James Palmer talks Bears' addition of Kalif Raymond, NFL free agency signings
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What insights does James Palmer provide about the Bears' free agency signings?
This hour is brought to you by Jewel Osco. Here he is, my guy, James Palmer. Get in here. We don't have a lot of time.
You know what, James? I love it when you check into Snitchville. Go ahead, buddy.
All right, well, I'm a permanent resident, so here we go. I think there was a bit of cohesion issue within the offense. I think you started to see, and I know DJ knew this, Caleb really wasn't looking his way towards the back end of the season as much. And it didn't seem like there was a whole lot of trust from, I don't know which direction, from one side to the other. I think DJ's a very professional receiver that plays the position in that manner, if you understand that term. And I think Caleb is a little bit more of a difficult quarterback to play in that manner with. With Rahimi Harrison-Grody on 104.3 The Score.
This is Rahimi Harrison-Grody on 104.3 The Score. And joining us on our hotline, also on Twitch, twitch.tv slash thescoreshicago, is our friend James Palmer. James is with The Athletic. He is the co-host of the Scoop City podcast with Diana Rossini. He's an NFL insider for Bleacher Report. And he is the co-host of 89 with Steve Smith. And he's our friend. James, how are you?
Family, how we doing?
Oh, we good. It's day two. We've been waiting for some more hot scoops.
Right? Yeah. Yeah, we got a salty Schefter right now. It's already like we're off and running. He's all fired up and upset. It's been great to watch.
Wait, what is he upset about? We've been working on our show.
Okay, well, see, so Shafty was a little upset in that, I think, that studio, that Thunderdome studio. He was the first time in there working his phones and whatnot. But I think he's just kind of saying, you know, the league year, everybody says, the new league year, 4 o'clock Wednesday. He's like, no, free agency is, you know, noon on Monday. I mean, nobody talked to anybody, right, guys? These deals just happened in an instant as soon as the legal tampering window opened, right? So I'm doing the math. There's no way nobody spoke to each other prior to that window opening, right?
Do we need a legal tampering window for the legal tampering window? Is that what you're saying?
Yeah, let's do this. Let's go by the book and say we have to have a legal opportunity for two days that these teams can first speak to one another. But before we do that, let's put all of them in one city in Indianapolis in a number of watering holes, and they will not speak to each other.
And not exactly a city, James, known for having a plethora of watering holes per capita. Only a few options. And they close early-ish. This isn't the East Coast or Chicago, for example, where you can sneak off to some dive bar nobody knows about. Chances are you're going to see a lot of these people out and about.
Listen, if you guys want to split a shrimp cocktail at St. Elmo's, just tell me right now, okay? That's what you want to do, James.
We can do it. I'd love to do it. I didn't even go this year, which I was there for five days, and I didn't even make it into St. Elmo's. It was a rare year.
How does the addition of Kalif Raymond impact the Bears' offense?
Oh, I was going to say, I was thinking you meant the combine, actually, but to avoid St. Elmo's is a feat. Sometimes they bring it to you guys with the early shrimp cocktail in the morning. All of that said, though, what do you think about a lot of the moves that were done? Now, I'm going to say, I think you know this because you've been on our station a lot. We were very in love with the Max Crosby idea. We were very in love with Tyler Linderbaum, especially since we knew him from playing at Iowa, but... Max Crosby left the Raiders. Tyler Linderbaum went to the Raiders. And the Bears don't have either guy.
Yeah. Layla, but do you love either of them at the cost that it would have taken? I guess that's the point of this offseason, right? Value is everything, right? And what the Raiders essentially did, to my understanding, is they knew this was essentially over. And I feel like John Spitek was lying to my face at the Combine. No, he was... They knew at the end of the season kind of the way that this was going to go.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What insights does James Palmer provide about the Bears' free agency signings?
0:01–2:47
2
How does the addition of Kalif Raymond impact the Bears' offense?
2:47–5:59
3
What are the challenges of building team cohesion in the NFL?
5:59–9:48
4
How did the Bears miss out on key players like Max Crosby and Tyler Linderbaum?
9:48–14:24
5
What strategies should the Bears consider for improving their pass rush?
14:24–18:49
6
How does free agency affect the value of NFL players?
18:49–20:03
Speakers
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