Chicago Bears wide receiver DJ Moore may join his former college coach again.
The Bears are in the process of bringing on Chris Beatty as their wide receivers coach, although it wasn't official as of Tuesday morning, according to a source. Beatty coached Moore for two of his three seasons at Maryland, including 2017, when Moore was the Big Ten wide receiver of the year.
Beatty is set to join the Bears after serving as the Los Angeles Chargers wide receivers coach for three seasons, marking his first NFL role after 15 years in college coaching.
He will take over from Tyke Tolbert. whom the Bears fired along with offensive coordinator Luke Getsy and three other offensive staffers earlier this month. ESPN first reported the news of the expected hire.
Apart from his time at Maryland, where he was promoted to associate head coach and co-offensive coordinator, Beatty held various position coach roles at Pittsburgh, Virginia, Wisconsin, Illinois, Vanderbilt, West Virginia, Northern Illinois, and Hampton. He was a co-offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach under Tim Beckman during his one season with the Illini in 2012.
Beatty, a former wide receiver at East Tennessee State and in the Canadian Football League, began his coaching career at the high school level.
He would be responsible for coaching a wide receivers group that Bears general manager Ryan Poles might seek to improve following the lack of production beyond Moore in 2023.
In his first season with the Bears and quarterback Justin Fields, Moore achieved a career-high 96 catches for 1,364 yards and eight touchdowns.
But Darnell Mooney had his worst season with 31 catches on 61 targets for 414 yards and a touchdown. And rookie Tyler Scott had a bumpy first season, finishing with 17 catches on 32 targets for 168 yards.
With Beatty's addition, the Bears will have made five coaching hires this offseason. They previously brought in offensive coordinator Shane Waldron, quarterbacks coach Kerry Joseph and defensive coordinator Eric Washington and are hiring Thomas Brown as passing game coordinator. They also still need to hire a running backs coach.
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