I hate dealing in hypotheticals, but, for 900 words, let’s talk about coaches.
So many rumors. So much time. The fact, fiction and falsehoods of it all. Wishful in belief. Unequivocal.
The name carousel spins. Ben Johnson (Detroit). Mike Vrabel (Cleveland). Kliff Kingsbury (Washington). Bobby Slowik (Houston), Todd Monken (Baltimore). Brian Delance Johnson (Washington). Aaron Glenn (Detroit). Marcus Freeman (Notre Dame). A wheel of fortune. The unchosen few.
There’s a difference between the “hot seat” and being on the “watch list.” Most NFL head coaches occupy one, most really good-to-great NFL offensive or defensive coordinators occupy the other. The rare ones occupy both at the same time. For the Bears there are those they are paying close attention to and there are others whom they could care less than a Brian Daboll about.
It’s called “front-office politics.” Most of us who don’t work within an NFL corporate structure know nothing of the true difference between a “hot seat” and “wish list” when it comes to selecting a future head coach. And as often as it seems that we, the gen-pop public, make better decisions than the teams that actually do the hiring — we be the ignorant ones.
Or so they say.
The new HCIC Thomas Brown’s meteoric ascent from Bears passing-game coordinator to Bears offensive coordinator to Bears interim head coach in three weeks is more of a reflection of the dysfunction and instability within the Bears’ organization than it is one man’s unexpected and unthinkable come-up.
His name is close to the top of the Bears’ (and a few other NFL teams) “watch list.” Right now. While at the same time, depending on how the last five games of the season end, he’ll be sitting on the “hot seat.” A situation that Brown may discover — knowing more with every passing week of just what he has forwardly fallen into — might not be a bad seat at all to be sitting in.
It’s now the voiceless heresy of other names become additional. Mike McCarthy. Antonio Pierce. Sean McVay. Kyle Shanahan. Even Robert Saleh.
And then there’s Kevin Stefanski. The name of names.
The two-time AP Coach of the Year (2020, 2023) of the Cleveland Browns who’s in a marriage with his current team that has “irreconcilable differences” written all over their future divorce proceedings. It’s just a matter of when. And for the Bears: Will “when” be soon enough?
They say the best ability is availability and as there is no guarantee that Stefanski will either be or (forcibly) make himself available for the Bears during their hopefully months-long chase to “find the guy,” if we’re wishfully dealing in “best available” hypotheticals, Stefanski would be the best guy for, as radio legend David Kaplan said, “the most important hire in the history of the franchise.”
It’s an eff it, all-chips-in move that the Bears are not just not known for but throughout history have never done. It always has seemed as if it never meant that much to the McCaskeys as both a family as well as an owning organization. Settling has been their first, second and third nature. Getting Stefanski — or at least putting his name at the top of their list and making us believe that he’s their primary and secondary target, even if it’s a lie — would come off as the smartest awakening made by them in any of our lifetimes. One — and maybe the only one — that could make us lie to ourselves and say “every post-Lovie move was worth it to get us here.”
All because this “leader of men” they seek and speak of should have NFL experience in leading men. The full on-field responsibility of games won and lost. Of overachievement and underperformance. The only thing new to the Bears’ next head coach should be the team, not the position or title.
Or the fear of failure. Which every OC whom the Bears look at as a possible HC is going to have.
Which is why the prayers for Stefanski should go up fast. Prayers for Browns losses. Prayers for the return of Deshaun Watson. Prayers for further distance between he and the Browns’ brain trust. Prayers for the rumors of him not making it to the end of the season to get louder. Prayers that he continues to feel underappreciated and that the faith in him has waned. Prayers that Adam Schefter mentions his name every time he begins to speak anything Bears into existence.
The greatest recent exitus directed at Stefanski: “Would you rather go into yet another year of the Deshaun Watson nonsense that is sure to come in 2025? Or would you rather go coach Trevor Lawrence in Jacksonville?” The Sporting News’ Jarrett Bailey wrote that before Eberflus was fired, before the Bears became a hella better option that the Jags. Only replace Lawrence’s name with Caleb Williams. Now re-read the question.
He already did the impossible, leading the Browns to the AFC playoffs twice in the last four seasons. The Browns. Something no other coach on the Bears’ “watch list” has ever done, something none of their last four coaches has been able to or been capable of doing.
A younger Andy Reid. A white Mike Tomlin. Another Nick Sirianni.
An exuberant task. In both the find and the ask. Which should begin, for the Bears’ front office, with one, currently unavailable, single name. And let everything fall from there.