By: Kenneth Harrison Jr.

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

The NFL regular season ended Sunday. Changes were made immediately after that, which brings us to the aftermath of Black Monday. Some moves were obvious, while others have been very puzzling to say the least.

The Chicago Bears fired John Fox. Fox is a pretty decent coach, winning the NFC and AFC Championship with Carolina and Denver. He suffered double digit losses every year in his three seasons in Chicago. His overall record with the Bears is 14-34.

The coaching change makes sense but another move by the Bears is a head scratcher. The general manager Ryan Pace has been with the organization for the same amount of time as Fox and he received a contract extension.

I’m not sure why he was rewarded for not building talented teams but if Chicago doesn’t mind why should I? His replacement will likely be an offensive coach like New England’s Josh McDaniel’s or Minnesota’s Pat Shurmur.

Jim Caldwell was fired by Detroit. Caldwell has been there since 2014 and he’s done a decent job. His only losing season was in 2015. The Lions were 9-7 the last two seasons and his overall record with the franchise is 35-28 (.556). That’s the best winning percentage for a Lions head coach since Buddy Parker in the 1950’s.

The Lions have asked for permission to interview Texans Defensive Coordinator Mike Vrabel.

Chuck Pagano has been fired by Indianapolis. He’s been in Indy since 2012 and this year was his first losing season. Starting quarterback Andrew Luck missed the entire season and the Colts went 4-12.

I think most teams would struggle without their starting quarterback. Their roster had glaring weaknesses even when Luck was healthy. The Colts were 8-8 in 2015 and 2016. I think the GM should also be fired with the coach in most cases and this is one of them.

The Colts will also interview Mike Vrabel but Jim Harbough is their top candidate.

Oakland fired Jack Del Rio after three seasons. The Raiders finished 6-10, which was disappointing because they were 12-4 in 2015. That was Del Rio’s only winning season in Oakland.

Their top candidate is their former coach and current analyst Jon Gruden. I think that would be a terrible hire but it would bring a lot of attention for the franchise.

Marvin Lewis was in the final year of his contract in Cincinnati coming into the season. He’s been there since 2003, making him the second-longest tenured coach in the NFL behind Bill Belichick.

The Bengals were one of the worst franchises before he got there so he did help them improve into a winning team. I have to mention he also never won a playoff game during his tenure.

For that I think he should have been fired a while ago. The Bengals went 6-9-1 in 2016 and 7-9 in 2017.

This next move was very confusing to me. New York Jets coach Todd Bowles has been with the team since 2015. His first year the team was 10-6. The last two seasons they were 5-11. He and GM Mike Maccagnan signed contract extensions to continue through 2020.