One of the most confusing and concerning issues facing the Chicago Bears going into this off-season was the contract status of GM Ryan Poles. Initially, reports said he’d signed a four-year contract in 2022. That meant 2025 would be his last season, making him a lame-duck GM right when the Bears were set to hire a new head coach. Not only that, but it sounded as if the team wasn’t keen on extending him despite letting him lead the search. It felt like an egregious miscalculation.
Later updates indicated Poles was actually signed through 2026, giving him a little more cushion. Some wondered if the Bears planned to let him and the next head coach feel each other out for two years. If it worked out, they’d address the issue then. If not, they could find a new GM the coach prefers. As it turns out, there will be no such experiment. According to Courtney Cronin of ESPN, expectations are that Poles will receive a three-year extension in the near future to bring himself into alignment with head coach Ben Johnson.
The Bears do not publicly comment about the contracts of coaches and front office personnel, nor would Poles address whether he has assurances of receiving a contract extension when asked on Jan. 7. According to a team source with knowledge of the situation, Poles’ deal runs through the 2026 season, and the expectation is he will receive an extension to align him with Johnson, who signed a five-year contract with Chicago, a term that is common for first-time head coaches.
What’s less common for first-time head coaches are substantial salaries. He’s believed to be making $13 million per year, whereas Eberflus made $6 million. As one source put it, the Bears “didn’t cut corners” when it came to paying Johnson.
Ryan Poles got the same treatment as Ryan Pace.
In 2018, the team extended the former GM right before he conducted his search for the next head coach, who eventually became Matt Nagy. Their partnership produced a division title and another playoff berth in 2020. Unfortunately, their inability to fix the quarterback position proved their undoing. Ryan Poles may have avoided that pitfall by selecting Caleb Williams in the 2024 draft. That means he is free to build up the rest of the roster without sacrificing extra resources to fix the most important position. If he and Johnson can produce some good off-seasons over the next two years, this team may emerge as a contender in the near future. At least there won’t have to be any further conversations about it.
