Turning of the Tide: Why This Year Feels Different in Chicago

Somehow, watching the electric, fast-paced Super Bowl, I still found myself thinking about my good ol’ Chicago Bears.
I saw so much more potential in our team during Sunday’s game than I did before. I can say, with all honesty on the Cupid’s bow of my lips, I am more excited for this year’s Bears than I ever have been before a season started.

Something just feels right

Remember a couple of weeks ago, when I wrote an article about how the Bears are shaping up to be a mixture of both the Rams and the Eagles?
It’s becoming more and more true by the day. It seems like that article wasn’t just an observation but was borderline prophetic.
Perhaps I’m just a little over-zealous, but I honestly think there is something brewing in Chicago.



Last week, news broke that Jared Goff would be living with Mitch Trubisky in L.A. as they train together this offseason. Some of my friends and I were talking, throwing out names and hoping that Trubisky would work out with a private quarterback coach this offseason.
Turns out, he’s going to be training with a good buddy who was also in a very similar situation. Both quarterbacks struggled in their rookie year, but both quarterbacks were also under coaches who were conservative to a fault and looked like the game had passed them by.
During the Super Bowl, the Eagles showed off a next-level, Mission Impossible 16 (geez, why are they making another one of these movies), Super Mario boss-beating, Mortal Kombat fatality type of win over Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and the Malcolm Butler-less New England Patriots.
We saw plenty of RPO’s.
Nick Foles threw 21 passes out of the play-action, and the quick-pass plays looked very similar to someone else’s scheme … You guessed it, Matt Nagy.
Check out my friend Andrew Link’s article as he breaks down the type of plays Nagy ran and implemented into the Chiefs’ system and see for yourself.
Monday morning, Shannon Sharpe on Undisputed said something amazing, that further confirmed what I was watching in the Super Bowl. *Ahem* This next quote, should get you, as a Bears fan excited as well.
“Skip, the thing is … Let’s go back this entire season. What team gave the New England Patriots the most problems? The Kansas City Chiefs. Where does Doug Pederson derive from? Look at the routes. Look at what Clement was doing … So you saw a lot of similarities. 537 yards for one team, 538 for the other. 41 points for one team, 42 points for the other. So we see a lot of similarities. But Doug Pederson was aggressive.”
Gee, I wonder who else was a former quarterback, that spent a long time under Andy Reid with both the Eagles and the Chiefs as an assistant who worked his way up to Offensive Coordinator and received a quarterback as the second overall draft pick as a head coach of his new team? ?
That coach then hired a phenomenal staff including a respected veteran defensive coordinator and is poised for success. Hmm … I wonder who was the offensive coordinator of that Kansas City Chiefs team that hung 42 points on the Patriots?
Oh yeah! That’s right – Nagy.
In the weirdest of ways, it feels like history is repeating itself. And somehow, it’s overlapping with not so old history (like the Eagles and Rams) and some history familiar to Bears fans young and old.
This past weekend I watched The ‘85 Bears in theatres and marveled over some of the most organic interviews I’ve seen in a long time, and the part of the movie dedicated solely to Buddy Ryan stuck out the most.
To make a long story short, the members of the Bears’ defense wrote and signed a letter to Papa Bear George Halas begging that he keep Ryan on staff as defensive coordinator in the transition of head coaches.
The same is true with the current Bears. It wasn’t as intense, but in light of another head coaching change, locker room leaders like Akiem Hicks weren’t shy at all in saying they wanted Vic Fangio to be back publicly.

Just like in the ‘80s, Chicago retained its defensive coordinator.

Fangio genuinely wanted to return to the Bears. That continued desire is going to take this defense to the next level. The less veterans have to learn and think, they more than can rely on their instinct and react. Retaining Fangio was a sure win that sent a strong message to the locker room.
Depending on what you believe, this could be a “sign.” To others just a string of too many coincidences between recent history and history from the past.
When I look at it, like the kid fan that I still am on the inside, I can say with confidence the Bears are due and it’s starting to look up. The Bears have a new coach, great staff, an innovative offense that’s about to be hand delivered, and they honored players’ wishes by keeping their leader. Not to mention Brian Urlacher gets inducted into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot when many believed he wouldn’t.
Many may feel the Bears will be the same old team again, but something about this year, feels different.