Bears president Kevin Warren has seen team transform in Year 1, but biggest challenge remains

George McCaskey always knew Kevin Warren would have a different management style than retiring Bears president/CEO Ted Phillips. One year into Warren’s tenure — the former Big Ten commissioner started at Halas Hall on April 17, 2023 — the chairman has adjusted to it. He considers it his duty.

“Energetic, dynamic, passionate, enthusiastic,” McCaskey said at the NFL’s annual meetings last month. “Not that Ted wasn’t all of those things, but Kevin just does it in a different way. He’s a force of nature.”

That force is about to be tested. The Bears are pushing to build a domed stadium just south of Soldier Field, saying they’re willing to invest $2 billion in private money toward a building they wouldn’t own. Questions remain about where the rest of the money will come from, though, and Friends of the Parks is urging them to slow down.

Building downtown when the team owns 326 acres in Arlington Heights is a sharp turn from one year ago, given the team’s previous frustrations with the city and Soldier Field. Warren and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson have cultivated a working relationship, though.

“One of the things I promised myself when I started on April 17 of last year [was that] I was going to understand and appreciate and embrace the history of the Chicago Bears and all the relationships,” Warren said last month. “But any tension or negativity, I was not going to take it forward.”

Warren said “this is the year” to agree on a stadium plan. He expects to release stadium renderings soon.

“You could always figure it’s not the right time,” he said. “I’m just one of those individuals that comes to the table to say we have a unique opportunity to build a world-class, fixed-roof stadium, to bid for the Super Bowl, to bid for the Final Four, to bid for college events, to bid for concert events, and then all the other mega events that come into town and the economic impact that this will have on our city.”

It seems everything is changing at Halas Hall. When the Bears draft USC quarterback Caleb Williams — college football’s first Name, Image and Likeness celebrity — first overall next week, they will cap one of the most transformative periods in franchise history.

General manager Ryan Poles, who reports to Warren, has overhauled the roster, adding veteran standouts DJ Moore, Keenan Allen, Montez Sweat, Tremaine Edmunds, Kevin Byard and D’Andre Swift in the last 14 months. The contracts he gave Sweat, Edmunds and cornerback Jaylon Johnson rank in the top six in Bears history in average annual value.

The Bears are even more unrecognizable off the field. In the last six weeks, Warren has created four executive vice president roles — the level just below him on the organizational chart. He promoted Karen Murphy and Liz Geist to two of the roles and hired Krista Whitaker from the NBA’s Heat and Meka White Morris from baseball’s Twins for the other two positions. Wednesday, the Bears named former Chiefs executive Ted Crews their Special Advisor to the President/CEO and Chief Administrative Officer. He’ll oversee football and corporate communications.

Three of the Bears’ six senior vice presidents — the next rung down — have either been promoted or hired in the last six weeks. More changes are expected, the result of Warren meeting individually with almost 200 staffers in his first six months on the job.

The image of the Bears as a sleepy, family-run business is starting to feel outdated. In January, the team parted with senior vice president and general counsel Cliff Stein after almost 22 years.

“Our family feels very strongly that Kevin needs to be given the freedom to make the decisions that he needs to make to make sure the Bears are successful,” McCaskey said. “I feel it’s my job to support him in that.”

Warren’s energy feels different, McCaskey reiterated.

“He makes it easy because he is so passionate about it, so excited about it,” McCaskey said. “It’s gone very well so far.”