But in the two months afterward in which he received limited interest from other teams that anger turned to resignation and on Wednesday Urlacher announced his retirement.
After spending a lot of time this spring thinking about my N.F.L. future I have made a decision to retire Urlacher who turns 35 on Saturday said in a statement he linked to from his Twitter page. Although I could continue playing I m not sure I would bring a level of performance or passion that s up to my standards. When considering this along with the fact that I could retire after a 13 year career wearing only one jersey for such a storied franchise my decision became pretty clear.
The Bears had made a one year offer worth a maximum of $2 million Urlacher had asked for two years and $11.5 million. At the time Urlacher called it a slap in the face.
Urlacher has been slowed by injuries and had his final season cut short when he hurt his hamstring in Week 13. He was the Bears leading tackler at the time but he was far from the player he was in his prime. Then the 6 foot 4 258 pound Urlacher was a feared presence in the middle of a fierce defense. He was selected to eight Pro Bowls and was named the defensive player of the year for the 2005 season.
With career totals of 1 358 combined tackles 41 sacks and 22 interceptions according to Pro Football Reference.com Urlacher seems assured of a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Fittingly he will be eligible in the same year as Baltimore s Ray Lewis who also recently retired.
For his part Urlacher takes his place in the pantheon of Bears greats at middle linebacker along with Dick Butkus and Mike Singletary.
He was that caliber of player right there with Butkus and Singletary said Marshall Faulk a former St. Louis Rams running back who is now an analyst for NFL Network. I know how we prepared for him game planned for him. When we beat the Bears we knew we earned it because he came to play every single time.
I played against a lot of great players but he was one of those guys who didn t really talk to you. When he got the best of you you knew it. And when you got the best of him he just kept coming after you. He was one of those lunch pail hard hat kind of players.
The Bears chose Urlacher who starred at New Mexico with the ninth pick of the 2000 draft. He became the anchor of their stellar defense helping them to the Super Bowl in the 2006 season (they lost to Indianapolis). The team struggled to build an offense that would carry it that far in the playoffs again and the Bears missed the playoffs altogether in five of the last six seasons.
That led to the firing of General Manager Jerry Angelo in January 2012 and Coach Lovie Smith was fired in December. Smith who specialized in defense was replaced by an offensive coach Marc Trestman.
It was Angelo s replacement Phil Emery who made the decision on Urlacher and Emery said Wednesday that he had no regrets about closing that era. It s been a win win as far as Brian and the Chicago Bears Emery told The Associated Press.
He added We ve committed more resources to Brian than any Bear in the history of the organization. We were willing to commit more. In the end we just could not agree on what that amount was. It s no more than that.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction
Correction May 22 2013
An earlier version of this story misspelled the given name of a former Bears great. He was Bronko Nagurski not Bronco. Also his primary position for the Bears was fullback not linebacker.
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