Michael Mccaskey

This time, the Chicago Bears made sure they had a deal before announcing their new coach. Dick Jauron, the defensive coordinator for the Jacksonville Jaguars, agreed to contract terms late Saturday, team spokesman Bryan Harlan said. The move came less than 12 hours after Dave McGinnis flew home to Phoenix, still upset that Bear President Michael McCaskey had announced his hiring before they had an agreement. Jauron will be introduced at a news conference today.

Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley unveiled a surprise plan for a $395-million conversion of Soldier Field that would add a retractable dome over the stadium where the Chicago Bears play. Daley previewed his plan for Gov. Jim Edgar and Bear President Michael McCaskey only hours before presenting it publicly. He said it was aimed at resolving the often bitter differences the three men have had on a new stadium.

The feud of the new year: Canadian Don Cherry won't allow his syndicated hockey column to run in the Montreal Gazette because he dislikes the paper's columnists, Pat Hickey and Jack Todd. So Hickey wrote, "The guy who preaches toughness is basically a gutless bully." Todd was even more graphic, calling Cherry "that breast-beating, narrow- minded, loud-mouthed, bigoted, Europhobic, Francophobic . . . embarrassment to Canada."

It's doubtful that quarterbacks Jim Harbaugh and Jim McMahon will exchange pleasantries Sunday when the Chicago Bears play the Minnesota Vikings in Minneapolis. McMahon, a former Bear, now with the Vikings, told Inside Sports: "A lot of guys can't figure out why (Chicago President Michael) McCaskey threw all that money at Harbaugh, because a lot of guys on the Bears don't think Harbaugh should even be playing. "Harbaugh doesn't even have instinct.

The Chicago Bears wanted Dave McGinnis to bring the black and blue back to their defense. What they got instead Friday was a red face on one of the most embarrassing days in their long history. Instead of introducing McGinnis to reporters, the Bears were left to explain why they announced they had a coach when it wasn't a completed deal. "The matter has not been resolved," team spokesman Bryan Harlan said. "There will not be an announcement today."

Skip Bayless of the Chicago Tribune ridiculing the botched Chicago Bear news conference, presumably to name Dave McGinnis as the new coach: "Friday, [Bear President Michael] McCaskey officially ensured that your Chicago Bears have become national laughingstocks. "Not just the jokes of the NFL, mind you--McCaskey went sea to howling sea. His Grin-and-Bear-Its now rule as the biggest dunces in all of sports. "Now when you think Bears, you think losers. Boobs. Goofs. Fools.

In what could be a chilling Arizona omen, Wilma Wildcat, the school mascot, took an accidental in-costume 15-foot plunge into the ocean from a pier at the 32nd Street Naval Base during Holiday Bowl festivities Monday in San Diego. The mascot apparently was running near the edge of the pier as players from Arizona and Nebraska gathered for a ceremony aboard the USS Peleliu when she tripped and toppled over a two-foot-high cement wall.

Reports that George Halas will soon coach the Oakland Raiders have not been confirmed, but following the resurrection of Dick Vermeil this past week to coach the St. Louis Rams and now the New Orleans Saints' anticipated hiring of Mike Ditka, nothing can be discounted. Who next? Pop Warner?

With 20% of its members implicated in the Salt Lake City scandal, the International Olympic Committee promised Wednesday to consider expelling more of them to restore its damaged credibility and assuage big-money sponsors. "We will act decisively," said Anita DeFrantz, an IOC vice president from Los Angeles.

Michael McCaskey carefully chose his words when he first started talking about the past and immediate future of the NFL team he inherited from one of the game's legends, George (Papa Bear) Halas. McCaskey, grandson of the late owner, was talking fondly of his recollections of having Thanksgiving Day dinner at grandpa's, hearing the talk about how the NFL came to be the giant industry it is today.