Vic Fangio received a lot of credit for orchestrating the No. 1 defense in the NFL last season. He parlayed it into the head coaching job for the Denver Broncos.
But the former Chicago Bears defensive coordinator downplayed his influence in a classy vote of confidence for the guy filling his shoes at Halas Hall.
“The players haven’t changed, and the players are the most important thing,” Fangio said at the NFL combine. “Chuck [Pagano] will do fine with those guys. There’ll be some carryover, as there are from a lot of systems. But I don’t think they’ll have much problems.”
Fangio said he was moved by the outpour of support he received from his former players when he reached his goal of becoming a head coach in the NFL.
“It was neat to have players reach out from all the way back in the mid-80s, when I first started in the league,” Fangio said. “It was difficult. Just everything that I had there going in Chicago, it was hard to leave.”
The Bears defense has nine of their 11 defensive starters currently under contract for 2019, with Adrian Amos and Bryce Callahan set to hit free agency.
Fangio could have interest in bringing either along with him to Denver, potentially cutting in to that continuity in Chicago.
