The Chicago Bears are filling the vacancies on their offensive staff. After firing four coaches, including offensive coordinator Mark Helfrich, offensive line coach Harry Hiestand and tight ends coach Kevin Gilbride, the Bears have added three new faces to Matt Nagy’s coaching staff.
Juan Castillo joined the Bears coaching staff as offensive line coach, Clancy Barone was added as the Bears’ new tight ends coach, and now Chicago has found their new offensive coordinator in Bill Lazor.
Here are five things to know about the Bears’ new offensive coordinator:
1. Lazor’s offenses haven’t been the most productive
It’s no secret that the Bears were courting new Broncos offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur, who ultimately chose Denver over Chicago. Shurmur has a proven track record as an offensive coordinator and working with quarterbacks. The same can’t be said for Chicago’s new offensive coordinator.
During his four years as an offensive coordinator, Lazor’s offenses were some of the worst in the league. The Bengals were the worst offense in the NFL in 2017, and just once have his offenses finished higher than 26th. That came with the Dolphins in 2014, where they finished 14th during his first year as an offensive coordinator.
2. Lazor has found “some” success with quarterbacks
Lazor has been a mixed bag when it comes to working with quarterbacks. While Lazor was in Philadelphia for Nick Foles’ impressive 27-touchdown, 2-interception season in 2013, as well as Ryan Tannehill’s best season as a Dolphin in 2014, the same couldn’t be said for potential free agent acquisition Andy Dalton.
Dalton had underwhelming seasons under Lazor. In 2017, Dalton passed for 3,320 yards with a 59.8 completion percentage, as well as 25 touchdowns to 12 interceptions. He followed that up with 2,566 passing yards with a 61.9 completion percentage and 21 touchdowns to 11 interceptions in 11 games in 2018.
With Dalton a pending free agent this offseason, it wouldn’t a surprise if the Bears brought him in to compete with Trubisky for the starting job in 2020.
3. Surprisingly, there’s no Andy Reid coaching-tree connection
Typically when we’re talking about Matt Nagy’s coaching hires there tends to be some kind of Andy Reid connection. Someone that worked on his staff or someone that Nagy worked with. But Lazor doesn’t hail from the Andy Reid coaching tree.
Lazor was with the Philadelphia Eagles for a short time, but it was after Reid was fired. But if you really want to dig deep to find as close of a connection as you can, Lazor did spend 2008 in Seattle coaching under Mike Holmgren, who Reid served under at one time.
4. Lazor has found some success in the run game
While Lazor’s track record as offensive coordinator hasn’t been the best, his offenses have been able to find some success on the ground, which is what the Bears are looking for.
Here are his run game rankings with Cincinnati and Miami:
2018 Bengals: 14th Rushing DVOA
2017 Bengals: 20th Rushing DVOA
2015 Dolphins : 2nd Rushing DVOA
2014 Dolphins: 13th Rushing DVOA
Finding an answer to the run game will be a focus this offseason for the Bears, and so far they’ve made an effort from a coaching standpoint. They brought in offensive line coach Juan Castillo, who has experience as a run game coordinator. They brought in Clancy Barone, who has experience coaching the offensive line. Now, they’ve brought in an offensive coordinator in Lazor who has a solid track record in the run game.
5. “Lazor” is pronounced “laser”
For future reference in all things pronunciations.
