Chicago Bears Fire John Fox
Sooooo the Bears need a new head coach. Yesterday's firing wasn't a surprise to anyone who was paying attention, but it's still pretty up in the air what direction the organization chooses to go in next. Fox wasn't a terrible coach by any means, but at the end of the day it's a results driven business. And while players loved playing hard for him, which don't get me wrong is huge, there were too many games where the Bears just played sloppy, undisciplined football- and that's on Fox.
Right now the big names being tossed around in the Bears' coaching search are John DeFilippo of the Eagles, Pat Shurmur of the Vikings, and Josh McDaniels of the Patriots. DeFilippo and Shurmur have both been lauded for their development of quarterbacks this year (Carson Wentz and Casey Keenum respectively), and McDaniels has been extraordinarily successful as an assistant and now offensive coordinator. You're taking a risk on all of these guys, because each of them either has a. no head coaching experience, or b. a pretty poor record as head coach. I'm not going to do a deep analysis on these guys yet, but I might in the coming days.
The two most important things for the Bears are the continued development of Mitchell Trubisky and the retention of Vic Fangio. Honestly, Trubisky is less of a priority here. Now I know that's probably not going to be a popular opinion but when it comes down to it, we really have no idea what Trubisky can do. Don't get me wrong, I hope that Trubisky is the next franchise quarterback of the Chicago Bears, heck I like him a lot. But when you compare him to a piece like Fangio, who's not only beloved by the defense, but has proven himself through results, I don't think it's quite the same. Fangio inherited a dumpster fire of a defense. We'd seen the edges start to fray under Lovie, but damn did the bottom fall out under Trestman. Through Fangio's coaching, the Bears have made themselves not quite a feared, but surely a respected, defense. The fans want him to stay, the players definitely want him to stay, and it really comes down to whether the next head coaching candidate will want to work with a guy from the past regime, or if Fangio decides to take up another team's offer for defensive coordinator.
I have no clue what's going to happen. It feels like a lot of things have got to go right for the Bears moving forward, which makes me nervous. But hey, maybe Cam Meredith comes back stronger than ever, Pace nails this draft, Fangio stays and becomes the next Buddy Ryan, and Trubisky blossoms into an all-star talent. That's not asking too much, right?
