It was Thanksgiving 1981. The Bears were coming off a loss to the Dallas Cowboys to drop their record to 3-10. The writing was on the wall. The Bears defensive players knew that owner George Halas was going to be making changes to their coaching staff.
Safety Gary Fencik started a conversation with his teammates about his concerns and over the next few days it was determined that he would pen a letter to Halas and the entire squad would sign it. On December 9, that letter was delivered to Halas.
The letter read:
Dear Mr.