Much like what he said when he stepped to the podium, the Matt Eberflus era was mostly filler. The Bears’ near-total waste of time under his watch ended Friday when they fired him in his third season with a 14-32 record and a string of embarrassing decisions.
He is the first head coach they’ve ever fired in-season, and his departure was as awkward as his arrival.
Eberflus actually spoke to the media via Zoom around 9 a.m. for his regular day-after-game availability and deflected three questions about his job security, and they dismissed him shortly.
In typical Eberflus style, he talked around giving a yes-or-no answer to the question of whether he had certainty he would be coaching the Bears in their next game, Dec. 8 at the 49ers.
“The operation’s been normal in terms of debrief after the game, coming in, grading the tape, meeting with the coordinators,” he said. “It’s been a normal operation.”
That’s the type of answer someone gives in court to avoid lying.
There was little “normal” in Eberflus’ tenure, beginning with the Bears’ process of replacing former coach Matt Nagy and general manager Ryan Pace after their firing in January 2022. Chairman George McCaskey and former president Ted Phillips began interviewing coaching candidates and appeared to narrow it to finalists before hiring Ryan Poles as general manager.
From there, it somehow got weirder. And worse.
Eberflus went 3-14 in 2022, which was the franchise’s worst record in more than 50 years, then 7-10 with a decent roster last season and was 4-8 with six consecutive losses after mismanaging the clock at the end of a 23-20 loss to the Lions on Thursday.
