and again to declare that Caleb Williams is a scrambling quarterback and not a pocket passer as opposing defenses trip over themselves to stop his big-play threat from the pocket while gladly conceding record-setting amounts of yardage on the ground (don't matter, we're still the most explosive offense in the NFL by the way).
I don't know if it's something in the sports media water, if COVID and the internet rabbit hole fallout after really did break people's brains, or if folks just don't know ball, but professionals whose job it is to understand football... fail to understand football when Caleb Williams is the one holding it at a staggering rate.
Here, myself and beloved BWF Podcast host Coach Bob discuss the dreaded TTT stat that has plagued Bears beat writers (but, notably, not anyone actually involved in the Bears) for weeks now:
I was wrong. Assuming the idiocy was intentional, planned, the work of people even remotely capable of doing their jobs was, incredibly, still overestimating their competency. It doesn't explain, say, Troy Aikman spending an entire broadcast projecting his self-loathing onto Caleb at a frankly embarrassing rate. It doesn't explain Adam Archuletta pounding the table again and again to declare that Caleb Williams is a scrambling quarterback and not a pocket passer as opposing defenses trip over themselves to stop his big-play threat from the pocket while gladly conceding record-setting amounts of yardage on the ground (don't matter, we're still the most explosive offense in the NFL by the way).
I don't know if it's something in the sports media water, if COVID and the internet rabbit hole fallout after really did break people's brains, or if folks just don't know ball, but professionals whose job it is to understand football... fail to understand football when Caleb Williams is the one holding it at a staggering rate.
Here, myself and beloved BWF Podcast host Coach Bob discuss the dreaded TTT stat that has plagued Bears beat writers (but, notably, not anyone actually involved in the Bears) for weeks now:
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