O-Noes! Bears List of Coordinator Candidates Shrinking
By Benjy Lipsman in News on Jan 13, 2010 3:20PM
With vacancies at both offensive and defensive coordinator, the Bears' brass has a lot of work to do to retool coach Lovie Smith's staff. Unfortunately for Lovie and his long term job prospects in Chicago, many of the top candidates have been taken out of consideration. USC's offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates had been considered the leading candidate of late, but he opted to follow boss Pete Carroll to the Seattle Seahawks and canceled an interview scheduled for Tuesday. What about Green Bay QB coach Tom Clements? Nope, he won't be interviewing for the job either after the Packers refused the Bears' request. While lobbying for the Bears job before it was even available, former Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis, became the Kansas City Chief's offensive coordinator last week before even meeting with Chicago.
The team did finally interview a candidate on Tuesday when the Cincinnati Bengals' quarterbacks coach Ken Zampese visited Halas Hall. Others mentioned include quarterbacks coaches Bill Musgrave of the Falcons and Paul Hackett of the Raiders (have the Bears looked at the Raiders QB play lately?), along with former Vikings coach Mike Tice -- who's background as an offensive line coach might be beneficial. And then there's always Mike Martz, who also began campaigning for the job before it was officially available.
On the defensive side of the ball, the Bears seem more certain they've found their guy after meeting with Perry Fewell on Monday, who had most recently served as the interim head coach of the Buffalo Bills and served as the Bears' secondary coach in 2005. But he's also apparently the New York Giants' top choice for their defensive coordinator position and is considered a candidate for the Bills' permanent head coaching vacancy. Can the Bears lure him back to Chicago?
Even coaches without other offers may be difficult to lure to the Bears. With Lovie Smith effectively a lame duck in 2010, who'd want to take a position on his staff knowing they might be job hunting again a year from now when a new head coach takes over?