DABEARSDABOMB

It is really simple. Emery interviewed everyone but he also had Marinelli take part in the process. He never delegated the decision to Marinelli, just had other people involved. Haven't you guys ever interviewed at a company where you are interviewed by your future boss (along with other cohorts, etc, sometimes introduced briefly to staff, etc). Happens all the time. Some of you are implying that the Bears gave Marinelli full control. That isn't the case. They just involved him in the process and let him meet potential candidates and asked for his opinion. His opinion isn't what mattered and that was clear at the end of the day. Of course we'd have been better off had it mattered.

I don't think he was in charge of the process, however, they clearly valued his opinion and its too bad no one listened to him. Marinelli has been around the league a long time and is one of the most respected, non head coaches in the business.

Ok...it took the Bears management 10 years to figure out Angelo was bad? Angelo, the same guy who built a franchise that looked to be loaded for a multiple super bowl run (and it might have darn well happened had Harris not been injured). Yes, Angelo struggled his last few years and he failed miserably at reacting quicker to our oline but early on in his tenure he did an exceptional job. Was he responsible for everyone the Bears had on that Super Bowl run, no, but he made a heck of a lot of good moves.

I agree and I would hope if that was whom everyone thought was the right guy and it took making a president, they would do exactly that. To be frank, they already said if they needed to change that structure for the right person, they would be open to it.

Your right, he had done both, but he had a heck of a lot of successes. His big misses were Mark Bradley and Cedric Benson. You list a lot of other guys but not knowing the details, you don't know what Ballard's view was on those guys. You also are going to have misses and Ballard in general had a pretty good track record and has major support. Outside of DeCosta, who is likely not leaving Baltimore, Ballard is arguably the next top candidate in the league.

The general league wide consensus on Ballard is he is probably the top realistic GM candidate. Haven't heard a national pundit who doesn't rave about him. Now we'll leave everything up to Ernie but I don't care if he worked for the bears or not (and I also am not going to handcuff a guy just because he worked for the Bears). The top candidates is the Ravens asst gm, however, he turned us down a couple years ago and I presume he'd do the same now. PS: Ballard wasn't involved in the Bears drafts, he was more a pro scout with the Bears IIRC.

Ballard or DeCosta please.

So for those of you bashing George / Phillips. Does anyone seriously think that Ted / George are going to turn down the candidate that Ernie recommends at the end of the day? Yes, the final decision is with the owners but if people think these guys are going to complete ignore what comes out of Ernie, than well, I think you all are crazy. Also, Pixote, not sure if it was in this thread or another thread, but your post was spot on regarding not trusting them to hire GM, than why trust them to hire football czar either. At the end of the day they made a significant move and are acting much differently than in years past. For now, they get the benefit of the doubt for me and I'm excited about that.

Polian is reportedly talking with the Bills about returning their, so I presume at this time, he wasn't interested.

Accorsi will stick around to help the whole way through but the head coach is going to be picked by the GM (although others will have input). They talked numerous times about how important it is for their to be extremely strong chemistry between the head coach and GM, etc.

Now we have to hope we get different results!!!

Not really...they will have final say and clearly be involved, but they have an expert to help them with the process and provide a lot of insight, etc. Owner is always going to have a say but this time they also have a voice in the room who has successfully done this in the past in Ernie.

In the past, they hired more corporate consulting firms to help with the search. Now they are hiring an extremely respected past GM, who had tons of success and has successfully hired new head coaches and knows exactly what it takes to be a succesful GM. This is totally different.

Would be a good move by Lovie. He has the leadership skills Trestman lacks and should be able to cover Trestman's weaknesses (while Trestman covers up Lovie's offensive limitation).

I have never seen a worse head coach in the NFL. He was awful.

He also was a pretty good player after he got over his illness. You just have to realize he's more limited and needs less snaps to be more effective but he can still get after the QB. I'm okay cutting him too though.

I presume almost everyone. Not sure about Houston, he probably can't be cut. I'm going to guess Jennings might not be able to as well. Other than that, there isn't much money invested in this defense anyway. Its all sunk into the offense. By the way...welcome back Jason!!!

Yep...exactly the case. This is the status quo way of doing it in the NFL.

No; They fired him because they wanted it to be known that they wanted to send a message that ownership did not approve of what he did. Case closed.

They handled everyone but Kromer like every NFL team does assistants and there are many reasons for this, one of which is to save money. Only Kromer was and that was because he was a buffoon in how he handled things. Tucker, while the results were not good, they actually improved and played with some heart. Terrible yes, but Tucker was about the only primary coach who handled himself with class. Tucker, like pretty much everyone else on the coaching staff won't be around, but the Bears were at least smart enough to appreciate Tucker's professionalism and handled the removal of their assistants professionally, which is what a good organization should do.

Yep, I thought that was great. I also thought that the comments around...what do you think about the football roster and is Jay Cutler or any player going to be involved in the process. The way they answered both of those was great and you could tell they are making it extremely clear to outsiders that whomever comes in to take the GM role is going to have pure authority (unless they coin a prestigious guy who gets a higher title...say the Colts current GM who gets some form of an upgraded title / higher pay). Not that the Colts are going to just let that happen either.

Also, Ernie oversaw the hiring of the Panthers GM a year or two ago and found a GM who was able to work with Ron Rivera, etc. I'd say to date was a relatively successful hire (given what they have done past two years).

I think it is more that the football decisions really are outside of Phillips ultimate control and that is why he has stuck around. What he does is the bus ops side and while his title is CEO, the owners view him in a different light. Phillips and George both clearly know that they aren't guru's of football. Last time around we had a clown consulting firm helping us. Now we have a legit, top end NFL mind helping them with the search. Major coup and this whole day has been a true sign of a change at halas hall. On a sidetone, I'mr really warming up to Ballard or the Ravens assistant and am also pretty high on Toub / Arizona DC / Rex Ryan. The more I think about what Ryan was given and what he accomplished, I at least have confidence we will bring back the intensity and fear of playing in Chicago. I also think we could benefit from things he learned from his experience in New York. Originally I was against Ballard cause he has Chicago ties, however, the more I've heard from national pundits and the references to NFL rockstar, etc, the more I think he'd be a great hire.

Really a tremendous move. Major coup and a great decision. His most recent hire, Tom Coughlin, worked out pretty good for the Giants!

I think the same ole Bears schtick is a little old. By and large I liked everything I heard, other than not definitively hiring a football czar. All that said, I really like who we brought in to help with the process (bears GM) and if I were a GM candidate, I'd love everything I heard from Phillips and McCaskey...which is basically, this is a very attractive job with a storied history and we are not looking to be involved in the football decisions. That is exactly what any top GM candidate wants. The other thing you have to show that GM candidate is that ownership will dedicate the financial resources and over the past 5 years they have definitely demonstrated that so that shouldn't be difficult. Unlike years past where they hired consulting firms, we brought in a guy who was extremely successful at running football teams and hiring coaches to help with the search. That alone is a huge step forward, not to mention the change we made in the first place to clean house. While not perfect, today really is a major step in the right direction. Even Hub Arkush, Bear hater, while having some concerns, was overly positive about the press conference and especially who they have hired as the consultant. He also thought Ted Phillips handled questions around player personnel brilliantly.