Dan Pompei at the Chicago Tribune answers your questions:
“What do you think about the Bears trying to hire Jeremy Bates as [Bears quarterback Jay] Cutler‘s QB coach now that he was let go by Seattle? Mark, Chicago
“In theory, it sounds good. But I don’t think it would work. It’s more important that the quarterbacks coach matches up with the offensive coordinator than that he matches up with the quarterback. Bates comes from a different offensive background than Mike Martz, and they might not be a good fit together.”
It’s a shame that Bates finds himself out in the cold after deciding to follow Pete Carroll to Seattle instead of considering the offensive coordinator position in Chicago. Carroll didn’t seem to hesitate to dump Bates when what he thought was a better guy in the form of Darrell Bevell appeared on the market.
It’s a tough business but, though Lovie Smith has been known to dump a lot more than an assistant or two over the years, its fair to wonder if he wouldn’t have been more loyal to Bates than Carroll was after only one year and a playoff appearance. My guess is that he would have had to have done much worse with the Bears than he did with Seattle for that to have happened (see Terry Shea).