It’s a tempting notion to offer up: A promising first season presages a long and successful career for a coach.
After all, if everything is working, teams should get better ever year.
But in real life, it doesn’t always work that way. And in the case of the Bears, it rarely does.
In fact, if the won-lost records in first seasons were pivotal, Bears history might have been quite different, a fact no doubt noted by Lovie Smith as he prepares for his first season as head coach.
Smith is the eighth man to coach the Bears since George Halas retired after the 1967 season.
And he wouldn’t mind being the first to have a winning record in his first season.
But a .500 record in 1968 didn’t do Jim Dooley any good. That only set up the 1-13 season of 1969.
Dave Wannstedt’s 7-9 opener in 1993 led to a playoff berth the next season, but Wannstedt’s program went nowhere from there.
In short, there are bigger issues for first-year coaches than just winning games.
“Basically, you have to get control of the team,” said former linebacker Doug Buffone, who played for four first-year coaches in his franchise-record 14 Bears seasons.
“You have to have certain leaders you can work with, come out with a philosophy and be fair with it.”
Ditka’s message
Mike Ditka’s 3-6 record in the strike-shortened 1982 season gave little indication that he’d be wearing a Super Bowl ring just three years later. But under the surface, other things were going on, even if they didn’t show up in the record.
“In the first season you set an attitude and expectations, and Mike certainly did that,” said Gary Fencik, who was in his seventh season when Ditka took over.
“He was the first head coach I had who actually stated what the goals of the organization were. I remember vividly at our first mini-camp in Arizona when he said our goal was not just to win, but also to get to the Super Bowl and that `half of you won’t be here when we get there.’ And he underestimated the turnover.
“There are many very important things, like attitudes, goals and the way you conduct yourself, that immediately send out signals.”
Of the seven men who have coached the Bears since Halas retired, three had direct Bears ties. Only Ditka had a successful run, a 112-68 record, a Super Bowl victory and seven playoff appearances in 11 seasons.
But Ditka had been away from Chicago for more than a decade when Halas hired him, and he had the benefit of playing for and working under Hall of Fame coach Tom Landry in Dallas. Jim Dooley and Abe Gibron had been Bears assistants.
Dooley had been one of Halas’ favorite players, and he had a brilliant offensive mind. Despite the good start he didn’t have much of a chance, as the 1-13 record in 1969 showed.
“A catastophe,” said Buffone. “Everyone talks about coaching, but you have to have the horses.”
“Dooley seemed to lose respect instead of gain it,” said center Mike Pyle. “Jim was a great football man, but he never became a good head coach.”
“He had a hard time with discipline, like he wasn’t really the boss,” said running back Ronnie Bull. “He had been a teammate of some of the guys, and here was a guy you played with, and now he’s telling you what you can and can’t do, and at the same time he’d been doing the same thing.”
Dooley was succeeded in 1972 by Gibron, one of his assistants. In his case, the first season did tell the story of his tenure. The Bears went 4-9-1, and Gibron’s three-year record was 11-30-1. Gibron’s Bears beat up the opposition more often than they beat them.
“Since Abe had been an assistant, everyone knew he was going to be a rough-and-tumble type of coach,” Buffone said. “I remember being in the locker room after we lost and everyone’s down, and he said, `We put out 11 Lions.’ That was the mind-set.”
Going outside the clan
Smith will be the fifth of Halas’ successors to take the job with no previous ties to the Bears. Jack Pardee, Neill Armstrong, Wannstedt and Dick Jauron had similar stays–all made cameo appearances in the playoffs.
All went to the playoffs in their second or third seasons before tailing off except Pardee, who took off to become coach of the Washington Redskins.
“I knew there was a problem on the plane back from our playoff loss at Dallas in ’77 when Jack asked me if I wanted to buy his home in Lake Forest,” Buffone said.
“I said, `Jack, what are you talking about? What’s going on here?'”
Not even Ditka got to leave on his own terms, which makes Pardee unique. When Pardee left, general manager Jim Finks hired an old associate, Armstrong, the Minnesota defensive coordinator. The Vikings were the NFC’s dominant team at the time, so the hiring made a lot of sense.
But the Bears were one of the NFL’s biggest disappointments in ’78, falling to 7-9 instead of building on the 9-5 playoff record of ’77. A wild-card playoff berth in ’79 led nowhere, and Halas fired Armstrong after four seasons.
“We used to call him Nice Neill,” Buffone said. “I didn’t mind playing for a coach like that–you just go out and play–but the fact is you needed more discipline.”
Armstrong found himself with a very different team in Chicago.
“Neill just came from a different culture,” Fencik said. “The Vikings were a veteran team, and in Chicago there was a lot of work to be done.
“We had a lot of second- and third-year players, and people were euphoric after we went to the playoffs in ’77, so the bar was low.”
In Arizona in the spring of ’82, Ditka raised the bar and kept it high for 11 seasons. Team President Michael McCaskey fired Ditka after a 5-11 season in 1992, hiring Wannstedt.
