Former Bears assistant — and nearly head coach — Dave McGinnis dies at 74

Dave McGinnis, the longtime Bears assistant coach whose botched head-coaching hire led matriarch Virginia McCaskey to replace her own son as team president, died Monday at 74.

McGinnis was the Bears’ linebackers coach from 1986-95, mentoring, among others, Mike Singletary, Otis Wilson and Wilber Marshall. He became the Cardinals’ defensive coordinator in 1996 and was the Bears’ first choice to replace head coach Dave Wannstedt when he was fired in January 1999.

After the Bears interviewed five candidates, they sent out a press release and scheduled a news conference to welcome McGinnis as the Bears’ 12^th head coach — only McGinnis had never agreed to a contract. The news conference was delayed, then canceled. Disturbed by the unusual process and upset by contract terms that he considered below the industry standard, McGinnis left Halas Hall and never accepted the Bears’ job. The team apologized.

The Bears hired Dick Jauron the next day. Three weeks later, Virginia McCaskey decided to replace Michael McCaskey as president with vice president of operations Ted Phillips, who negotiated contracts for the team. It marked the first time in Bears history that someone outside of the Halas and McCaskey families held the president title.

Michael McCaskey became chairman of the Bears board of directors, where he remained until 2011.

In 2018, McGinnis told the Talk of Fame Network that he woke up at his hotel on the second day of his Bears job interview and was “announced as the head coach before I had even been offered the job.” He said that when he drove to Halas Hall to find out what was going on, he heard a WGN-720 AM news report that said he’d be introduced as head coach at 11 a.m.

McGinnis became an NFL head coach eventually, taking over the Cardinals on an interim basis in 2000 and going 17-40 over four seasons.

He became the Titans’ linebackers coach in 2003 and stayed until 2011 before following head coach Jeff Fisher to St. Louis. He served as the assistant head coach at both spots.

He spent the nine years as a color analyst for the Titans’ radio broadcasts. He was admitted to a Nashville hospital March 4 and was visited by friends and former players in recent days, according to the Titans.