The Ben Johnson era has begun for the Chicago Bears and there has been a ton of worry for Detroit Lions fans that Johnson and the Bears will be raiding the Lions coaching staff. You breathe easy on that for now.
According to Chicago Tribune Bears beat writer Brad Briggs, the Bears will likely not be hiring Lions offensive line coach Hank Fraley to be their offense coordinator.
Keeping Fraley is a big deal for the Lions if they’re able to do it. Fraley is still an offensive coordinator candidate with the Seahawks at the moment. He’s had two interviews there. So don’t get too comfortable just yet.
In terms of the rest of the staff, there is still a chance Johnson will take an assistant with him. We don’t know who that is or what their role is. What we do know is that Johnson reportedly is looking for guys with head coaching experience to be his coordinators. If you were concerned that he would take Tanner Engstrand with him to be the OC in Chicago. At the moment that doesn’t look like it’s going to happen.
The Lions may wind up keeping a lot more coaches than previously thought if they can get out of this cycle alive. The Bears not taking anyone is big. Now we know that while Aaron Glenn plans to bring Mark Brunell to New York with him, he doesn’t appear to be looking to take anyone else.
Looks like the Lions are holding onto Kelvin Sheppard for now. Other teams could still be interested. The Lions now have some runway to move forward with their contingency plan for the coordinator roles if they plan to promote from within.