5 Moments That Define the Bears-Packers Rivalry

Good evening, Bears fans—it’s here. ‘Hate Week’, against that team from Wisconsin—you know which one. Every season, twice a season, no matter how good or bad either team is, it’s the biggest and most important game on the schedule. It’s the NFL’s oldest, most-played, and easily most bitter rivalry. It’s one of—if not the—best rivalries in all of sports. Indeed, it’s here: Bears-Packers.

This Sunday in Green Bay, exactly nine months and one day after their previous meeting, the Bears and Packers will face off for the 214th time (211th in the regular season). Last season gave us three incredible showdowns (more on them later), and even without Caleb Williams or Micah Parsons on the field this week, the anticipation for the game is sky-high.

Of course, this is a rivalry that goes far beyond just the final scores of each game. Yes, it’s a rivalry that’s featured 77 combined Hall Of Famers, 22 combined NFL championships (5 Super Bowls), and is played by the two winningest teams in NFL history. But it’s also had plenty of incredible plays, brawls, mind games, and much more over its 105-year history.

So, with that in mind, and in preparation for Sunday’s matchup, here is my ranking of the five moments that I feel best define the Bears-Packers rivalry.

5: The 2010 NFC Championship Game:

This isn’t a list of best Bears moments from the rivalry—it’s about moments that define the rivalry as a whole. That means talking about both the good and the bad. And in this case, the bad was very bad.

This game was easily the highest-stakes game in the series’ history to that point (and arguably still is); just the second-ever playoff meeting between the two teams, and the first in almost 70 years. A trip to the Super Bowl on the line, and the season series at stake as well (the Bears won in Week 3, Green Bay won in Week 17).

The Bears were the NFC’s two-seed, had a top-five defense in the league, an offense that was streaky but still veryeffective when it needed to be, and home-field advantage. The Packers had playmakers all over the place, a chip on their shoulder, and had just beaten the one-seed Falcons on the road. In short, the lights couldn’t have been any brighter.

It was supposed to be the most satisfying victory in Bears history—instead, it was perhaps the single most crushing loss the team has ever suffered. I don’t think I’m alone in my belief that if Jay Cutler hadn’t  chickened out of the second half (or if Caleb Hanie was even a slightly better quarterback), the Bears would’ve won the game, and likely beaten Pittsburgh in the Super Bowl.

Instead, B.J. Raji silenced the Soldier Field crowd when he did this, and Green Bay won it all just two weeks later.

4: Devin Hester Introduces Himself to the NFL:

For some reason, the 2006 Chicago Bears aren’t talked about nearly enough—whether by Bears fans of NFL fans in general. But those of us who know, know. We know that the 2006 team is easily one of the five best in Bears history. We know that if Tommie Harris was healthy for Super Bowl XLI (and if they had run the ball more than just 15 times), the Bears would’ve beaten the Colts. And, of course, we know that Devin Hester had arguably the single greatest rookie season of all time.

The Bears opened 2006 against Green Bay at Lambeau. They had a loaded defense (Urlacher, Briggs, Vasher, Tillman, Mark Anderson, etc.), a solid, underrated offense (Thomas Jones, Mushin Muhammad, Bernard Berrian, etc.), and were the defending NFC North champions. But nobody expected them to do what they did on that day.

Indeed, the 26-0 final gave Brett Favre the first shutout loss of his career, snapped the Packers streak of 233 straight games with a point scored, and featured a 49-yard touchdown bomb from Rex Grossman to Berrian on the first drive of the season. But it was in the fourth quarter where the game’s best moment happened.

The Bears were already up three scores as the quarter began, and forced a punt on a 4th and 15. Waiting for it was Chicago’s second-round pick from Miami, a 24-year-old named Devin Hester. He very quickly earned himself a nickname.

On that play, the Windy City Flyer was born. Hester sealed the win as he took back the first of his NFL-record: 14 punt return touchdowns, 19 total return touchdowns (punt and kickoff), and 20 combined special teams return touchdowns (punt, kickoff, and field goal).

He’s the greatest return specialist of all time—and the first Hall of Famer at the position. This touchdown is one of many reasons why.

