The Fire are on the verge of making their executive hire and changing the structure of the franchise.
A source confirmed a report the Fire are finalizing an agreement to hire Georg Heitz as sporting director. Heitz will report directly to owner Joe Mansueto.
Nelson Rodriguez, who had been the Fire’s president and general manager, will serve as president and be moved exclusively to the business side of the franchise. He will also report directly to Mansueto, who told the Sun-Times in September he didn’t anticipate any changes to the team’s structure “at the moment.”
“We were just saying how quickly the next season comes around. March is not that far away,” Mansueto said in September. “In parallel, we’ve got to be planning for next year.”
The Fire declined to comment.
Heitz’s previous job in club soccer was with Swiss side FC Basel from 2008-17, where he helped discover stars such as Mohamed Salah and Xherdan Shaqiri. Over that time, FC Basel was a domestic powerhouse, winning eight straight titles while effectively serving as a feeder team for the biggest and richest clubs in Europe.
However, Heitz will face new challenges with the Fire, ones that are unique to North America.
One obstacle is that he’ll have to learn the nuances and intricacies of MLS roster rules quickly to give the team a chance to compete in 2020. The Fire currently have 17 players under contract, no Designated Players, and all parts of the lineup could use reinforcement after departures up and down the roster.
With Heitz in the fold, the Fire’s next piece of business will be finding a coach. They are one of three teams, along with New York City FC and Inter Miami, that haven’t filled that role.
Rodriguez was hired in Sept. 2015 by former owner Andrew Hauptman to clean up the on-field mess left behind by coach Frank Yallop. Rodriguez tabbed Veljko Paunovic in Nov. 2015, but the duo only reached the playoffs once in four years and never won a U.S. Open Cup before Paunovic was dismissed last month, well after the end of the 2019 season.
