Chicago Bears coach Matt Nagy was named the 2018 NFL Coach of the Year Saturday at the NFL Honors ceremony after leading Chicago on a worst-to-first turnaround last season.
The Bears finished 5-11 in John Fox’s last year as the team’s head coach, leading to the coaching change that landed Nagy. In just one season on the job, Nagy led the Bears to a 12-4 record and an NFC North championship.
He was one Cody Parkey double-doink from winning a playoff game, too.
Nagy’s remarkable season puts him in some rarified air in Chicago. It’s the seventh time a Bears coach won Coach of the Year, but he’s only the fifth one in Chicago to do it.
Two legends won the award twice: George Halas (’63 and ’65) and Mike Ditka (’85 and ’88).
Lovie Smith, the only Bears coach besides Ditka to lead Chicago to a Super Bowl, won the award in 2005. Dick Jauron took home the hardware in 2001.
Nagy set a high standard in 2018. There’s little doubt he’s up to the challenge of maintaining it, even with the Bears likely entering 2019 as a Super Bowl favorite.
