The Chicago Bears are one of the legendary franchises in the history of the NFL and have been around for 99 years which is incredible. When you think of the Bears, you think of all the iconic names that have played for this historic franchise from Dick Butkus to Mike Singletary to Richard Dent to William “the refrigerator” Perry. How could I forget one of the greatest, if not the greatest running back in Walter Payton and a man who was just inducted into the Hall of Fame in August in Brian Urlacher. There’s a lot of history surrounding this organization. The 2018 Bears are having one of their best seasons in recent memory and at the moment, they have a 7-3 record and are in first place in the NFC North. What’s been the reason behind their success this year?
I look at the energy of the entire team and they play with a lot of enthusiasm and excitement and I’ve watched a lot of Bears football over the years and in recent memory, they had two recent head coaches that just didn’t get the job done and that was Marc Trestman and John Fox. Under first-year head coach Matt Nagy, you see guys wanting to play for him and he can relate to his players because he once played so he knows the ins and outs along with the ups and downs of being a player. This Bears offense has some pop and they’ve done a good job at surrounding Mitchell Tribusky with weapons to complement him and his game. I’ve heard Mitchell say that his coach actually believes in him and over the last month or so, I’ve seen him decide to channel his aggression and take more shots down the field and it helps when you have an offensive minded coach who has some faith in you. They also have a dynamic tandem of running backs in Jordan Howard and Tarik Cohen.
What’s really driven this team has been their defense and after Ryan Pace made the acquisition to get Khalil Mack from the Oakland Raiders, I knew he’d have a major impact and it’s shown. The Bears have one of the three best defenses in the league and they play so well as a team. The defensive line is active up front and they dominate yet control the line of scrimmage. They shut down the run, they can pressure the quarterback and they thrive when they’re able to get those takeaways, they’re even better and I haven’t seen a Bears defense this active, stingy and aggressive since 2012, Lovie Smith’s final season with the team. Khalil has really given them a boost and elevated the guys around him and they haven’t had a player play at this high of a level since the Urlacher days. With everything they do, this is a team I can see holding on to win the division and making things really interesting in the playoffs. It’s a good time to be a Bears fans right now especially with the team playing as well as they have.