Wannstedt was coming off a Super Bowl victory as defensive coordinator of the Dallas Cowboys. He had a decent first season, going 7-9 in 1993, and improved to 9-7 in ’94 and ’95.
In Wannstedt’s last three seasons, the Bears went 7-9, 4-12 and 4-12.
“That was the beginning of free agency and the salary cap,” said safety Mark Carrier, who played for Ditka and Wannstedt. “A lot of things came into play.”
Jauron, Jacksonville’s defensive coordinator, succeeded Wannstedt in 1999 and tried to do something only Ditka has done in recent years–settle on a long-term quarterback in the first season. Jim McMahon took over in the third game of Ditka’s rookie season, but Cade McNown, the first-round pick in 1999, lasted only two seasons.
The Bears went 13-3 in Jauron’s third season, 2001, the only winning year in his five seasons. Jauron spent much of his Bears career dealing with injuries at quarterback. The 2001 season is now seen as a product of good fortune–few injuries and several breaks.
It’s Smith’s turn
And now comes Lovie Smith, like Wannstedt and Armstrong a former defensive coordinator of a Super Bowl team.
And Smith, liked Ditka, has spelled out some expectations.
“Beat Green Bay–and he expects us to win, and that’s what we’re going to do,” said Pro Bowl center Olin Kreutz.
Smith’s first season will be measured in ways that go beyond wins and losses. Does Rex Grossman, like McMahon and unlike McNown, establish himself as a starting quarterback?
Can Brian Urlacher and Mike Brown provide the leadership and production on defense that the likes of Mike Singletary, Dan Hampton and Fencik did for Ditka?
And so just what does Smith expect?
“I’m a defensive coach, so I’d be disappointed if we weren’t a very good defense this year,” he said. “If you have a good, dominant defense, you’re in every football game. Our offense will give people trouble, and I can see [a time] when both of them will be clicking together.
“The defense is going to get turnovers and play hard, and then we’ll see what happens. The Super Bowl is everyone’s goal. Our goal, truthfully, is to get into the playoffs and see what happens, playing hard each week and getting into the playoffs and seeing what happens. That’s our goal. Don’t sell yourself short. We don’t know how good we are or how good we can be. We want to play the best and see what happens.”
From his perch at WSCR-AM 670, Buffone will get yet another chance to analyze a new Bears coach. And he has some advice for Smith.
“You have to play the best players,” he said. “I don’t care if it’s his first year or last year, if he’s 32 or 22, you play your best players.
“Last year I don’t think they did. Charles Tillman and Lance Briggs should have played right away. It’s important to play your best players.”
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Sizing up the 1st year
A look at how Bears coaches since George Halas have fared in their first seasons and during their tenures.
Jim Dooley, 1968-72
First year: 7-7
Career: 20-36
Postseason: 0-0
Capsule: Dooley’s first team was his best and was in the race for the playoffs down to the last game of the season. But the Packers came into Wrigley Field and won 28-27.
Center Mike Pyle: “We played better than we expected. I thought it was going to be tougher.”
Abe Gibron, 1972-74
First year: 4-9-1
Career: 11-30-1
Postseason: 0-0
Capsule: Like Dooley, Gibron’s first season was his best. Unlike Dooley’s first season, it foreshadowed what was to come.
Linebacker Doug Buffone: “We were physical, mean and tough. But we didn’t win.”
Jack Pardee, 1975-77
First year: 4-10
Career record: 20-22
Postseason: 0-1
Capsule: With a solid group of rookies led by Walter Payton, the season offered some hope. Bears won two of last three.
Buffone: “Jack was a good coach. He was from the old school, and everything looked pretty darn good at first.”
Neill Armstrong, 1978-81
First year: 7-9
Career: 30-34
Postseason: 0-1
Capsule: Armstrong inherited a playoff team, but a franchise-record eight-game losing streak followed a nice 3-0 start.
Safety Gary Fencik: “Neill came from a different culture in Minnesota, where he was dealing with a veteran team. He had a more laid-back approach.”
Mike Ditka, 1982-92
First year: 3-6
Career: 106-62
Postseason: 6-6
Capsule: A seven-game strike interrupted the season after an 0-2 start. Rookie Jim McMahon became the starting quarterback after the strike.
Fencik: “A lot of adjustments were being made, and we lost some close games (four by seven or fewer points).”
Dave Wannstedt, 1993-98
First year: 7-9
Career: 40-56
Postseason: 1-1
Capsule: Bears won three straight road games to start 7-5, then collapsed.
Safety Mark Carrier: “Dave followed Ditka and came from working for Jimmy Johnson in a successful program in Dallas, and he had to put his own stamp on what we were going to do. He was enthusiastic and upbeat. It started off great.”
Dick Jauron, 1999-2003
First year: 6-10
Career: 35-45
Postseason: 0-1
Capsule: Four losses in final five games cooled early optimism.
Defensive lineman Bryan Robinson: “The coaching staff was demanding until they got to know the players. Any new coaching staff has to get to know the players.”
