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Rozner: Bears have much bigger problems than OC

If not for the clowns and dancing bears in Lake Forest, the world would, um, have many fewer clowns and dancing bears.

That's the big take-away from Friday's hysterics, which mostly involved offensive coordinator Aaron Kromer confessing to be the source of anonymous criticism of Jay Cutler in a national report last week.

While his method was unprofessional, the madness overcame Kromer. The public protection of Cutler has driven Kromer to take a route that is not all that unusual in pro sports when there is no accountability in a broken organization.

So, fine. He said what he said and has apologized.

Now what?

The simplest and most common reaction is Kromer should be fired. This, of course, makes sense.

Cutler can't possibly trust Kromer after this, and their working relationship will never be the same.

What else is new?

How many people can you name that Cutler liked, worked well with and didn't hate by the time their working relationship ended?

It's a very short list.

Cutler does not work and play well with others. He didn't in Denver and he hasn't in Chicago. As long as Cutler is in the NFL, he will continue to get coaches fired.

But the Bears are stuck with a very expensive quarterback and there isn't anything they can do about that in the short term.

So do you start firing assistants? Should Kromer go? Should Mel Tucker? Joe DeCamillis?

Of course. But then what?

What kind of quality assistants are you going to get to Lake Forest knowing the head coach has a year left on his contract?

All you do at that point is force the remaining players to learn new systems under new coaches for one year, before they all get fired anyway.

There are no good options until Marc Trestman is replaced, the coaching staff is turned over and there's a new franchise quarterback in place with experience under his belt, until that QB is in the proper system, with a better offensive line and the correct weapons.

That is years away.

There's a much bigger problem here than even Trestman, Kromer and Cutler, who are all pretty big problems.

GM Phil Emery hired Trestman and he's going to be reluctant to fire him. Emery is the one who signed Cutler, and he's going to be reluctant to admit a huge mistake. Emery is the one ultimately responsible for the entire mess, and he knows it would not be simple to turn around this sinking ocean liner.

It would take years.

He has to decide if it's of any value to start the rebuilding process immediately, knowing a new system and coaching staff for Cutler is not going to be of much value in 2015.

See, that's the real problem.

The Bears need a total housecleaning and until that happens, Emery knows he could turn 2015 into even more of a circus with small changes.

Above him, why should ownership trust this general manager to get right the hiring of a new coach or quarterback, when he's done such a poor job to this point?

Above him, why does the team president need search firms to find general managers when there are qualified NFL people out there who can do the job without that kind of outside help?

Above him, should ownership be involved in the hiring and firing of GMs, coaches and QBs, beyond putting in place a team president qualified to handle all of those matters himself?

That's the real issue, much larger than any day-to-day soap opera involving who said what and to whom.

Until the folks who own the team decide they want to run a professional football team professionally, they will continue to buy brooms and clean up after the daily mess that is this bizarre organization.

Nothing at all new about that.

brozner@dailyherald.com

•Hear Barry Rozner on WSCR 670-AM and follow him @BarryRozner on Twitter.

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