Buddy Ryan's Defense Still Rules

It's been 37 years and the Chicago Bears 1985 defense still ranks No. 1, although their nickname could have been better.

USA Today

On Thursday, the Bears celebrated the anniversary of winning their only Lombardi Trophy.

It's been 37 years since that defense for the ages, led by coordinator Buddy Ryan, carried the team to a 15-1 season and total postseason dominance.

The impression left by this defense is so deep that almost four decades later a poll of 225 writers, broadcasters, former NFL players and coaches turned up the only opinion anyone who objectively watched all the defenses from TV era of football until now could produce: The greatest defense in the history of the NFL belonged to the 1985 Chicago Bears.

The poll was conducted by Pro Football Hall of Fame writer Rick Gosselin, who invented the formula used by many teams to measure special teams success.

The 1985 Bears dominated in this poll like the defense did on the field. They came in No. 1 on 126 of the 225 ballots.

Gosselin conducts NFL polls weekly and chose the defensive question this week because of the dominance of both defenses in Sunday's NFC championship game.

The next-closest to the Bears' 126 votes was the 2000 Baltimore Ravens with 38 votes. The Pittsburgh Steelers of 1974 had 34 votes, while the 1969 Kansas City Chiefs, 1977 Dallas Cowboys and 2002 Tampa Bay Buccaneers each received seven votes. The 2013 Seattle Seahawks and 1972 Miami Dolphins had three votes.

Former Associated Press writer Barry Wilner put it best, for those who didn't experience the 1985 Bears and only heard about them or saw video clips.

"The 1985 Bears had teams beaten before kickoff," Wilner said. "They were the most intimidating and physical of all these groups.

"This is not to downgrade any of them, but opponents feared taking on that defense more than any other."

It wasn't just physical punishment that set the 1985 defense aside as No. 1. No one had figured out Ryan's "46" defensive scheme, named for former Bears safety Doug Plank. When a group of athletes mostly drafted by Jim Finks was melded with this plan of attack, opposing offenses were just hoping to get out of the game healthy without worrying about scoring or winning.

On this day in 1986, the greatest team I ever saw in any sport won the Super Bowl. #Bears pic.twitter.com/tDpoonPDaK

— Mike Greenberg (@Espngreeny) January 27, 2023

Typical of their efforts was the 44-0 shellacking of the Dallas Cowboys when they knocked quarterback Danny White out of the game twice and also beat up replacement Gary Hogeboom.

"I've been watching football since the 60s and can't remember a more punishing or destructive defense than the '85 Bears," said Fred Gaudelli, the executive producer of NBC Sunday Night Football. "They baffled some of the greatest offensive minds in NFL history and laughed in their face."

The "Monsters of the Midway" was the nickname used by many in referring to the 1985 Bears, but it was a convenient moniker given earlier to the Bears dynasty of the 1940s and even stolen then. It first was a name used for the Chicago University Maroons. 

So it was outdated even in the 1980s. It was like calling the 2009 New York Yankees Murder's Row, when the title had belonged to the 1927 team.

The poll conducted also asked which was the best nickname for the best defenses of all time, and so it is not surprising the Bears weren't even close in this one.

The easy winner was the 1974 Steelers' "Steel Curtain" with 95 votes.

The Minnesota Vikings never won a Super Bowl but their nickname "Purple People Eaters" finished second in balloting with 74 votes.

"As a kid, the name alone made me a Vikings fan," longtime Browns writer and reporter Tony Grossi told Gosselin.

Seattle's "Legion of Boom," was next with 19 and Dallas' "Doomsday Defense" had 17. The Monsters of the Midway name had just 15 votes, Miami's 1972 "No-Name Defense" had three and the more recent Steelers nickname, "Blitzburgh" had two.

BEARS NO. 1 AMONG LEGENDARY DEFENSES

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