Chicago Sports

Andrew McKenna Sr., a titan in Chicago’s business, civic and sports arenas, died Tuesday.

Mr. McKenna, along with insurance magnate Patrick Ryan, purchased 19.6% of the Chicago Bears in 1990 from the grandchildren of Bears founder George Halas Sr. during a highly publicized family feud.

On the Bears website, team Chairman George H. McCaskey said of Mr. McKenna, who sat on the team’s board of directors: “Few people have had a larger impact on our great city.”

Over the course of his career, he served as board chairman for McDonald’s, Schwarz Paper, the Cubs, the White Sox and the University of Notre Dame.

“His nickname among his close friends was Mr. Chairman because he ended up being chairman of almost everything he touched,” Ryan told the Sun-Times.

Mr. McKenna also served for decades on the board of Aon Corp., a company Ryan founded and formerly headed as chief executive.

Mr. McKenna, who lived in Winnetka, was 93. He died at home surrounded by family from an illness that came on in recent weeks, friends said.

He grew up in South Shore in a large Irish Catholic family and was a member of St. Phillip Neri Catholic Church and was loyal to the South Side his entire life, Ryan said.

After graduating from the University of Notre Dame and earning a law degree from DePaul University, Mr. McKenna worked as a salesman for Schwarz Paper and was about to leave the company when its owner suggested he buy the business.

“He made it a successful company,” his friend Newton Minow said.

His first venture into professional sports took place in his late 20s when Mr. McKenna served as general manager for a minor league baseball team in Michigan City, Indiana, for a year.

Years later, he spearheaded an investor group with Bill Veeck that bought the White Sox and kept the team from being moved to Seattle. Mr. McKenna was named chairman of the ball club. After the team was sold to Jerry Reinsdorf in 1981, he was hired for the same position with the Cubs when they came under Tribune ownership.

Friends spoke of an unparalleled wisdom, sincerity, kindness and trust that undergirded Mr. McKenna’s relationships.

“I’ve never known a person who is more highly regarded across the entire landscape of Chicago, but really beyond Chicago because of his national prominence in corporate governance,” said Ryan, who counted Mr. McKenna as his mentor for nearly six decades.

He mentored hundreds of people as their career trajectories elevated them to unfamiliar heights.

“When people were promoted or hired into prominent positions they were told: ‘Go see Andy McKenna,’ so there were just scores of people as they came into greater responsibility in the Chicago area who were directed to see Andy for guidance. His wisdom was just unique. And he was the go-to guy whenever I had a vexing problem,” Ryan said.

Chicago financier Lester Crown, a longtime friend, spoke with Mr. McKenna weekly.

“When something came up, like thousands of others, I would call Andy. His judgment was just so good and so solid. I called on him often for his evaluation of someone’s character even more than their capability,” Crown said.

“He was very quiet, he wasn’t pushy in any way, he made his point with just good humor, but you could go to bed on what he told you, and there are not that many people you can say that about,” Crown said.

Mr. McKenna was a key player in organizing the city’s unsuccessful Olympic bid under former Mayor Richard M. Daley.

“He did things very quietly, behind the scenes, always giving others credit. The important thing was to get things done. He was so comfortable in his own skin that he could do that. He wasn’t afraid of saying things publicly, but he didn’t attempt to become the guy out front seeking publicity,” Crown said.

One of his key roles in boardrooms was bringing in talent, Ryan said.

He headed up the boards of Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, the Ireland Economic Advisory Board, Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Museum of Science and Industry, Civic Committee, the United Way of Metropolitan Chicago and the Big Shoulders Fund, which he co-founded.

“I will always think of him as St. Andrew because to me he was a saint,” Minow said. “If he was ever asked to take on some civic duty he never said no.”

And he never forgot about his alma mater, Leo Catholic High School, where he helped raise millions for the school’s tuition assistance program.

“I can’t say enough about what he meant to Leo,” said school President Dan McGrath. “His influence was profound.”

