Bears hire John Fox as head coach

LAKE FOREST, Ill. (AP) — John Fox has a reputation for turning around teams. The Bears are counting on him to do just that.

Fox was hired as Chicago's coach today, four days after he and the Denver Broncos parted ways.

He was widely seen as a likely candidate to replace the fired Marc Trestman once he left the Broncos on Monday, given his record and his ties to consultant Ernie Accorsi and new general manager Ryan Pace.

Fox was the defensive coordinator for the New York Giants from 1997 to 2001 when Accorsi was the GM. Saints coach Sean Payton was the offensive coordinator for part of that time, and he is tight with Pace, who was hired out of New Orleans' front office.

Fox has a 119-89 regular-season record in 13 years with Carolina (2002-10) and Denver (2011-14), with six division titles and seven playoff appearances. He is one of six coaches to lead two franchises to Super Bowl appearances, joining Don Shula, Bill Parcells, Dan Reeves, Dick Vermeil and Mike Holmgren.

Fox comes to Chicago with a reputation for overseeing turnarounds, and he will try to do just that after the Bears went 5-11 and missed the playoffs for the seventh time in eight years.

He took over a team in Denver that went 4-12 the previous year and led them to the AFC West title all four seasons, with Tim Tebow at quarterback the first season and Peyton Manning the next three.

Carolina went 1-15 in 2001, the year before Fox arrived. In his second season, the Panthers went to the Super Bowl with Jake Delhomme at quarterback.