Game 13: Bears @ Packers - Sunday, Dec. 7th @ 3:25 PM

[CheezWizHed]

The Battle for NFC North as the 8-3-1 Packers face off with the surprising 9-3 Bears.  Regardless of the outcome, Ben Johnson is probably a leading candidate for Coach of the year. 

Both teams are coming off mini-bye weeks due to Thanksgiving and Black Friday games, so both should be well rested and prepared. Are the Bears just lucky?  Will the Packers put them back in their place?  Will @nate82 give us any peace if the Bears win? 😉

Time for Parsons to bring the Bears' motto to life:

[Joseph Zarr]

Any fan of the Packers/Beers historic rivalry has to Love this opportunity. Ben Johnson's opening introductory presser comments will surely be good bulletin material for the Packers locker room. The loss of Wyatt feels fairly large for this One with the Bears coming off 300 plus ground yards at Philly. That is an absolute ground game whooping..

[Recovering Chicagoan]

I guess this is the pessimist in me, but how will we react if the Bears end up beating the Packers both regular season games -- and then in the playoffs?  

[CheezWizHed]

40 minutes ago, Recovering Chicagoan said:

I guess this is the pessimist in me, but how will we react if the Bears end up beating the Packers both regular season games -- and then in the playoffs?  

I'm sure there will be a smattering of "Fire MLFs" and a bunch of comments about "the NFL is fixed". 

Personally, I'm not worried about that happening.  I think you might need another therapy session to help your "recovery". 😄

[TwinsBrewersWorldSeries]

Why wait? I’ve wanted to fire MLF all season :)

and I’ll want to fire him, regardless of these next 5 games.  He simply doesn’t have what it takes to make us a contender.  If he gets us to the Super Bowl (and past the Rams, Bears, and Eagles), I’ll reconsider….

but at some point, put up or shut up.  

[homer]

8 hours ago, TwinsBrewersWorldSeries said:

Why wait? I’ve wanted to fire MLF all season :)

and I’ll want to fire him, regardless of these next 5 games.  He simply doesn’t have what it takes to make us a contender.  If he gets us to the Super Bowl (and past the Rams, Bears, and Eagles), I’ll reconsider….

but at some point, put up or shut up.  

So you'd prefer Nick Sirianni?

[homer]

13 hours ago, Joseph Zarr said:

Any fan of the Packers/Beers historic rivalry has to Love this opportunity. Ben Johnson's opening introductory presser comments will surely be good bulletin material for the Packers locker room. The loss of Wyatt feels fairly large for this One with the Bears coming off 300 plus ground yards at Philly. That is an absolute ground game whooping..

Yeah credit where it's due. The Bears O Line looked really good. GB has to get in a positive game script and make Caleb beat them.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

13 hours ago, Joseph Zarr said:

Any fan of the Packers/Beers historic rivalry has to Love this opportunity. Ben Johnson's opening introductory presser comments will surely be good bulletin material for the Packers locker room. The loss of Wyatt feels fairly large for this One with the Bears coming off 300 plus ground yards at Philly. That is an absolute ground game whooping..

Make Williams throw, because he sucks. They don't do anything else well. The Bears truly must be remarkable running the ball, because everyone has to know that's what they're going to do. Williams is emblematic of the Bears mirage right now, his stats look decent at face value but you dig in, it gets a lot less impressive. 58% completion is among the worst in the league, bad YPA, bad QBR. Unfortunately for GB they have been soft in the one spot CHI is good, and just lost another cog. It's not really the best matchup for GB.

[OldHeidelberg]

The bright side of the Bears win is it really put Detroit in a tough spot with 5 to go. They have a hot Dallas team coming in and then have to travel to the Rams. How many had them missing the playoffs at the beginning of the year or 6 weeks in for that matter? 

[BrewerFan]

14 hours ago, Recovering Chicagoan said:

I guess this is the pessimist in me, but how will we react if the Bears end up beating the Packers both regular season games -- and then in the playoffs?  

Ya don't say. 

How will we react if the Bears beat us 3 times in the next 6 games? Rather poorly I'd expect....

[BrewerFan]

8 minutes ago, OldHeidelberg said:

The bright side of the Bears win is it really put Detroit in a tough spot with 5 to go. They have a hot Dallas team coming in and then have to travel to the Rams. How many had them missing the playoffs at the beginning of the year or 6 weeks in for that matter? 

This is what I said after the Lions game. Do we root for the Bears or Eagles?

I was half rooting for the Bears. 

We control our destiny and could end up with the #2 seed(maybe #1 seed) if we play just take care of business(the Broncos game will be a very tough game).

 

MLF and Love seem like they've kinda turned a corner(for this year, over the course of his career, MLF has been great). Throwing to set up the run, Anthony Belton has been huge.

Losing Wyatt was one of the worst players they could have lost, but they should have a full compliment of WRs and Wicks looks like he's turning it up at the right time. 

