Chicago Bears: John Fox showing salt in his criticism of team

John Fox went on television and said the Chicago Bears had the worst offseason in the NFL. He sounds more than a little salty critiquing his former employers.

Things changed a lot for the Chicago Bears since the end of the 2017 season. They went 12-4, going from last to first in the NFC North. Sure, they lost the playoff game, but that serves as a motivator for the 2019 season.

Of course, what they changed was their direction away from former head coach John Fox and his 14-34 in his three seasons in Chicago. Fans grew tired of his dinosaur styled offense, one that basically was depending a lot on a good defense and a good rushing attack.

That old style of football did not work. The offense got worse every season. The unit ranked 23rd in 2015, 28th in 2016 and 29th in 2017. The defense, however, went from 20th to 24th then up to 9th. After the calls for his firing grew to a loud scream, the Bears finally decided to part ways with Fox.

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A year after Fox’s firing, it seems that he harbors some hard feelings. He went on ESPN’s NFL Live and one of the segments was on which team had the worst offseason. Fox stepped up and fired a shot at his former team.

"I think when you’re going to play defense, you’re going to lean on your takeaways to help a young offense and you don’t have a kicker, a reliable kicker that you’re going to need those points from after some of those turnovers. I think the kicking question is really big right now in Chicago and I think that might be a problem going into the season."

Fox jumped on the kicking situation. While he is correct that the kicking is important, they’ll find an answer. They’ll find a kicker who can make more than 76.7 percent of his kicks like Cody Parkey did last year.

The way Fox handled things in Chicago put a bad taste in Bears fans’ mouths. He put leashes on some of the youngsters in 2017. Tarik Cohen, Adam Shaheen and the team’s first-round pick, Mitchell Trubisky. While Cohen and Shaheen showed lots of promise, Fox kept them out of key situations in big game situations.

Fox mishandled the rookie franchise quarterback

With Trubisky, Fox just didn’t know what to do right from the start. He put him into a preseason game late in the fourth quarter after Connor Shaw got hurt. Putting him in wasn’t the problem. The problem was he had Trubisky drop back multiple times, risking injury in a meaningless game.

Then, during the season, Fox refused to have Trubisky pass too much. The Bears ranked dead last in passing attempts and passing yards. That did not sit well with many fans.

For Fox to now say that this version of the Bears is dependent on the offense is rich. He’s confusing them with his offense. Under Fox, if the defense gave the offense the ball on the opponent’s 15, Fox’s offense would move the ball to the 13 in three plays and settle for a field goal.

Now, to be fair, Fox wasn’t the only one to say the Bears had the worst offseason. Damien Woody also mentioned Chicago. His explanation was the loss of defensive coordinator Vic Fangio. It’s possible that Woody said the Bears only to mitigate Fox’s answer, however.

Fox’s relationship with Chicago isn’t so good

Fox still has a good relationship with his first team, the Carolina Panthers. He recently played in a charity golf tournament with his replacement, Ron Rivera.

Things aren’t so rosy with Chicago. When talking about the Bears with his replacement Matt Nagy, Fox wasn’t as high on him as many around the league.

There are teams like Kansas City that are doing similar things. For me, the jury is out on all of it. Some of the defenses are catching up with these things pretty quickly. I mean, remember the run and shoot? It had its moment, but it kind of went away over time. You will have trends.

Nagy is a trend? His offense is like the run and shoot, a gimmick? Okay. Fox also said that a big reason for the Bears’ improvement was more because of the added players and not because of Nagy’s play calling, saying that running the ball and having a good defense is still the way to go.

A couple of former Bears greats didn’t exactly cry when the team fired Fox. Here is what Dan Hampton said about Fox during the Bears100 Celebration, per Pro Football Talk:

"Thank God John Fox’s ass is out of town. Thank God."

At the same event, Gary Fencik expressed his opinion as well, also per Pro Football Talk:

"What I find refreshing, I liked John Fox, but John Fox didn’t treat fans with respect. And I’m a [Bears] fan. I’m a season ticket holder. And it was kind of like, ‘You don’t deserve to know,’ or ‘I’m not going to give you a lot of information.’ What I really like about Matt [Nagy] is I think he recognizes and respects that the fans aren’t idiots."

John Fox is still stuck in the past. He just doesn’t see how big the passing game is in today’s game. Yes, a good running game helps, but a team could win with a middle-of-the-road rushing attack. The Kansas City Chiefs under Nagy ranked 14th and they had one of the top offenses in the NFL. Last season, even with the loss of Kareem Hunt, they had the top-ranked offense in the league.

There are doubters to what the Chicago Bears are doing this season, and that’s fine. They’ll prove the doubters wrong. It’s a shame that some shade comes from someone who was so close to many of these players.