Friends all said Mr. McKenna was happiest around his family.

He is survived by seven children, 24 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren. His wife of 66 years, Joan McKenna, died in 2019.

Services are being planned.

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PHOENIX — Jim McMahon doesn’t watch a lot of football anymore. But he knows that the Bears finished with the worst record in the NFL.

“That’s not good for the city,” the former quarterback said Wednesday. “I know Chicago is a big Bear town. I know there’s a lot of frustrated fans out there. …

“I think the whole city’s a lot happier when the Bears are doing well. They suffer when they don’t do well.”

As for quarterback Justin Fields, consider McMahon one of the few people associated with the NFL who doesn’t have an opinion.

“I didn’t watch any of [the season],” he said. “I haven’t seen him play.

Really?

“I don’t watch [football],” he said. “I like playing it. I don’t care to watch it.”

For the second straight year, McMahon was pushed around radio row in a wheelchair. It was for the same malady — McMahon had right ankle surgery 15 months ago, and an infection necessitated two more surgeries.

“It’s a little bit better, but it’s taking way too long,” he said. “I’m not used to being this laid up.”

McMahon is able to walk, and to travel, but admitted that “it’s a pain, getting through the airports on a crutch.”

McMahon was promoting his own cannabis line, Revenant, and a Friday charity golf tournament benefiting the Gridiron Greats Assistance Fund. Former Bears coach Mike Ditka is an emeritus member of the fund’s board of directors.

It will be a chance for McMahon, who lives in the Phoenix area, to show off his city to out-of-towners. Chicago’s never too far from his mind, though.

“I still love the city,” he said. “I just don’t like the weather.”

Mahomes on ankle

Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes continued to sound optimistic about recovering from his right high ankle sprain.

“It’s going to be definitely better, more mobile — [I’ll] be able to move around a little bit better for sure,” he said. “And then we’ll see on game day how close to 100 percent I can be.”

Head coach Andy Reid said “he can really do just about everything” with the ankle, which he injured in the second round of the AFC playoffs.

Anti-Combine

At the NFLPA’s annual news conference, executive director DeMaurice Smith called for the end of the Scouting Combine.

Smith said the combine requires players to “waive your medical rights” while being examined by team doctors whose goal is to “decrease your draft value.”

Smith said he would support the union putting on regional pro days instead. That doesn’t seem likely any time soon.

Hamlin honored

Just five weeks after he collapsed during a game and almost died, Bills safety Damar Hamlin received the NFLPA’s Alan Page Community Award. He was honored for his help in raising $9 million through his foundation; fans donated in the days after he went into cardiac arrest.

Hamlin spoke briefly when he accepted the award inside the Phoenix Convention Center, saying that “giving back to my community has always been a big part of who I am.”

