Episode 6: NU Hoops, Recruiting and New Media
The West Lot Pirates talk about the rough stretch of NU Hoops, preview signing day, and have a discussion on the perception of athletes and the advent of new media like Twitter. You can download the episode directly from here.
Be sure to tune in next week for our special Signing Day episode where we will break down the NU Football class of 2015.
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Posted on January 29, 2011, in Podcast. Bookmark the permalink. 4 Comments.
West Lot Pirates Podcast 
Hey, guys– great show; I really appreciated the discussion of public perception and judgement, interfacing through new media. I was a little surprised that Kane Coulter’s name didn’t come up there, given the immediate reaction by the ESPN 3 play callers (echoed by my father-in-law) when he apparently took himself out of play for a few downs in the Outback Bowl.
Personally, I think that if you know you’re not at 100%, and there’s someone else you think will do a better job, it’s appropriate to admit that and step aside– and then train like hell so that you’re ready for that situation the next time. Coulter clearly hasn’t had the time to develop all the chops he’ll need down the road– he’s not YET the player nor the leader that Persa is. That’s cool.
Thanks for the feedback!
In the case of Colter, I think the poor kid was just gassed. He basically hadn’t seen any significant collegiate game reps outside of a few in the Illinois/Wisconsin games. Then suddenly Fitz is calling his name on QB sweeps play after play.
Fitz has said before that he hates playing true freshmen because of the conditioning issues…and we played a bunch of them last season. As you said, I think by next year these guys will have the chops they need for 4 full quarters of action.
Hey guys, great stuff as always. I kind of completely disagree with the Cutler analysis though…. You guys mentioned how the Bears – especially Urlacher – jumped to the defense of an injured teammate, but that “they had to.” But when the Bears played in the Super Bowl and Cedric Benson removed himself from the game a lot of people questioned his toughness too. Since Twitter wasn’t around it didn’t become such a big deal and the response wasn’t immediate, but I don’t remember anyone on the Bears sticking up for him. It looked like he quit on his team and his teammates didn’t do anything to dispel that perception. You felt Benson’s days with the Bears were numbered from then on and he just made that decision easier when he decided to see how many different modes of transportation he could operate while drunk.
Anyway, when one of the leading guys in the crusade against Cutler was MJD who sat out the last three weeks of the season with a knee injury, you kind of have to question the validity (or motivation behind) some of the criticism. I think the best line I heard was “it’s easy to be tough with someone else’s body.” Also, the statement that Cutler hasn’t missed a game due to injury since joining the Bears was incorrect – he missed the Carolina game with a concussion.
But wait, this in an NU podcast right? I’m looking forward to the signing day report.
Thanks for the comment, Jon – even though this was a bit outside of our normal scope, I think we were hoping this conversation would generate some additional discussion.
You bring up a valid comparison with the Benson situation – though I’ll point out that we did contrast current players’ support of Cutler to the outright mutiny against Kyle Orton in the 06/07 season. I do wish our discussion had come full circle a little bit, so that we could’ve more solidly connected my feeling about the media looking for what they want to find and John’s comment on media taking a stand on players one way or another… to me there was clearly no “neutral” view, though the broadcasters didn’t have the guts to say so outright. But then, Fox took every opportunity to show a sour-faced Cutler on the sidelines (and one smiling shot after Hanie threw the TD pass)… in my mind, this was a pretty solid effort to string him up for the public to bash. Contrast that with a player like Rothelisburger – the media is giving every opportunity in the world for him to redeem himself this season (including a really inane comment from Berman last weekend along the lines of “looks like Ben is a good person again” or some crap like that… ridiculous).
Whether this is “fair” to Cutler or not debatable (given the public-sphere and all), but clearly the media picture of Cutler is biased. Turning to the next available source – players – it’s hard to just take other Bears’ word for it, when a whole bunch of NFL guys (before and after the game) were saying the things they did. Maybe players just feel much differently about Cutler if he’s their QB, vs an opponent… kinda like AJ Pierzynski in baseball.