Bears president/CEO Ted Phillips to retire in February

Ted Phillips, who has served as the Bears’ president and CEO since 1999, will retire in February, the team said Friday.

Phillips is the fourth president in team history — and the only one not related to founder George Halas. His son “Mugs” Halas held the job, followed by grandson Michael McCaskey. Phillips replaced McCaskey after serving as vice president of operations from 1993 to ’99, finance director from 1987 to ’93 and controller from 1983 to ’87.

“He started out with us as a financial expert,” Bears matriarch Virginia McCaskey said in a statement. “Anything that he was ever asked to take care of, he came through and did it very well. We’ve been very blessed to have him.”

The Bears already have partnered with executive search firm Nolan Partners to look for his successor.

Phillips’ focus was on the Bears’ business operations. He negotiated a deal to renovate Soldier Field in 2003 after Michael McCaskey could not, although the Bears since have decided that playing there is no longer acceptable. Chairman George McCaskey and Phillips led the Bears’ search for land upon which to build a new stadium. The Bears signed a $197.2 million purchase agreement for the former Arlington International Racecourse site last year. The team is in escrow, which is expected to close before Phillips retires.

Unlike more modern front offices, the Bears don’t bifurcate their upper management into football and business operations. Until only recently, that left general managers to report to Phillips, a business executive respected around the NFL but with a limited football background.

Phillips’ presence at season-ending news conferences irked Bears fans frustrated with losing. The Bears won only three playoff games during Phillips’ tenure. They had only seven winning seasons, tied for 23rd-most in the league during that span.

Phillips infamously brushed aside the franchise’s biggest concern in January 2021 when he and McCaskey announced they were retaining GM Ryan Pace and coach Matt Nagy.

“Have we gotten the quarterback situation completely right? No,” Phillips said. “Have we won enough games? No. Everything else is there.”

A year later, Phillips helped hire GM Ryan Poles to replace Pace. Phillips’ pending retirement seemed to be a possibility when McCaskey said, in a change, that Poles would report to him and not Phillips. McCaskey said at the time that Phillips would be able to focus on the Arlington Heights project.

Whomever the Bears hire to replace Phillips will inherit the most challenging — and exciting — business opportunity in franchise history. In Arlington Heights, the Bears intend to build a mixed-use stadium site that they’ve called “one of the largest development projects in Illinois state history.” They will hold a public meeting to detail some of those plans Thursday.

That massive undertaking provides a rare chance for the McCaskeys to hire outside their family — or, in Phillips’ case, someone not close enough to be a family member.

Organizational information gleaned from the Bears’ lengthy general manager interview process — they talked to 13 candidates — could inform how the Bears proceed in hiring Phillips’ replacement. The Bears should consider executives who already have accomplished what the Bears want to do — oversee a stadium project that could add billions of dollars to the franchise’s valuation. They could consider hiring a football czar and business executive in separate roles, but the former could undercut Poles.

McCaskey did not change the fundamental structure of Halas Hall in January, short of having the GM report to him. He said then that he didn’t understand the appeal of a football czar. It’s unclear why he’d have a change of heart now. Change, after all, moves slowly at Halas Hall.

The Bears likely will consider internal candidates — including senior vice presidents Cliff Stein, Scott Hagel and Karen Murphy — for the promotion. After all, they’ve never hired a president who didn’t already work down the hall.