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Wednesday, February 8, 2023

BIG NORTHERN

Winnebago at Rock Falls, 7:30

DU KANE

Geneva at St. Charles East, 7:00

Glenbard North at Wheaton North, 7:00

Lake Park at St. Charles North, 7:00

Wheaton-Warr. South at Batavia, 7:00

INDEPENDENT SCHOOL

Northridge at Morgan Park Academy, 6:00

KISHWAUKEE RIVER

Woodstock North at Woodstock, 7:00

NIC – 10

Auburn at Harlem, 7:00

Belvidere at Jefferson, 7:00

Belvidere North at Hononegah, 6:30

Boylan at Guilford, 6:30

Rockford East at Freeport, 7:00

NON CONFERENCE

Crystal Lake Central at Elgin Academy, 7:00

DePue at Deland-Weldon, 5:30

Ellison at Hancock, 6:30

EPIC at Shepard, 6:30

Fasman Yeshiva at Wolcott, 6:00

Fenger at Schurz, 5:00

Flanagan-Cornell at Midland, 7:00

Innovations at Longwood, 4:30

Intrinsic-Belmont at Douglass, 5:30

Jones at Latin, 6:00

Leland at Woodland, 7:15

Lemont at Hinsdale South, 7:00

Lincoln-Way West at Thornton Fr. South, 7:00

Little Village at Thornwood, 5:00

Milledgeville at South Beloit, 7:00

Momence at Watseka, 7:00

Newark at Sandwich, 6:45

Noble Academy at Mather, 6:30

North Shore at Lake View, 6:00

Ogden at Chicago Academy, 5:00

Ottawa at Dunlap, 7:00

Our Lady Sacred Heart at Chesterton-IH, 5:30

Payton at Amundsen, 6:00

Schurz at Fenger, 5:00

Steinmetz at Elmwood Park, 7:00

Streator at Plano, 7:00

Vernon Hills at Grayslake North, 7:00

Wells at Clemente, 5:00

LAKE SHORE ATHLETIC TOURNAMENT

Semi-Finals

Intrinsic-Downtown at Horizon-McKinley, 5:30

Beacon vs. Christian Heritage

PUBLIC LEAGUE PLAYOFFS – BLUE

at Dunbar

Manley vs. Julian, 5:00

PUBLIC LEAGUE TOURNAMENT – BLUE 8

at Dunbar

Carver vs. Goode, 6:30

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Rumors abound about the possibility of Tee Higgins being available via trade should the Bengals be unable to extend him.

Tee Higgins has been the picture of consistency, he’s good for about 74 receptions and just under 1,100 yards receiving and 7 TDs since he entered the league as a second-round draft pick from Clemson.  The Cincinnati Bengals face a conundrum however, Joe Burrow will need to be extended soon as will Jamar Chase, the other monsters in the Bengals’ two-headed WR attack.

Peter King thinks the Bears should enter the Tee Higgins sweepstakes if the Bengals make him available for trade.  This thought is an absolute no-brainer that should have the Bears possibly looking to trade for Tee Higgins after the trade back in the 2023 NFL Draft.

The best possible scenario for the Bears would be to trade back and then look to make a trade similar to the one the Eagles made for AJ Brown.  Brown went for the #18th overall pick in the first round, as well as a third-round pick in 2022.  That would seem to be fair value for both the Bears and the Bengals and it would also have the Bears using their available cap space in order to sign Higgins to a long-term deal.  The market rate for Higgins would probably be in the neighborhood of $25-million per season, again, similar to the deal the Eagles gave Brown last year.

Tee Higgins should be the priority of the Bears if the Bengals are willing to trade him away.  The free agent market for WRs is absolute trash and the likelihood that the Bears can find an impact WR in this year’s draft is also slim.  Chase Claypool on the outside with Darnell Mooney in the slot would give the Bears a stronger receiving core and allow them to focus on the offensive line in the upcoming NFL draft.

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While raving Wednesday about Sam Lafferty’s fantastic recent stretch, Blackhawks coach Luke Richardson made an eye-opening comparison.

“He’s starting to put the pieces together and really understand where he’s effective in the game with his speed and size,” Richardson said. “It’s unique. We had a guy like that in Montreal, Josh Anderson, and everybody in the league wants one of those guys. He’s starting to become that, and that’s great.”

The interesting thing about Anderson is he was the subject of one of the more memorable and ambitious trade-and-sign instances in recent NHL history.

With Lafferty, 27, attracting serious attention ahead of the trade deadline and skyrocketing up league-wide trade rankings, Hawks general manager Kyle Davidson would surely love to execute a similar maneuver.

In October 2020, Anderson was coming off a miserable final season with the Blue Jackets in which he tallied just four points in 26 games. Although terrible shooting luck was involved — and he had recorded 47 points in 82 games the year before — his value seemed fairly low.

But the Canadiens nonetheless gave up the sizable package of a third-round pick and (coincidentally) Max Domi to acquire him, then immediately signed him to a seven-year contract.

