3 nightmare head coaching candidates the Bears need to steer clear of at all costs

It may be cold in Chicago, but the sun is shining more brightly over Soldier Field today. Matt Eberflus was fired on Friday, and a new era of Bears football is at hand.

Bears ownership, led by chairman George McCaskey, were the last ones to know that Eberflus needed to go after yet another embarrassing late-game mistake, but Bears fans everywhere are glad that the team brass finally came around.

Eberflus ends his Bears career with a 14-32 record, yet it took one of the worst six-week stretches in NFL coaching history to finally seal his fate. The Bears were in the mix to start the season at 4-2, but October and November have featured one case of coaching malpractice after another.

By now, Bears fans can recite Eberflus' baffling decisions by heart, so there's no need to go over them again. Instead, let's look to the future and the most important decision the team has faced since, well, April, when they used the number one pick in the NFL Draft on Caleb Williams.

Other rookie quarterbacks, such as Jayden Daniels, Bo Nix and Drake Maye, have all looked good for extended stretches this year, but it looks like Bears general manager Ryan Poles nailed it by choosing Caleb Williams. Throughout the season, the former Heisman Trophy winner has flashed all the tools scouts look for in a franchise quarterback, and since the Bears replaced offensive coordinator Shane Waldron with Thomas Brown, everything has really come together.

Williams has played as well as or better than any quarterback in the league during his last three games as he's thrown for 827 yards, five touchdowns and no interceptions against a formidable trio of NFC North defenses. He's also used his legs effectively, rushing for 142 yards on 19 carries.

The search for the next Bears head coach will undoubtedly be influenced heavily by what is seen as being best for Williams' development. The rookie has already shown that he has the potential to lead an explosive, efficient offense, and Poles needs to continue to foster that development, while still finding someone who can field an effective defense, inspire the team and make good decisions at the ends of games.

Thomas Brown will continue his rise within the organization for now as the interim head coach. Brown has received praise from other respected voices around the NFL, such as L.A. Rams head coach Sean McVay, and the Bears will need to give him serious consideration for the permanent position if he acquits himself well in what amounts to a five-game interview to end the season.

Other names have been brought up as possible Eberflus replacements, and in the next few months Poles will have the make-or-break decision of choosing which is the right one to lead this team to a new and better future.

Any good hiring process eventually narrows down the candidate pool to the best possible choices. To do that, you must first remove the potential applicants that just don't fit, and that's what we're endeavoring to do today. With a young franchise quarterback and talent on both sides of the ball, Poles will have a large pool of eager suitors to choose from, but there are some big names that just wouldn't be good hires. Here are three that he should avoid at all costs.

3 head coach options the Bears should avoid at all costs

3. Bill Belichick

If Poles is going by resume, there's no coach alive or dead that can compare to Belichick. The former New England Patriots coach has more rings than he can count, and after a brief dalliance with the Atlanta Falcons last offseason, he's had a year off to recharge his batteries since finally parting ways with New England.

Belichick is the biggest fish in the coaching pond, but he doesn't align with what the Bears are trying to do, for a few reasons.

First is his age. Belichick is 72, which makes him six years older than Andy Reid, the current oldest head coach in the league. No coach has won a Super Bowl beyond the age of 68, which is how old Bruce Arians was when he teamed up with former Belichick quarterback Tom Brady to win a ring in Tampa Bay. Belichick hasn't lifted the Lombardi Trophy since he was 66.

The Bears need someone that will be around for a long time. Just as Belichick and Brady were joined at the hip through the entirety of the Patriots dynasty, Poles needs to find someone who can be by Williams' side for the next decade-plus. Even though Belichick would command respect and make better in-game decisions than Eberflus, there's no way he'll be in this for the long haul.

Belichick's final years in New England should give Poles pause also. Eberflus was partly done in by making a bad hire at offensive coordinator. Belichick's coordinators towards the end of his Patriots tenure were a complete disaster. When he wasn't engaging in nepotism by hiring his own sons, he was doing inexplicable things like making former defensive coordinator Matt Patricia the team's offensive coordinator, with predictably awful results.

Belichick had his shot with a young quarterback in Mac Jones, and though the former Alabama quarterback showed promise in his rookie season, he regressed heavily after that, eventually losing his confidence and leaving New England altogether. The Bears can't run the risk that Belichick will have a similar effect on Williams.

2. Lincoln Riley

Some football insiders have pointed to Williams' former coach as a candidate to become his future coach, but hiring Lincoln Riley away from USC is one of the worst things Poles could do.

There's no disputing how productive Williams was with Riley as his coach, both at Oklahoma and USC. Williams threw for over 10,000 yards in three seasons with the Sooners and Trojans, with a sterling 93-14 touchdown-to-interception ratio and 9.2 yards per pass attempt. Other quarterbacks have been outstanding under Riley's tutelage, too. Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray have each won a Heisman with Riley as their coach, and both have gone on to NFL success.

The way Williams has prospered under Thomas Brown shows that he doesn't need Riley to be all that he can be. If that's the case then, why hire Riley? His track record on the other side of the ball is extremely spotty. Even with Williams leading an offense that averaged over 41 points per game, the Trojans managed only an 8-5 record last year thanks to a defense that was one of the worst in the country. You think Bears fans are upset now, ask them about the Mel Tucker years when their defense was historically bad.

Without Williams, Riley has managed only a 6-5 record this year, USC's first as a member of the Big Ten. Can he be a successful coach when he doesn't have a Heisman-quality quarterback, or were his quarterbacks propping him up all along? USC fans would get over it quickly if Riley left for the NFL.

While Williams is the most important player on the team, the Bears need more than just a quarterback whisperer to lead them, and Riley hasn't shown that he's a coach that's capable of winning at the highest level. Matt Eberflus couldn't beat winning teams, and while Riley's 80-23 record is impressive on the surface, his teams are just 1-4 in major bowls and have never seriously contended for a national title.

1. Kliff Kingsbury

Of all the candidates that the Bears need to avoid, they need to avoid Kliff Kingsbury the most. The current Washington Commanders offensive coordinator is coaching fool's gold, someone who looks nice and shiny from afar, but when brought to the light doesn't hold up to close inspection.

Kingsbury is always a hot name in the NFL coaching carousel because he's an exciting offensive mind. His four-year stint in Arizona and his six-year run at Texas Tech are proof though that he doesn't have what it takes to be a great head coach.

Kingsbury's teams always start hot and then tail off down the stretch, to an alarming degree. Throughout his career, his teams are 42-20-1 in the first seven games of the season, then 16-43 afterwards. Maybe it's Kingsbury and not Murray who is playing too much Call of Duty every November?

We're even seeing it again with the Commanders, and Kingsbury is only the offensive coordinator. Jayden Daniels has come back to earth after a red-hot start to the season, and Washington is scoring about eight points fewer per game in its last five than it did in its first seven.

There's something known as the "Peter Principle," which states that a person will keep getting promoted until they are in a job that they are no longer competent at. Kingsbury is football's best modern example of that, a good offensive mind that can't hack it as a head coach.

Kingsbury went 28-37-1 with the Cardinals, and he never went better than 8-5 at Texas Tech. The Bears need a winner, not someone that they'll need to hope can produce completely different results than they ever have before.