The Bears may have to look outside the organization for an offensive play caller, as the Oakland Raiders want to talk to offensive coordinator Mike Tice about their head coaching vacancy. more ›

Could Captain Neckbeard be returning to the Bears in a Movember miracle to save the team from doom, now that Jay Cutler has been lost to a broken thumb? more ›

With the Bears in their bye week and their season nearly half-complete, we figured now was a good time to look back on the season so far as well as their remaining schedule. more ›

Such are the perils of living in a city with one professional football team. more ›

Here's video from Sunday night's game where Cutler has a suggestion for one of Martz's plays. more ›

After two lackluster offensive performances, Mike Martz's "Greatest Show on Turf" seems as much a relic of the late 90's as Netscape. more ›

So what do we foresee for the Bears this season? more ›

The Bears traded Greg Olsen to Carolina late yesterday afternoon, completing a purge of the tight ends on their roster. more ›

The last thing Jay Cutler needs after breaking off his engagement is to have his best bro shipped off to another team. more ›

Even when they've won, the Bears' play has been less than satisfying to watch. We knew that they couldn't continue to find ways to win every week, and Sunday was case in point. The Seattle Seahawks, who had yet to win on the road, came into Soldier Field and left with a 23-20 victory that dropped the Bears to 4-2 on the season. more ›

The 2010 Chicago Bears are awful, and Lovie Smith needs to be fired. There is no other way to deal with the debacle we saw at Soldier Field on Sunday. No matter that the Bears managed a 19-14 win when Jay Cutler connected with Matt Forte for a 28-yard touchdown inside of two minutes and a Calvin Johnson touchdown for the Lions was controversially waved off in the final 30 seconds. If there is such thing as a moral victories, this was the definition of moral defeat. The Bears played at home against a Detroit Lions team who had lost 20 straight road games. A Lions team that had won two games in the past two seasons. A team that lost their starting QB to injury just before halftime. And yet the Bears needed a miracle finish to win the game. more ›

The first pre-season is pretty much a meaningless exercise for fans. The starters make brief cameos before yielding to the guys fighting to make the roster or improve their standing on the depth chart. So last night's 25-10 loss to the Chargers means little in the scheme of things for the Bears. Fans hoping to get a real preview of Mike Martz's new offense were left wanting as Jay Cutler played just one possession. He completed both passes he threw, for 47 yards, and helped set up a Robbie Gould field goal. Second year QB Caleb Hanie took the majority of snaps, completing 10 of 17 passes for 148 yards. He threw a scrambling seven yard TD to Devin Aromashodu in the second quarter to cap an impressive 15 play drive, but also made a questionable throw under stiff pressure than resulted in an interception. Hanie left the game with an injured shoulder in the third quarter, suffered when he was sacked from behind by San Diego linebacker Antwan Applegate. more ›

After one disappointing season, the Bears released offensive tackle Orlando Pace on Monday. The future Hall of Famer was signed as a free agent last off-season to a fill a gap on the left created by the retirement of John Tait. The 13-year veteran started 11 games for the Bears, but ended the season on the bench. And while the Bears didn't expect Pace to perform to the level that'll help enshrine him in Canton, they were expecting more when they signed him to a 3-year, $15 million deal last April. Even the Bears hiring of offensive coordinator Mike Martz, who was Pace's offensive coordinator and head coach with the St. Louis Rams, wasn't enough to save his job. The Bears would prefer to use his cap space to chase other free agents. Teams can begin signing free agents on Thursday. Meanwhile, Pace is apparently mulling retirement. more ›

The trouble over Soldier Field's turf? It could get resolved even more quickly now that Mike Martz has been signed as the Bears' new offensive coordinator. The mind behind the '99 Rams' "Greatest Show on Turf" Martz's high-flying offense could be the push needed to get the Chicago Park District to follow through on a $1.5 million proposal to replace the Soldier Field grass surface with FieldTurf. The team, though, has been reluctant to make the change so far. more ›

The Chicago Bears finally have a new offensive coordinator and it turns out it was the name some folks expected all along: Mike Martz. Martz was rumored to be on the top of the list during the season but denied the suggestion at the time. He inherits an offense that sputtered in spite of some great potential. more ›

• The Tribune discovered personal data literally floating down the street.
• Ald. Ike Carothers has allegedly reached a deal that will involve him pleading guilty on Monday to bribery charges; a guilty plea would require Carothers to resign from his position.
• The former mayor of Niles, Nick Blase, was sentenced to a year in prison for his part in a shakedown scheme.

We're not sure what it costs to run a full-page ad in the Trib or Sun-Times, but apparently it's less than the $11 million balance on Lovie Smith's contract because Bears management decided to retain their beleaguered head coach as they officially announced during a press conference at Halas Hall on Tuesday afternoon. The same coach who led the team to a season poor enough that management felt compelled to apologize to fans in print this week. While Lovie remains as head coach, most of his offensive staff got their walking papers on Tuesday. As widely expected, offensive coordinator Ron Turner was the primary fall guy for the Bears' season. Offensive line coach Harry Hiestand, quarterbacks coach Pep Hamilton, tight ends coach Rob Boras, assistant o-line coach Luke Butkus and assistant wide receivers coach Charles London also got the ax. Given that the Bears have missed the playoffs for three straight seasons after appearing in Super Bowl XLI, David Haugh was correct to in his assessment that "[t]his wasn't a housecleaning at Halas Hall. This was light dusting." more ›

According to Mike Martz, there will be no "Greatest Show On Turf" at Soldier Field. With the Bears mired in a three-game losing streak (and losers in five of their last six games), rumors have swirled that both head coach Lovie Smith and GM Jerry Angelo are on the way out, rumors the team has denied. Another rumor has offensive coach Martz coming to town, pushing out Ron Turner. Martz was the architect behind the '99 Super Bowl Champion St. Louis Rams' explosive offense and the chance to work with Cutler would seem irresistible for Bears fans. Or not, as some fans might also remember Martz as the offensive coordinator who more recently struggled mightily in Detroit. more ›

The Bears open their 2006 season on Sunday against the Packers up in Green Bay. What a way to kick the season off! While the Bears look to figure into the playoff picture, the Packers are focusing on the Brett Favre farewell (maybe) tour. The Bears should open with a key road victory against a division opponent, but in these big rivalries, one never knows. So just how good are the Bears this year? That's... more ›