(In the three years since, Anderson has been decent but unremarkable, producing at a prorated 36-point pace. That’s not really relevant to this conversation, though.)

Lafferty’s current value realistically can’t quite match Anderson’s 2020 value. They are both hard-nosed players with great skating ability, but Anderson was two inches taller, one year younger and had proven his productivity over a much longer period.

Although Lafferty’s pace of 1.62 points per 60 minutes this season (17 points in 43 games) is close to Anderson’s pace of 1.68 during his Columbus tenure, Lafferty has never done anything like this before. He touts just 49 career points; Anderson touted 115 at that time.

Nonetheless, Lafferty probably could fetch a larger return than, say, Mason Appleton, who also had 17 points (in 49 games) when he was traded from the Kraken to Jets before last year’s deadline for a mere fourth-round pick. And Lafferty definitely would fetch a larger return than Alex Nylander, whom Davidson used to originally acquire him from the Penguins.

That’s because buzz really is building. Lafferty is No. 12 on the Daily Faceoff’s trade targets board, ahead of much bigger names like Philadelphia’s James van Riemsdyk and St. Louis’ Vladimir Tarasenko. Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman recently called him the “most popular Blackhawk.”

And there is good reason: he brings far more than just moderate production. His speed has become truly game-breaking, almost rivaling Andreas Athanasiou at this point. He’s an excellent penalty-killer. He’s winning 53.6% of his faceoffs. And he has another year left on his contract with an extremely affordable $1.15 million salary-cap hit.

“The more aggressive a guy can play with that speed and size, it’s really hard to handle,” Richardson said. “Especially with the rules nowadays, you’re not allowed to hold [him] up. As a defenseman, if you see him coming, you’re concerned. And he can make a play with the puck and finish off things when you turn it over. He’s just being a dominant player right now, and we’re lucky to have him.”

Lafferty, for the record, said he loves Chicago and would “love to stay,” but he recognizes trades are “part of the business.”

It’s certainly possible he does stay, not only past March 3 but potentially long-term if he maintains this surge into and through next season. He does fit Davidson’s post-rebuild vision for a team predicated on speed and work ethic.

But he will turn 28 in March, and his sale value might never get higher than this. How the next few weeks play out will be fascinating.

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One NFL analyst believes the Chicago Bears will be aggressive this offseason targeting a few spots

The Chicago Bears have a number of needs this offseason and with the most cap in the league, they should be able to address the majority of those needs.

One unit on the roster that is a must to be addressed is the offensive line. The Bears were very inconsistent on the offensive line despite adding Lucas Patrick, Dakota Dozier, Michael Schofield and Riley Reiff as free agents. They also drafted Braxton Jones and Ja’Tyre Carter while welcoming back Sam Mustipher, Teven Jenkins and Larry Borom.

But of that group, only Jenkins and Jones really stood out.

As we inch closer and closer to free agency, one NFL analyst believes the Bears will address the offensive line and be aggressive in doing so. Here’s what Peter King told NBC Sports’ Josh Schrock about how he sees the Bears attacking the offseason:

“My gut feeling is that Ryan Poles, I think he’s going to look at two positions aggressively. One is wide receiver and the other is various spots on the offensive line.”

Chicago Bears have plenty of needs

The other need that King mentioned there is wide receiver. The Bears lack a true number one receiver for quarterback Justin Fields but the options just aren’t there in free agency to address that. Instead, the Bears may have to look at the trade market with names like Tee Higgins, DeAndre Hopkins and more being floated around.

Fixing the offensive line and adding more weapons at wide receiver will be the priority for Ryan Poles this offseason. If he can somehow find multiple starters that are good at both spots, the Bears should be better next season.

That also means we could see a big jump in Justin Fields’ play as well. And thats the goal for the Chicago Bears as we get ready for the 2023 offseason.

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NEW YORK – Billy Donovan really likes this Bulls basketball team as currently constructed.

The coach has made that very clear, even going back to last season.

