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Bears Bulletin

Matt Eberflus finalizes Bears coaching staff

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Bears coach Matt Eberflus has completed his coaching staff by hiring running backs coach Chad Morton, receivers coach Chris Beatty, offensive passing game coordinator Thomas Brown, assistant offensive line coach Jason Houghtaling, assistant quarterbacks and receivers coach Robbie Picazo and assistant running backs coach Jennifer King.

Here's some background on all six new Bears coaches:

Morton boasts 24 seasons of NFL experience as a player and assistant coach. A running back and return specialist, he was selected by the Saints in the fifth round of the 2000 draft out of USC. He appeared in 93 career games with five starts over seven seasons with the Saints (2000), Jets (2001-02), Commanders (2003-04) and Giants (2005-06), rushing for 382 yards on 89 carries, catching 48 passes for 419 yards and one touchdown, and averaging 9.2 yards with one TD on 155 punt returns and 23.6 yards with three TDs on 229 kickoff returns.

Morton has spent the past 15 seasons as an NFL assistant coach, working for the Packers as a coaching administrator (2009) and special teams assistant (2010-13) and the Seahawks as a special teams assistant (2014), running backs assistant (2015-16) and running backs coach (2017-23), while doubling as run game coordinator in 2022-23.

Over the past three years in Seattle, Morton worked under offensive coordinator Shane Waldron, who has been hired in the same role by the Bears.

As a player, Morton set NFL records for most receptions in a playoff game by a rookie (13) and longest overtime kickoff returned for a touchdown (96 yards). As a coach, he won a Super Bowl ring with the Packers in 2010. He is the younger brother of former NFL receiver Johnnie Morton.

Beatty possesses 26 years of coaching experience at the high school, college and NFL levels. After serving as a head coach at three different high schools in Virginia from 1998-2005, he spent the next 15 seasons as a college assistant at Hampton (2006), Northern Illinois (2007), West Virginia (2008-10), Vanderbilt (2011), Illinois (2012), Wisconsin (2013-14), Virginia (2015), Maryland (2016-18) and Pittsburgh (2019-20), primarily as a receivers coach.

Beatty served as Bears receiver DJ Moore's position coach at Maryland in 2016-17. In 2017, Moore was named Big Ten Receiver of the Year and first-team All-Big Ten after catching a school-record 80 passes for 1,033 yards and eight TDs.

Beatty spent the last three seasons in the NFL as Chargers receivers coach, working with star wideout Keenan Allen. In 2023, Allen was voted to his sixth Pro Bowl after catching a career-high 108 passes for 1,243 yards and seven touchdowns.

Before becoming a coach, Beatty played receiver at East Tennessee State and in the Canadian Football League with the Baltimore Stallions (1995) and Hamilton Tiger-Cats (1997).

After a brief NFL playing career as a running back with the Falcons (2008) and Browns (2009-10), Brown has spent the past 13 seasons as an assistant coach, nine at the collegiate level and the past four in the NFL.

Brown was selected by the Falcons in the sixth round of the 2008 draft out of Georgia. After missing his entire rookie year with an injury, he was waived by Atlanta and signed to the Browns practice squad in November 2009.

Brown began his coaching career at Georgia in 2011 as a strength and conditioning coach. He then served as a running backs coach at Chattanooga (2012), Marshall (2013) Wisconsin (2014), Georgia (2015), Miami (2016-18) and South Carolina, doubled as offensive coordinator in his three seasons with the Hurricanes.

Brown left Miami to work on coach Sean McVay's staff with the Rams as running backs coach (2020-21) and tight ends coach (2022), while also serving as assistant head coach in 2021-22. Brown won a Super Bowl ring with the Rams in 2022.

Last year, Brown joined the Panthers as offensive coordinator and was voted the NFL's second-best offensive coordinator in a poll of players conducted by the NFL Players Association.

Houghtaling possesses 17 years of coaching experience, 14 at the collegiate level and the last three in the NFL with the Titans.

He spent 10 seasons in three different stints at Wagner College in New York: as running backs coach (2006) and offensive line coach (2007-08); offensive coordinator (2012); and offensive coordinator (2014) and head coach (2015-19).

Houghtaling later entered the NFL on coach Mike Vrabel's staff with the Titans, serving as assistant offensive line coach (2021-22) and offensive line coach (2023).

Picazo brings 11 years of coaching experience to the Bears, nine at the collegiate level at Stanford (2013-17) and Rice (2018-21) and two in the NFL with the Texans (2022) and Seahawks (2023).

Last year in Seattle he worked on the same staff as Waldron and Morton, the Bears' new offensive coordinator and running backs coach, respectively.

King boasts six years of NFL coaching experience. After serving as a coaching intern with the Panthers (2018-19) and the Commanders (2020), she became the first Black woman to be named a full-time NFL coach in 2021 when she was hired as Washington's assistant running backs coach, a role she held the past three seasons. She is also the first female coach in Bears history.

King played in the Women's Football Alliance (WFA) as a quarterback and receiver for the Carolina Phoenix from 2006-17, a defensive back and receiver for the New York Sharks in 2018 and a safety for the D.C. Divas in 2019.

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