Dan Wiederer

My kind of thought process is who else was competing for that?

And wouldn't it have been better to take a little bit more time with the possibility that you'd lose out to someone else who might want to develop it and build it rather than be in this five year kind of period that you've been in?

That's been been kind of a roller coaster, but that's certainly kind of one of those nuggets from today that it's that I'm going head scratcher about how this whole thing started.

The leverage has to work, though.

And that's the problem here is that until you've got some of this serious, significant momentum in Springfield, you can't bank on Arlington Heights at all, because if it all falls through here and the spring legislative session ends and there's like no forward moving progress on this project for the Bears.

Well, now you're kind of stuck and you've got to go that route.

One of the questions I asked in a side session with Kevin Warren this morning is just kind of.

Pressing him for his accountability.

You know, he got here three years ago and he's been clear since day one that time is of the essence.

And with every day that passes, with every week that passes, month, year that passes, the cost of this project goes up.

You know, you've got the cost of steel, you've got the uncertain financial markets, all these things.

And so.

as a guy who was brought in primarily to be the engine of this stadium drive, we're sitting here without any clarity again in March or April.

Now it's April, April fools of 2026.

And we don't, we don't have that.

And Kevin's response was essentially, well, sometimes time is needed to make sure you get things right.

That's the process they're in right now.

They're trying to get it right.

You can respond to that and react to that because I do think that he needs to shoulder some of the accountability for why this whole situation has been like one of those mazes you fill out on a kid's menu at dinner.

Dan Wiederer, Bears reporter and senior writer for The Athletic.