In Donovan’s estimation, he knows exactly what they are, and he feels like they continue to improve, despite the 26-28 record in this 2022-23 campaign.

“We know the things we need to get better at,” Donovan said. “When you’ve played 50 games, it’s hard to say you don’t know who you are.”

More importantly, executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas might like the roster even more than Donovan, which said a lot.

Further evidence that the Bulls could be very quiet come Thursday’s NBA trade deadline, and if anything might be buyers over sellers on a minor level.

“You mean blow the whole thing up? I don’t see [that],” Donovan said after the Tuesday loss to Memphis. “The way I would look at it from my perspective is I know that I really, really like our guys a lot in terms of working with them, and where the heart and the spirit is at. And I think Arturas likes this group better. As much as I do, I think he likes them too. He wants to continually see these guys get better.

“I would say this: You and your wife go buy a house. ‘This is our dream house … we’re never going to …’ and then all of a sudden you’re like, ‘Hey, this is what they’re going to give us.’ If some team came with something – and we like our guys – that’s just, ‘Geez this is too good.’ I don’t know if those conversations happened, but I think Arturas is going to look. That’s why I’m saying it’s just not about the player, it’s about the totality of the organization and what’s best for the organization.”

As of Wednesday, the feeling around the league was what the Bulls deem was best for their organization was staying the course with most of the current foundation pieces.

A source did say that there have been a lot of phone calls made to Karnisovas, but the asking prices on players remained extremely high. Posturing as the deadline draws near? Absolutely, but as Donovan pointed out, the “dream house” comes with a high cost.

From a financial standpoint, the rotation players that the Bulls have to make contract decisions on after the season were Nikola Vucevic [unrestricted free agent] and Coby White [restricted free agent]. So if they were looking to try and accumulate assets rather than letting players simply walk, Vucevic and White would be the likely players to go.

However, teams have inquired about White since last summer, and a source reiterated that the Bulls want a lot back for the streaky shooting reserve guard.

As far as Vucevic, he threw a slight curveball into the equation on Tuesday, telling the Sun-Times that he would like to stay a Bull and get a contract extension. Prior to that, Vucevic would take the high road when asked questions about his pending free agency, insisting that he would worry about that after the season.

According to Vucevic, it now sounds like there has been dialogue about his future, with Karnisovas first wanting to see how this season ended.

“Hopefully we can work something out that would be great,” Vucevic said. “It makes sense that they want to first see how this all works out, how we do, how we finish the season.”

So what exactly will the Bulls look like when they take the court against the Nets hours after the deadline passes on Thursday?

Zach LaVine didn’t seem overly concerned.

“Whoever is here, I’ll ride with them,” LaVine said. “Play my heart out for those guys on the court. Same answer as always: I don’t do anything but play basketball, and I’m glad for that.”

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Today’s audiences have plenty of access to Billie Holiday songs via audio recordings. But video of Holiday’s live performances remains sparse, rendering her alluring stage presence a rare experience indeed.

“Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill,” which debuted in 1986 and ran on Broadway in 2014, presents an intimate glimpse into this larger-than-life figure. The play is set in a dingy South Philadelphia bar in March of 1959, the sort of spots Holiday was forced to play when her cabaret license was suspended following a brief prison stint for possession of narcotics. Holiday’s most iconic hits are featured, including “Crazy He Calls Me” and “Strange Fruit,” along with musings on achieving fame for her talent, notoriety for dabbles into drugs and drinking, admiration for her civil rights advocacy, and sympathy for her history of abusive partners.

Running at the snug Mercury Theater’s Venus Cabaret space, “Lady Day” stands as a showcase for Holiday and the actress playing her, Alexis J. Roston (“She the People,” “The Chi”). Roston co-directs alongside Mercury Theater artistic director Christopher Chase Carter, and the pair present a polished portrait of a megastar come undone, even if, at times, the character’s tumult calls for pandemonium.

