No Major Changes to Chicago Bears’ Coaching Staff
Chicago Bears head coach John Fox announced on Wednesday that both offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains and defensive coordinator Vic Fangio will return next season.
If Chicago Bears head coach John Fox is to be taken at his word (yeah, we are laughing at that thought), then offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains and Vic Fangio will be return to the team next season.
“I can tell you that our coordinators are intact,” Fox said.
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The vote of confidence for both Loggains and Fangio came as a slight surprise. Loggains struggled with play-call during his first year as offensive coordinator of the Bears and Fangio was rumored to be at odds with Fox.
Bears’ general manager Ryan Pace downplayed the idea of conflict between Fox and Fangio.
“John is a former defensive coordinator so there’s constant communication there. Their offices are side by side. Hey man, you guys have been around football long enough. When you’re going through a tough season, of course there are going to be ‘debates’ that happen. It should happen. It happens in the draft room, it happens with coaches. But it’s a healthy productive relationship.”
Meanwhile, Fox praised the work Loggains did with the offense during the 2016 season.
“I think at 3-13, I think we’re 15th in the league, which is just slightly above average in offense,” Fox said. “We got explosive plays, we ran the ball efficiently. We got behind, tried to play catch-up late in the games, those totals go down.
“I think obviously we didn’t score enough points. Obviously turnovers were big on that. Minus-20 in turnover ratio. Definitely not a formula for success. That’s two-fold, that’s three-fold, you can put special teams in there as well. I think from design to starting with three quarterbacks, with the rotation of the receivers, inconsistency with personality, I think it’s a positive thing. Are we there yet? No. But I don’t think it’s play-calling or design that are issues.”
Reasons for Bears’ fans to be optimistic for the 2017 are drawing thin. Instead of acknowledging the problems with the Bears from this past season, the Bears are simply saying they will be better in 2017. Every team says they are going to better in the following season but we are not children. The Bears can’t simply talk their way to improvement. There needs to be solutions made to the problems. The first solution for the Bears this off-season should have been replacing Loggains.
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Instead, the problem of Loggains being the team’s offensive coordinator will bleed into the 2017 season. Too many problems without solutions could very well be the reason why John Fox and Ryan Pace are fired next off-season if the Chicago Bears do not improve.