Do you want the good news or the bad news first?
The Bears' pursuit of Lions' offensive coordinator Ben Johnson has already turned into its own little mini-saga. Chicago's hiring committee – all 215 of them – are doing their due dilligence in finding the next Bears coach, interviewing basically every even remotely possible option before they make a decision. Even still, (and this is the good news) it seems like Johnson remains the frontrunner for the job, if he wants it.
And now, the bad news: they're competing against Tom Brady. According to a new Sunday morning report from NFL Network reporter Ian Rapoport, Brady's pushing the Raiders' opening hard in conversations with Johnson, and the latter is reportedly somewhat interested in the job. Considering that Mike Vrabel officially signed the dotted line in New England this weekend, it feels like the Bears and Raiders are turning into the final two choices.
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Raiders (aka Tom Brady) are reportedly making a strong push to hire Ben Johnson
"Now let's talk about the Raiders," Rapoport said. "Ben Johnson, the Lions' offensive coordinator, interviewed with them earlier this week ... My understanding is the name to watch is Johnson. They are said to be enamored with him ... Tom Brady has loomed large recruiting Ben Johnson, imploring him to take the interview and consider the Raiders. If that is something that would be a possibility for Ben Johnson, [he] is said to at least be interested. Keep an eye on this one."
Welp. Who knows how these interviews are going, but I don't exactly love a Tom Brady-George McCaskey matchup when it comes to pitching Johnson on a modern football environment. On paper, the Bears are a bit ahead of the Raiders: they (probably) have the better overall roster and also, you know, a franchise quarterback. Las Vegas offers the change to build an entire team from scratch, and also, you know, happens to be Las Vegas. If Johnson doesn't want to deal with coaching against his old boss twice a year, taking over the Raiders would look awfully tempting.
This feels like one of those situations where, at the end of the day, money talks. I'm not sure there's a huge difference in regards to how appealing the two jobs are, and Johnson's obviously not going to come cheap. But you never know: Tom Brady's dropped the ball against the Bears before, maybe he'll do it again.