Chicago Bears have a HC and GM conundrum

What should the Chicago Bears do with their leadership?

What should the Chicago Bears do with Matt Nagy their head coach and Ryan Pace their general manager at the end of the year? Well, the reality is they only have two real options but it’s actually the third that would not only be true to form for this organization, but the worst outcome of all. More on that in a moment.

Let’s first take a look at why we’re even having this conversation. Well, to boil this down into its simplest terms, the offense is an abomination. While Nagy routinely says each week he has not experienced offensive futility like this, the truth is, he has. In fact, in each of the last two years, the offensive unit has ranked at or near the bottom of every important statistical category. Even 2018, when you look at it objectively, wasn’t all that great.

The reasons for the lack of production are too numerous to recount here, but suffice it to say the responsibility ultimately falls at the feet of the person who puts the players on the field and the one who coaches them. So it’s not a surprise that both are on the hot seat.

So what are the team’s options? As I alluded to earlier, they really only have two. They can either extend each of their contracts or fire them both at the end of the year. The worst thing they could do is nothing. I’ll explain why in a moment.

Currently, Pace is under contract through 2021 and Nagy through 2022. If they chose to extend them, it would likely be through 2023 for both of them to align. If they don’t want to extend — and frankly why would they — then they have to be fired at the end of the year.

Unfortunately, there is a growing belief that the Bears will maintain the status quo and do nothing. Many believe they will cite the impact COVID had on their ability to prepare this offseason as well as the financial cost. In other words, the ownership may not want to eat all that money considering they have little to no revenue coming in.

But that is the worst possible scenario and here is why. They are almost certainly going to draft a quarterback in the 2021 NFL Draft — very likely in the first round. If so, it would be imperative to ensure that the triumvirate — the quarterback, head coach, and general manager — are all on the same timeline. The worst thing that could happen to a young quarterback is to lose his head coach and the general manager who believed in him after just one year. That’s exactly what could happen if the Bears bomb again in 2021 and then decide to fire Pace and Nagy.

It would be catastrophic to his development and status with the team. Often times, when a new general manager comes in, he wants to hire his own head coach and bring in his own quarterback. Just as it would be unfair to the quarterback, it would be unfair to try to force one on a general manager and head coach. For starters, you’d be limiting your pool of candidates to those who believe in the quarterback.

That’s not how they should do business. But is the way they’ve done it for years. Instead, they need to rip off the band-aid entirely, and start over completely. Give the new leadership the chance to identify their head coach, who together, will identify which quarterback fits the system they are trying to build together. Instead, if the Bears stand pat at the end of the year, they will simply continue their pattern of trying to jam a square peg into a round hole.