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NFL

Fox: Bears evaluating everything, including QB

GREEN BAY, Wis. — Chicago Bears coach John Fox said he’s evaluating every position, including quarterback, after Mike Glennon had four turnovers in Thursday night’s ugly 35-14 loss to the Packers.

“We need to make a lot of changes,” Fox said when asked specifically about quarterback. “We will evaluate everything, and we’ve got a lot of work to do before we line up against Minnesota on [Oct. 9]. We are going to look at everything.”

If Bears coach John Fox decides to move away from Mike Glennon, above, as Chicago’s starting quarterback, Mitchell Trubisky is waiting in the wings. Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images

Fox refused to pin all of the Bears’ woes on Glennon.

“I don’t think all of those were Mike’s turnovers,” Fox said. “Again, there are a lot of people out there that are involved. We had dropped balls. We had penalties. There was plenty of stuff to pass around.

“I think we evaluate every day. It’s not going to be a new novelty; it’s just that obviously we have to fix some things on our football team. We are 1-3 to start the season. Not just the quarterback. Everybody wants to talk about the quarterback. We have more issues than the quarterback.”

But none seemingly more pressing.

The Bears promised Glennon — signed for $16 million guaranteed — the starting job in 2017, even after drafting quarterback Mitchell Trubisky second overall in April. But Glennon has eight turnovers in four games.

According to Elias Sports Bureau, Glennon is the only Bears player in the past 40 seasons with three turnovers in a half twice within the first four games of a season.

“The No. 1 thing we obviously have to fix are the turnovers,” Glennon said. “I’m not giving our team a chance when you turn the ball over like that.”

Trubisky — elevated to No. 2 on the QB depth chart ahead of Mark Sanchez four weeks ago — sparked the Bears’ offense in the preseason, passing for 364 yards, three touchdowns and zero interceptions for a 106. 2 passer rating.

“Again, Mitch is a young player, four regular-season games into his rookie season in his NFL career,” Fox said. “Like I said, we have a big gap here [in terms of Trubisky’s experience versus Glennon’s]. We will look at everything and everybody, not just the quarterback position.”

NFL

Trump: NFL's biz 'going to hell' without changes

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that the NFL is in a “very bad box” over the issue of players protesting during the national anthem and suggested it will harm the league’s business.

“I think the NFL is in a box; I think they’re in a really bad box,” he said to reporters while leaving the White House for a trip to Indiana. “You look what’s happening with their ratings, frankly, the only thing doing well in the NFL is the pregame because everybody wants to see what’s going on.

“You cannot have people disrespecting our national anthem, our flag, our country, and that’s what they’re doing,” Trump said. “And in my opinion, the NFL has to change. Or you know what’s going to happen? Their business is going to hell.”

The Nielsen company said Tuesday that through three weeks, viewership for national telecasts of NFL games was down 11 percent this season compared to 2016.

Nielsen said the games averaged 17.63 million viewers for the first three weeks of last season and have dipped to 15.65 million this year. The Nielsen figures don’t include many of the Sunday afternoon games that are shown to a regional audience but not a national one.

Trump has, since late last week, been lashing out at NFL players who kneel during the anthem. The president first said the NFL should fire players who kneel, then tweeted that the players were being disrespectful of the American flag, the anthem, military personnel and the country.

He has also suggested that viewers are turned off by the protests and has suggested fans boycott the NFL.

Players have said the protest, which began with then-49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick refusing to stand for the anthem, is their way of protesting racial inequality and police brutality. While the protests were scattered before Trump’s comments, they spread to nearly every team in the NFL this past weekend. Players across the country linked arms or knelt during the anthem, and some were joined by their owners on the sidelines.

Three teams — the Seahawks, Titans and Steelers — opted to remain off the field during the anthem, though the Steelers said Monday they remained in their locker room to avoid a political statement, not as a protest.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

NFL

Giants' Mara 'very unhappy' with OBJ TD antics

New York Giants co-owner John Mara said Tuesday that he isn’t happy about Odell Beckham Jr.’s touchdown celebration in which the wide receiver simulated a dog urinating. Mara said the team would deal with the matter “internally.”

Mara made his comments in an email sent to multiple media outlets.

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He wrote: “I do not want to get into a discussion about this, but I will say that I am very unhappy with Odell’s behavior on Sunday and we intend to deal with it internally.”

On Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagles, after his scoring his first touchdown of the season, Beckham pretended to walk like a dog after the score and simulated urinating on the field. The Giants were penalized for Beckham’s celebration.

He said after the Giants’ 27-24 loss that he had no regrets.

“I’m a dog, so I acted like a dog. I don’t know if the rulebook said you can’t hike your leg. He said I peed on somebody, so I was trying to find the imaginary ghost that I peed on. But I didn’t see him,” Beckham told reporters.

On Monday, he responded to a fan on Twitter who asked if the celebration was related to President Donald Trump’s recent comments about NFL player protests, Beckham wrote:

Giants coach Ben McAdoo wasn’t interested in discussing the celebration on Monday, other than expressing his displeasure that it cost the Giants yardage on the ensuing kickoff.

Eagles coach Doug Pederson called Beckham’s celebration “unfortunate” and said it was something his team would “file away” for later.

The Giants and Eagles are scheduled to meet again on Dec. 17 in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

Quarterback Eli Manning said Tuesday that he didn’t see the celebration and didn’t know why the Giants were penalized. He also didn’t feel the need to talk with Beckham in the days after the incident.

But he said he understood the criticism.

“Hey, that is part of football,” Manning said. “You get penalized there are going to be people who are unhappy, whether it is the owner, the head coach or other players. You can’t afford penalties.”

Beckham’s unsportsmanlike conduct was one of 10 penalties committed by the Giants on Sunday. Seven came in the fourth quarter.

Manning thinks they all need to do better, including Beckham.

“I want him to go out there and play hard. It’s part of being smart in all aspects of penalties,” Manning said. “I don’t think unhappy is the word. Just everyone has to be a little smarter in this situation where things are tough and we have to get wins and we have to grind and we’re catching some bad breaks and things aren’t going our way — we can’t afford to make it harder on ourselves.”

ESPN’s Jordan Raanan contributed to this report.

NFL

Palmer among 4 QBs with 100 TDs on 2 teams
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