Until the Bears change their process, they are stuck at the bottom: Silvy

Another fourth-quarter drive engineered by our talented rookie quarterback, and this time, Cairo Santos game-winning field goal attempt sailed through the uprights untouched.

Goodbye 10-game losing streak. Goodbye 11-game losing skid vs. Green Bay. It was the Bears first win at Lambeau since 2015 when Caleb Williams was 14 years old.

Happy New Year, indeed.

I want to believe this is the dawn of a new day for our Bears. I want to sell you this is the start of something great. I can’t. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times or more, and you’re the Chicago Bears.

Some teams are consistently getting ready for the playoffs at this time every year. And then there are the Bears who routinely kickoff another coaching search.

It’s a Halas Hall tradition unlike any other. George McCaskey throws on an orange tie, says he’s frustrated and that fans deserve better, and then promises that his once proud franchise will finally get it right.

Spoiler alert – it never does. Christmas. New Years. Bears search. It’s how we celebrate the end of December and beginning of January in Chicago.

Super Bowl shuffle? More like the airport shuffle as the Bears car service is getting another workout.

Let’s hope none of the coaching candidates get booked on a back-of-the-plane middle seat ticket like Dan Quinn when he was a finalist in 2022.

Since the Bears won their last division title in 2018, they hired a new defensive coordinator in 2019, a new offensive coordinator in 2020, a new defensive coordinator in 2021, a new general manager and head coach in 2022, a new offensive and defensive coordinator in 2024, and now a new head coach.

So excuse me if I’m not waiving a Bears flag thinking everything is going to be okay after this endeavor. How many times can the dog be kicked before it starts to growl?

Since McCaskey took over as the team’s CEO in 2011, the Bears have made the playoffs twice and haven’t won a single playoff game. George has conducted five head coaching searches along with three for GMs. His overall record is 94-133 for a .414 win percentage. His best years were his first four as CEO. Since Virginia told George she was “pissed” in 2014, McCaskey corrected the problems to the tune of a .386 win percentage.

McCaskey’s first big move was to fire Jerry Angelo and hire Phil Emery. His one stipulation was Emery couldn’t fire Lovie Smith immediately. So Emery waited a year and then replaced Smith with Marc Trestman. The stipulation to Trestman was that Mel Tucker had to run Smith’s defense even though he wasn’t familar with it.

Two years later, McCaskey fired Emery and Trestman for Ryan Pace, and the stipulation was that Pace could not hire his own coach but instead was to be “set up” with John Fox. Two years later, Fox had no clue Trubisky was getting drafted as his new quarterback. Fox was fired months later.

Stipulations? More like stupidity.

When Poles was hired, even though he ultimately chose Matt Eberflus, the search process began by interviewing coaching candidates before Poles had even interviewed for the GM job.

You wonder why the Bears are always losing and searching and searching and losing? It’s because the process is always littered with more bad practices than a Bears training camp.

You can try to treat the Bears losing symptoms by changing coordinators, coaches and general managers, but until the true illness is cured nothing will truly be fixed.

That illness is Bears ownership would rather lose in a comfortable fashion than win with people who make them uncomfortable.

Their actions have shown us this.

They want their guys to produce new results with old stipulations. George may say he wants to win, but until he is open to real internal changes, everything else is just patchwork.

There must not be many mirrors at Halas Hall because the lack of self awareness was stunning during Tuesday’s press conference.

The man in charge of the search, Ryan Poles, is the same person who assured us that his offensive line was much improved for the 2024 season, or that Nate Davis would be a core piece at guard, or that Chase Claypool was worth an early second round pick, or that Eberflus would be a good head coach and then worth keeping instead of trying to hire Jim Harbaugh, or that Jalen Carter wasn’t worth the risk in 2023, or that Velus Jones would be a productive wide receiver and then running back, or that a punter was worth a fourth-round pick. I can go on and on.

The Bears should be searching for a new GM and coach at the same time, but George is comfortable with Poles – just like last year when everyone was comfortable with Eberflus.

So now I’ll cross my fingers and hope the Bears somehow, someway stumble into landing Ben Johnson or Mike Vrabel. Even if they don’t, I’ll eventually rally and talk myself into whoever they hire as being a good fit – column upcoming.

But as of now, the 2024 season has taken my fandom and optimism to a dark place. I need to see real results and progress before I can start buying in again.

Even money says George puts on another orange tie for the GM search next year or in 2027 before the Bears fans are searching for playoff tickets.

Prove me wrong.

• Marc Silverman shares his opinions on the Bears weekly for Shaw Local. Tune in and listen to the “Waddle & Silvy” show weekdays from 2 to 6 p.m. on ESPN 1000.