Holiday on Broadway was famously played by Audra McDonald (“The Good Fight,” “Beauty and the Beast”), and the portrayal earned her a Tony Award in 2014 and an Emmy in 2016 for an HBO recording.

Even with McDonald looming large, Roston delivers. Her voice rings eerily like Holiday’s, including the singer’s seductive warble, playfulness with tempo and the way her nasal timbre lingers on the ends of phrases. (This is not Roston’s first time as Holiday, having previously filled this role in productions by Congo Square Theatre and Porchlight Music Theatre, for which she won a Jeff Award.)

Roston’s familiarity with the material shines during musical numbers when she digs into syllables and split seconds of the performance. On “What a Little Moonlight Can Do,” she chews and savors each “Moo” like it’s the last bite from a favorite childhood meal.

“Lady Day” requires more than musical mimicry, however, and Roston offsets tougher stories with levity, exuding kindness to the audience for listening. She describes encountering racism even as an icon, not allowed to use a theater’s green room or even dine at a restaurant, instead forced to munch quickly in the kitchen.

The depths of “Lady Day” include her battles with alcoholism and drug abuse in her later years, and her death from complications of cirrhosis of the liver in July 1959. Roston’s Holiday reflects this torment by becoming increasingly belligerent as the evening progresses, and the dichotomy, between happy-go-lucky musical talent with the world in her hands and worn-down veteran losing her grip, plays out in tone. This production teases the transformation with a false start (not in the original script) in which Holiday sings the first song, “I Wonder Where Our Love Has Gone,” with robotic inflection and snoozy energy before apologizing and leaving the stage to try again. She quickly returns, and her performance oozes confidence and calm.

The script portrays Holiday’s gradual unhinging by morphing concert banter into diatribes against injustice in the music industry; confusing her piano player, Jimmy, for a former bandmate; and lengthy tangents about her past. Each sip of her drink or allusion to drug use acts as a bellwether of the darkness Holiday kept inside.

The chaos is tempered by exerting excessive control on the performers’ movement. Roston’s words slur, but when she wanders into the audience to a smaller stage in the back of the house, she performs a song then wanders back while speaking directly to the audience members with the focus of a kindergarten teacher reading a story to class. The discrepancy between sparkly and sullen Holiday is simply too narrow.

Bandleader and pianist Jimmy (Nygel D. Robinson) remains behind the keys even when speaking in hushed, worried tones to a distraught Holiday. While necessary in the small Venus Cabaret space, his static-ness reduces any discord Holiday stirs.

Still, few plays are as focused on small slices of a singer’s career, and “Lady Day” offers audiences the chance to cozy up to Roston and experience Billie Holiday in 3D on an impossibly small scale. If the Broadway production was Lollapalooza, this is the intimate aftershow.

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The Chiefs were born in 1963, when owner Lamar Hunt moved the Dallas Texans to Kansas City and changed the team’s name. I’m guessing the Bears curse the day that happened and wish a pox on all of Hunt’s descendants.

The Chiefs are in the Super Bowl again. The Bears are not again.

Every time Kansas City gets into the big game, the McCaskey family, the owner of the Bears, can count on a boatload of stories about how their franchise decided not to draft Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes in 2017. Sunday will be the superstar’s third Super Bowl in the last four seasons. He’ll face the Eagles this time.

Some will argue that if the media didn’t keep bringing up the Bears’ awful decision to pass on Mahomes, nobody would be talking about it six years later. But that’s not how life works. If someone stops talking about a massive sinkhole alongside a four-lane highway, the sinkhole doesn’t stop being a sinkhole.

This Super Bowl is about more than the Bears’ franchise-altering decision to trade up one spot to take Mitch Trubisky with the second overall pick in the 2017 draft. It’s about Matt Nagy, too. The former Bears head coach is the Chiefs quarterbacks coach, meaning the McCaskeys are dealing with a double dose of bad memories. The family hired Nagy before the 2018 season and fired him after the 2021 season.

