Matt Nagy says he has not been told Chicago’s Thanksgiving’s game against the Lions will be his last as head coach of the Bears.
Mark Konkol, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for Patch who does not typically cover the Bears reported that Nagy “was informed of his pending post-Turkey Day termination on Monday.”
“That is not accurate,” Nagy told reporters on Tuesday. “I have great communication with ownership, George [McCaskey] and Ted [Phillips] and Ryan [Pace], and I have not had any discussions [on that].”
Communication was one of the hallmarks touted by Bears president Ted Phillips in his explanation of why he retained Nagy and GM Ryan Pace after finishing 8-8 and missing the playoffs last season.
Asked if he’d received assurances he would finish the season with the Bears, Nagy gave a very football coach answer: “My focus right now is on these players and Detroit.”
The Bears are 3-7, and the offense has struggled moving the ball despite it being Nagy’s area of expertise. Frustrations have been boiling over as Andy Dalton is set to start at quarterback on Thursday, with Justin Fields dealing with a rib injury.
It has been a rough week for Nagy in the Chicago community. “Fire Nagy” chants not only cascaded at a Chicago Bulls game, but reached Nagy’s son’s high school football game over the weekend.
“When I’m in the role I’m in, you have to be able to understand where people are coming from and how they react or how they don’t react,” Nagy said about the boos, according to The Athletic. “I was there to watch my son play a football game. I was there to be a dad.”
Dr. Neil Lesinski, the principal of Cary-Grove High School in Illinois where the chants rang out, apologized and said they were “not acceptable nor appropriate.”
Whether or not Nagy finishes the season with the Bears, it looks right now like it would take a miracle for him to return in 2022.