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The Chicago Bears are losing another assistant coach, as ESPN’s Field Yates is reporting that inside linebackers coach Mark DeLeone is heading to the Detroit Lions to serve in the same role on Dan Campbell’s new coaching staff.
Since this was a lateral move, DeLeone was either out of contract, which is the most likely as most assistants sign 2-year deals, or the Bears allowed him to leave for Detroit. DeLeone had been with the Bears since 2019, and before that he was with the Kansas City Chiefs from 2013 to 2018.
This now makes five assistant coaches that have left Matt Nagy’s coaching staff in the last few weeks. Defensive line coach Jay Rodgers left to become the Chargers defensive run game coordinator/d-line coach, passing game coordinator Dave Ragone left to become the Falcons offensive coordinator, running backs coach Charles London also went to Atlanta to be their quarterbacks coach, and outside linebackers coach Ted Monachino makes it a Falcon trifecta as he joins their staff in the same role.
The Bears now have four vacant spots on new defensive coordinator Sean Desai’s coaching staff.
- Defensive line – Vacant
- Outside linebackers – Vacant
- Inside linebackers – Vacant
- Secondary – Deshea Townsend
- Safeties - Vacant
- Pass rush analyst/assistant linebackers – Bill Shuey
- Defensive quality control – Shane Toub
- Defensive quality control – Ronell Williams
They’ll need to fill those first three openings for sure, but not all teams have a dedicated safeties coach on staff. Bill Shuey, who was the linebackers coach for the Eagles for three years, is a likely candidate for a promotion to one of the linebacker assistant jobs.
On offense, the Bears will need to hire a new running backs coach, but passing game coordinator is a relatively new role that not all teams have.