In the eyes of some fans, Nagy’s biggest sins were a playbook from hell and Trubisky’s lack of development. It was true that some of the plays looked like they were drawn up during one of Aaron Rodgers’ psychedelic trips. But the play-calling wasn’t the main culprit. Trubisky was. If you watched him with the Steelers this season, you know that to be true.

The Bears have to listen to all this being dredged up for the millionth time. Why, they ask themselves, couldn’t the Chiefs quarterbacks coach be somebody named John Smith? Given the McCaskeys’ track record on hiring coaches, the amazing thing is that the Eagles quarterbacks coach isn’t named Marc Trestman.

The good news for the Bears and their fans is that, no matter how dominant Mahomes and the Chiefs’ offense is Sunday, Nagy will get very little praise for it. Everyone knows that head coach Andy Reid is also the unofficial offensive coordinator. If there’s any applause left over, it will go to offensive coordinator Eric Bienemy. There might be one pat on the back for Nagy.

If the Chiefs lose, it will be a different story, especially if Mahomes plays poorly. You’ll need dental records to identify Nagy after social media is done with him. It’s funny how Bears fans don’t want Trubisky’s stay in Chicago rehashed, but they’re more than willing to bring up Nagy’s failings.

Part of that has to do with Justin Fields’ struggles under Nagy in 2021 and his success under new Bears coach Matt Eberflus in 2022. Nagy looked at Fields as a passing quarterback, which is what he’s going to have to evolve into to succeed in the NFL. Eberflus and offensive coordinator Luke Getsy looked at Fields’ running ability and saw the best way for the team to be competitive on offense. Fields rushed for 1,143 yards, a franchise record for a quarterback. He was thrilling. How often do you say that about someone on a three-victory team?

But he’s not Mahomes. Sorry to bring the conversation back to that. I would have moved on from Mahomes a long time ago if the Bears had been able to. But they’ve gone 42-56 since the Mahomes/Trubisky decision by former general manager Ryan Pace. That doesn’t count the two wild-card losses in the span, including the infamous double-doink missed field goal in 2018 that hung over the franchise like a cloud. It came against the Eagles, who had won the Super Bowl the season before and who, if I haven’t mentioned it, are in the Super Bowl again.

The Bears? They’re in rebuild mode, which is why Robert Quinn, their best pass rusher in 2021, will be playing for Philadelphia on Sunday, thanks to an October trade.

If the McCaskeys were directing media coverage this week, there would be stories on the chances of Chicago hosting a Super Bowl if the team moves to a new stadium in Arlington Heights. Less talk about Mahomes and more talk about money. Less about the past and more about the future. Unless you want to talk about the Bears’ last Super Bowl title, in 1985. Or other ancient history.

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Two boys pleaded guilty to felony arson Wednesday for starting a May 2022 fire that heavily damaged the shuttered Pheasant Run Resort in St. Charles.

“Well boys, you really screwed up. But what’s done is done. And all we can do is move forward,” DuPage County Judge Anthony Coco told the 17-year-old from Carol Stream and a 15-year-old from Wheaton.

Two other boys — a 15-year-old from Winfield and a 14-year-old from Carol Stream — pleaded guilty to misdemeanor trespassing.

All the youths, who are related, will be sentenced on April 19.

The two guilty of arson face punishment ranging from 18 months of probation to imprisonment in a youth prison until their 21st birthdays. They also will be listed for a decade on a state arson registry.

The two guilty of trespassing could be sentenced to court supervision or up to 30 days in a county juvenile detention center.

The fire destroyed the main lobby, the Bourbon Street hospitality area, and the A, B and E wings of hotel rooms.

The Wheaton boy made videos of the fires and the building burning. He then posted them on Snapchat and TikTok. Another video of the boys lounging at one of their homes included the caption, “After burning down the town, will we have peaceful sleep? Will the firefighters be able to stop it (the fire)?”

Read more at dailyherald.com.

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