With Matt Eberflus gone and the Chicago Bears' struggles continuing, blame is shifting to Ryan Poles. The Bears have said that they are committed to bringing Poles back next year, and while some fans will not like it, there is a reason why he is not getting the brunt of the blame.
Poles stepped into an interesting situation. Poles was hired when the Bears were already well down the road in terms of hiring their next head coach following the firings of Matt Nagy and Ryan Pace after the 2021 season.
Matt Eberflus had ties to Bill Polian, who led the head coach search, and he had ties to Lovie Smith, which the Bears thought was a good selling point. They hired Eberflus two days after Poles was hired, and one day after he interviewed.
Poles also inherited Justin Fields. During his first year with Fields, it was clear that he was not a believer in him. Fields started to win Poles over, but more than that, he won the fanbase over. We all know that George McCaskey is the biggest fan, so once again Poles had a decision made for him to roll with Fields.
Now, with the hire of Kevin Warren, it appears as though he has less power in the front office. The press conference detailing the firing of Eberflus showed who had full control, and there were reports that Poles wanted to fire Eberflus sooner but were not allowed by ownership.
When it comes to major decisions, Poles is not getting as much say as people think. We know that he passed on Jalen Carter, but we do not know what the people above him thought of Carter. We do not know the pressure that the ownership put on him to make a splash trade for Chase Claypool to help fan favorite Justin Fields.