3: The Dirtiest Play in NFL History:

There are plenty of reason why the Bears and Packers dislike each other, but there’s only one (very good) reason why the Bears hate the Packers.

November 23, 1986: The day a potential Bears dynasty died a tragic, shameful death.

The Bears were 9-2 entering the contest at Soldier Field, while the Packers were a measly 2-9. Granted, the 1986 Bears offense wasn’t nearly as good as it was the previous year, but the defense was still historically dominant, and Walter Payton was still racking up yards. Everything seemed lined up for the Bears to make a second-straight run at the NFC Championship, even with the rather awful quarterback play they had to deal with. After all, there were maybe only one or two better ‘leaders’ of a team than Jim McMahon at the time.

But it wasn’t meant to be, because midway through the second quarter, Charles Martin made one of the single dirtiest plays of all time.

McMahon’s already partially-torn rotator cuff was destroyed, and despite all of his toughness, grit, and playmaking ability, he never truly recovered. The Bears finished the year 14-2, but with their leader out for the season, the Monsters of the Midway fell to the Redskins in the Divisional Round. And while the Bears did continue to make the playoffs in following years, McMahon’s injury was the beginning of the end; Payton retired after the 1987 season, teams gradually began to figure out the 46 defense, and the front office started getting rid of many of the players key to their Super Bowl XX win.

And just in case you still had suspicions over whether or not it was a dirty play: Martin had an actual “hit list” written on his towel for this game, with the numbers of Bears players he specifically intended to injure. He did so solely because his team was terrible; instead of trying to win, he tried to make the Bears lose—and he succeeded.

Simply put, the Bears had the course of the franchise permanently altered that day at Soldier Field. In fact, it took almost 40 years—and the team’s best quarterback since Jim McMahon—for things to really start getting back on track…

2: All Three Bears-Packers Games Last Season:

All three Bears-Packers games last season were decided by one score. All three came down to the final possession. All three were on national television. And all three were incredible from start to finish.

Even the loss at Lambeau Field in Week 14 was a great game, and showed both Bears fans and NFL fans as a whole the with Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams at the helm, the Bears weren’t going to be pushed around by Green Bay anymore; win or lose, each and every game was going to be a dogfight.

And then, of course, came the two wins at Soldier Field.

Two incredible comeback, chock-full of incredible, unbelievable, impossible moments. The Week 16 game alone had the Bears recovering an onside kick, Caleb Williams’ fourth-down floater to Jahdae Walker to tie the game, and, of course, DJ Moore’s walk-off touchdown. All of that happened inside the final 7 minutes of game time.

Then, just a few weeks later, there was 21-3. The single greatest Bears game I have ever watched, with the single best throw I’ve ever seen a quarterback make.

In short, last year’s Bears-Packers clashes were (in my opinion) the single best stretch of games the rivalry has ever seen.

But while the games may have been great, they aren’t what best defines this iconic rivalry. That honor belongs to….

1: The Beginning:

Every great rivalry has to start somewhere. In the case of Bears-Packers, that somewhere was Wrigley Field (then known as Cubs Park) on November 27, 1921. On that day, in front of a crowd of 7,000, George Halas led his Staleys against Curly Lambeau’s Packers. Chicago won the game by a final of 20-0, marking the series’ first shutout.

There were plenty of other firsts surrounding the game—aside from the obvious: Halas was the Bears’ founder, first owner, and first head coach. Lambeau was the Packers’ founder, first player, and first head coach. 1921 was the Bears’ first season in Chicago as a franchise (they were renamed the Bears the following season), and was Green Bay’s first in what would later become the NFL.

Yes, this is the shortest entry on the list, but it’s also probably the most important, which is why it gets the top spot. Because without George Halas and Curly Lambeau, without that seemingly unremarkable 20-0 score, and without that unassuming November morning in 1921, we wouldn’t have any of the incredible rivalry that followed.

So there they are, Bears fans! The five most defining moments of the NFL’s oldest rivalry! And while we don’t know how this season’s games against the Packers will turn out, we do know one thing—there will certainly be plenty more memorable moments to come.