#3. Firing Lovie Smith – 2013
Listen, we all know Lovie Smith is one of the most boring humans on the planet. His media conferences will put you to sleep and his indirect way of answering questions will annoy the hell out of you. But the fact of the matter is …. he was winning in Chicago and build a unique culture here.
Smith was essentially fired after going 29-19 in his final three seasons. The Bears appeared in a 2006 Super Bowl, and won the NFC, once during his tenure. He was 10-6 in his final season, but missed the playoffs…. so the Bears canned him. Most Chicago fans know that really wasn’t the reason Smith was fired though, he was fired because he wasn’t able to fix the Bears’ historic quarterback problem. Thinking Cutler was the answer, and Smith wasn’t, management decided to go in another direction.
Shortly after that, Brian Urlacher and Lance Briggs basically hung them up. Urlacher retired and Briggs played two more mediocre seasons where his commitment level was questioned several times. The defensive mentality Chicago built, under Smith, was completely gone the following season when the Bears tumbled to the 30th ranked defense. That was after they finished 5th in Smith’s final year.
Had the Bears kept Smith, and got rid of Cutler, things may look quite different in Chicago.
Subscribe to the BFR podcast and ride shotgun with Dave and Ficky as they break down Bears football like nobody else.