LVN need to get healthy, Brooks, Wooden. Brinson has been playing really well. He's not a pass rusher, but he's been standing in there and closing running lanes. 

 

27-17 Packers
Packers finish 4-1 to go 12-4-1, #2 seed in the NFC....

[adambr2]

14 hours ago, Recovering Chicagoan said:

I guess this is the pessimist in me, but how will we react if the Bears end up beating the Packers both regular season games -- and then in the playoffs?  

Badly. I will be both sad and mad.

[Joseph Zarr]

The Bears run game has become Johnson's opus this season as he's recognized Williams massive step back and drop inefficiencies. He has the O-Line for it and they've made a living out of ground and pound with pre snap movements and PA/roll outs. They are a well oiled running machine right now. It's a game where the Packers are going to need to drill and adhere to disciplined lane assignments - no wandering eyes with all the movement eye candy and Edge defenders holding stout. They'll need Edge to lower his missed tackles; a healthy Quay (here's hoping) or one of those stalwart McDuffie games he absolutely showcases, the same rising star in Evan Williams to keep showing out, and a game of games from Bullard. I have no idea how they'll strategize replacing Wyatt but I have to think they'll be giving Stackhouse reps early to see if he can hold up and impact their run game in any manner - I don't know tho as the Bears O-Line often moves as a wall as their TE's burst through untouched to second level defenders. Not an ideal game One after losing Wyatt for the season that is for sure. It will be very interesting to see what Hafley and his stuff lean into.

As an aside, this was a very fun watch and more validation for MLF the play caller and quick study. Fantastic multiple attack concepts for a flaw they surely saw in the Detroit/Giants game:

Very encouraging stuff. We can only hope we see similar impact and results next weekend.

[CheezWizHed]

20 hours ago, TwinsBrewersWorldSeries said:

Why wait? I’ve wanted to fire MLF all season :)

There are a couple of things that MLF does that bug me.  But I think a bunch of people here seriously underestimate him.  There are better coaches out there, but he is better than 99% of the ones available for hire.  Good luck finding the 1%. 

[Fear The Chorizo]

I think the Packers need an offensive explosion game to try and force the Bears out of the run-focused game plan and make Williams throw against a line with ears pinned back and secondary that mixes up coverage schemes.

 

Want them to stay aggressive on offense.

[Joseph Zarr]

 

Neat. Just hope both can stay healthy. They both offer unique explosiveness.

[Joseph Zarr]

Oh it gets a little more enticing, even. They activated hyper athlete blitz specialist in rookie LB Collin Oliver too:

 

[homer]

50 minutes ago, Joseph Zarr said:

 

Neat. Just hope both can stay healthy. They both offer unique explosiveness.

I just wanna see Lloyd play. My assumption is that he is great in space and I feel like they need that. If he can contribute just as a change of pace guy then you get him, Reed, and Golden back just in time for the playoffs. 

[CheezWizHed]

I was hoping to see Reed activated for this game... 

[Joseph Zarr]

1 hour ago, CheezWizHed said:

I was hoping to see Reed activated for this game... 

Well, that still may happen right? They opened up One spot today and they'll IR Wyatt to open another:

 

[CheezWizHed]

11 hours ago, Joseph Zarr said:

Well, that still may happen right? They opened up One spot today and they'll IR Wyatt to open another:

 

Yes, it is looking that way now. I mistook Lloyd's and Cox's verbiage of "designated to return" for "activated"... and wondering why Reed wasn't.  Wrong stage of the process. 

Looks like they will wait to see how he responds from a full week of practice and then activate him.  Sounds like Golden might be back too. 

With Reed and Golden returning and Kraft injured, I wonder if we will try more 4-wide formations - Doubs, Reed, Golden, and Watson?   That would be a very MM thing to do, but I've not seen that much with MLF. But it would certainly play to the strength of our personnel and allow us to attack the medium-middle portion of the field again. 

[Joseph Zarr]

TE Luke Musgrave's ability to immediately fall down upon any amount of physical contact is truly a sight to behold. This 'block' is amazing.

If he were just a touch more physical...as he is? Man. Just man.

[endaround]

20 minutes ago, Joseph Zarr said:

TE Luke Musgrave'a ability to immediately fall down upon any amount of physical contact is truly a sight to behold. This 'block' is amazing.

If he were just a touch more physical...as he is? Man. Just man.

don't remember when , but saw a clip with Musgrave try to to chip an end and get out on a route and the end just shrugged his shoulder and Musgrave went flying backwards.

[SeaBass]

It honestly doesn't look like Musgrave even tried to block, he just made himself fall down. I've seen guys flop in the NBA with better acting skills than this.

[CheezWizHed]

1 hour ago, SeaBass said:

It honestly doesn't look like Musgrave even tried to block, he just made himself fall down. I've seen guys flop in the NBA with better acting skills than this.

but also worse...