Bears can take the first step toward righting a major wrong this week and opportunity comes at the most fitting time
The Chicago Bears will have a big week at Halas Hall this week with more virtual interviews coming down the pipeline for the team's vacant head coach position.The Bears have already completed eight virtual interviews in the first round and this week, the team will get a new pool of candidates to speak with.Starting this […]
The Chicago Bears will have a big week at Halas Hall this week with more virtual interviews coming down the pipeline for the team's vacant head coach position.
The Bears have already completed eight virtual interviews in the first round and this week, the team will get a new pool of candidates to speak with.
Starting this week, the Bears are able to virtually interview candidates who are currently employed on team's that played this past weekend during the Wild Card slate. Those interviews can start on the third day following that specific team's Wild Card date (either Tuesday or Wednesday).
One candidate that was on a Wild Card team already has a big interview lined up this week with the Bears and it couldn't come at a more fitting time.
The Bears are scheduled to interview Washington Commanders' offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury this week, one of the two interviews Kingsbury has accepted thus far.
His interest with the Bears is the intriguing one. Last offseason, the Bears interviewed Kingsbury for the team's vacant offensive coordinator position on Matt Eberflus' staff. At the time, Kingsbury was a senior offensive assistant at USC, where he worked closely with the Bears' eventual first overall pick, quarterback Caleb Williams.
By the end of the process, Eberflus and the Bears elected to go with Shane Waldron over Kingsbury, only to fire Waldron less than ten months later, with Eberflus axed as well 17 days after that.
In the meantime, Kingsbury was hired to be the offensive coordinator in Washington. pairing him with the second overall pick Jayden Daniels. Under Kingsbury's offense, Daniels' shined and is now the betting favorite to win the Offensive Rookie of the Year Award. Oh and by the way, the Commanders just won this weekend on the road in the playoffs and will be advancing to the Divisional Round.
So yeah, quite the fitting time to speak with Kingsbury again considering his season with the Commanders went exactly how the Bears expected their season to go.
However, the fact Kingsbury is willing to sit down and speak with the Bears after what they did, for an even higher position, is telling. He clearly wants to work with Williams again and his resume working with Daniels this season speaks for itself. And Williams has always had great things to say about working with Kingsbury.
"I know what type of guy he is. I know he loves football. I know he wants to win. He's a competitor," Williams explained. "I think he fits a bunch of those qualities that I said. A coach that challenges myself, whether it's an offensive coordinator or head coach, and also challenges us as players — whether it's on the field or character, doesn't matter. Just a coach that challenges us. A man of his word. A discipline coach, meaning whatever his rules are or whatever he's gonna bring rule-wise, how he's going to control the team and manage and control the team, things like that."
Will it be an awkward exchange at the start of the interview, most definitely. And I hope Kingsbury has the most smug grin on his face when his zoom call connects. But, once the process gets started, I expected Kingsbury to have a well thought-out plan for what the future of the Bears, and the development of Williams, should look like.
Before the team sits down with Kingsbury, they'll first have to sit down with another coach who the team initially passed on for the offensive coordinator position last offseason, Bears' interim coach Thomas Brown.
