Instead of just stringing together social media posts, I figure why not use my own website to collect all my thoughts concerning the head coaching searches in Chicago, and around the league.

• The whole “leader of men” cliche really needs to be retired. Men, football players, follow their leader when they win. That’s the long and short of it. If you show your program is successful, players will gravitate to your leadership. Do you think Bill Parcells and Bill Walsh had much in common besides their ability to win football games? Is anybody inspired by Bill Belichick’s personality? (The answer is no.) Find a winner. The players will follow him.
• The offensive options, as I see them:
  • Ben Johnson is going to be the top choice. But Johnson is going to bring baggage to the interview process, including demands in the personnel department. Will the Bears view him worthy of those concessions?
    • One source told me that Ryan Poles covets Johnson, while others in the building (Warren, especially) are looking for established program builders.
  • Liam Coen is the wildcard in this process, and I think he’s been every bit as impressive as Johnson this season. Is he ready to be a head coach? Nobody knows, but Coen would be a quarterback-centric hire.
    • Coen’s work with both the running game and tight ends in Tampa have been something of a revelation in 2024.
  • Todd Monken would certainly be an interesting hire, and he has certainly paid his dues at both the NFL and collegiate levels. Monken is also an Illinois native, so it’s likely a job he’ll covet.
  • Joe Brady. Beware of hiring coordinators of great quarterbacks. None of Peyton Manning’s or Tom Brady’s ever became a successful head coach in the league. Josh Allen is a great player but he’s also a unique one. Brady is going to be able to bring very little from Buffalo to Chicago.
  • Kliff Kingsbury. Unless Caleb seriously goes to bat for him, Kingsbury would be a risky choice. Some guys are just coordinators. That’s how K.K. profiles.
  • Drew Petzing is an interesting coach to interview, and he’s almost certainly going to be a head coach in the next five years. (He’s not an actual contender for this job.)
  • Mike Kafka. I saw a lot of fans getting worked up over this interview. But sometimes personnel guys give their friends head coaching interviews to raise their profiles. That’s what is happening here.
• Defensive options, as I see them:
  • Everybody will now be shocked if Mike Vrabel doesn’t end up in New England, but the job will likely have some appeal for Ben Johnson due to the presence of Drake Maye.
  • Vance Joseph, Brian Flores, Aaron Glenn, and Anthony Weaver are all solid, well-respected coaches. But they will arrive will major questions on the offensive side of the ball, including how they’ll manage the quarterback position. If you’re the Bears, why not allow the coaching rotating door to move to the other side of the ball for once?
• Program builders, so to speak:
  • Mike McCarthy is a good head coach. But this is not the time for the Chicago Bears to try and hit singles.
  • David Shaw is a coach I desperately wanted the Bears to consider a cycle or two ago, but I worry about guys who have not actively coached in the league for a number of years.

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We are a few weeks away from football practices starting. Some stadium drama, but not much.

• TRIB: Alice Hoffman believes the city of Chicago should give the Bears full control over upgrading Soldier Field in an effort to keep the club in the city. The last refurbishments were hampered by mayoral oversight and financial limitations. Would this gesture be enough to keep the Bears on the lakefront? Doubtful. Several owners believe NFL franchise values are beginning to plateau and they want the Bears to own their own land, and their own building.
• SUN TIMES: David Roeder believes there is starting to be momentum on the city side, and the reason might be the potential development dollars slated for the areas near the stadium.
• DAILY HERALD: David Shaw writes about the potential breakout star for the Bears in 2023, Gervon Dexter.
• ACTUAL BEAR NEWS: A mother bear and three clubs entered a home. Hear the 911 call.
• THE ATHLETIC: Is it too early to predict the 53-man roster for the coming season? Not for Kevin Fishbain. (Side note: it seems the Bears beat was unaffected by the first round of Athletic layoffs. I would imagine most NFL beats will be just fine short-term.)
• STAY TUNED. Next week, I’ll be making one of the more substantial announcements in DBB history. Exciting things on are on the horizon.

No podcast this week, as travel got in the way. We’ll have the 2017 season wrap-up pod in the next week or so if I can get Jahns to answer his cell.

Ted Phillips the Boogeyman!

Ever since Ian Rapoport reported Ted Phillips was “making phone calls” to gauge availability of head coaching candidates, Bears Twitter – including our own Andrew Dannehy – have been obsessed with Phillips’ role in the coaching search. Now Rap’s former bench mate, Albert Breer, had this dandy in his “Black Monday” column:

Chicago Bears: The writing has been on the wall here for a while. The expectation is that John Fox will be gone. What’s less certain is whether or not general manager Ryan Pace gets to pick the next coach, and whether or not the coaches pursued by the Bears dictate Pace’s fate.

(1) Ryan Pace is 100% picking the next head coach.

(2) The NFL sends each organization a list of prospective head coaches. Those coaches don’t always know they’re on that list. What teams do is call agents and ask if their clients are interested in becoming head coaches so that once the decision to fire the head coach is officially made, interviews can be lined up immediately. This is called due diligence. Teams also call agents of college coaches to gauge if they’re interested in coming to the NFL.

(3) Ownership, which Ted represents, can do this reconnaissance work while another coach is under contract. For a GM it is strictly verboten. The GM is a partner with the head coach, especially in an organizational structure where they both report to ownership.

(4) If this story was “George McCaskey is making calls” nobody would have cared. But McCaskey doesn’t make calls. That’s why he pays Ted Phillips and why Phillips is incredibly well-respected in the league.

(5) Do I think the Bears would want to know if Ron Rivera may become available? Of course. They want to know every good coach that is going to be available. But the apple of their eye is Stanford coach David Shaw.

Jahns on Shaheen

From AJ After Dark’s column in the Sun-Times:

But the Bears do feel good about Shaheen’s development. Loggains said he’s had a solid rookie season. Most of Shaheen’s 12 catches were either contested or diving grabs (two for touchdowns).

In time, the team believes that Shaheen will do more. The Bears still only have six packages for him.  All of his catches also have come when he is a prototypical in-line tight end.

“We know that he’s going to be a good, all-around tight end because of his size, speed, his athleticism,” Loggains said. “In the offseason, the biggest jump he is going to have to take is in the run game. But he came in and affected the game in his opportunities in the red area the way we thought he would.”

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