Three Reasons Why Packers Will Lose to Bears

The Green Bay Packers have dominated their series against the Chicago Bears, who have lost 10 straight to their rival and three in a row overall. Here’s why the Bears will upset the Packers on Sunday.

Chicago Bears cornerback Tyrique Stevenson (29) celebrates after breaking up a pass intended for the Packers' Romeo Doubs. / Tork Mason / USA TODAY NETWORK

GREEN BAY, Wis. – Every dog has its day. Will this be the Chicago Bears’ day?

Green Bay Packers coach Matt LaFleur is 10-0 against the Bears. The Packers have won 15 of 16 overall and 13 of 14 at Soldier Field.

The Bears have to beat the Packers someday. Here’s why Sunday will be that day.

Man of Mystery

The Bears, mired in a three-game slump in which the offense has been offensive, fired offensive coordinator Shane Waldron and replaced him with Thomas Brown.

Now what?

“It’s a little different because you don’t know what to believe on tape,” safety Evan Williams said.

It’s not as if the Bears are going to change their offense in the span of a half-week. But what the Bears showed on first-and-10 or third-and-short the past few weeks with Waldron might not be the plays that Brown dials up on Sunday.

“Yeah, it’s hard, right?” defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley said. “You find out Tuesday morning and they really have Wednesday, Thursday, Friday to practice. It’s not like we’ve seen his tape with this personnel group, so you can take a look at stuff he’s done in the past when he’s called plays. Does it change some tendencies?

“During the bye week, you study a bunch of the Bears’ tendencies and you get these thoughts based on what they’ve called, when they’ve called them, down and distance, certain tendencies on formations. And a lot of that’s going to be thrown out now. It’s a different mind calling the game. I’m sure he’ll have some wrinkles.”

In his coaching past, Brown was running backs coach at the University of Wisconsin as well as the Los Angeles Rams. Chances are he’ll want to establish running back D’Andre Swift, who at one point this season had four consecutive games of at least 119 scrimmage yards.

A successful running game would help embattled rookie quarterback Caleb Williams, who is averaging 2.0 yards more per attempt on play-action passes compared to standard dropbacks.

“I think we'll do a good job of marrying everything up together, making everything look the same,” Williams said. “Then from there, you'll get a few easier passes, few extra layups. I think it'll help us in the run game (and) I think it'll help us in the pass game being able to do that.

“I think from there, it provides a little bit more explosiveness for us as an offense, and being able to help out the complimentary football thing that we really want to attack.”

Superb Secondary

The Packers should be able to run the ball with success against the Bears, but you know that coach Matt LaFleur can’t help himself and Jordan Love will start slinging the football.

The strength of Matt Eberflus’ Bears is his pass defense.

Chicago ranks second in opponent passer rating, fifth in opponent completion percentage and 12th in yards allowed per attempt. The Bears are 11th in sack percentage and 11th in interception percentage. According to ESPN, they are fifth in pass-rush win rate.

The cornerbacks are really good. Jaylon Johnson is a premier player. According to Pro Football Focus, he’s allowed a 46.8 passer rating – No. 1 among cornerbacks. Tyrique Stevenson’s premature celebration during the Commanders’ game-winning Hail Mary has taken the luster off his strong second season. According to PFF, he’s allowed a completion rate of just 53.7 percent.

“This is a really solid, sound defense,” LaFleur said. “It’s been tough to go against over the course of Matt’s career going against him. I’ve always had a lot of respect for how he coaches and how his players play.

“You can tell that they’re an effort-based unit. It shows up all over the tape. Their style of play is exactly what you want, and when you combine that with really good players, you usually get a really good defense, and that’s exactly who they are.”

It’s a defense that can take advantage of Love, who has thrown a league-worst 10 interceptions, and turn the tables in the series.

“I see the stats of him throwing interceptions and making some bad decisions,” Johnson said this week. “Hopefully, he does that in our game. But he could come out and have a hell of a game against us. Overall, I still feel like he’s a good quarterback who makes some bad mistakes at times.”

Situational Weakness

The enormous mismatches in this game are in Chicago’s favor.

In the red zone, Green Bay’s offense ranks 29th with a touchdown rate of 47.1 percent. Chicago’s defense is No. 1 with a touchdown rate allowed of just 37.0 percent.

What’s gone wrong? For a starting point, according to coach Matt LaFleur, the Packers have been guilty of 18 red-zone penalties.

“It’s just staying out of negative plays,” Packers offensive coordinator Adam Stenavich said. “You look at the drives where we don’t have penalties or just making plays in general and we’re excellent in the red zone.

“If we do have negative plays, we’ve got to make sure we overcome those and that’s been our Achilles heel this year as far as scoring, is having those negative plays down there. That gets us behind the sticks and really forces us into field-goal opportunities.”

If Green Bay can get on track in the red zone, the offense could be borderline unstoppable. Even with their failures in scoring position, the Packers are ninth with 25.6 points per game.

“There’s definitely a lot still out there for this offense and some things we can clean up and be better at, but we’ve done a really good job of so far this season generating those explosive plays, those big plays that do lead to points,” said Love, who had 29 total red-zone touchdowns last year but 11 this year.

“Obviously, we’ve just got to finish when we get down there in the red zone. But I have no doubt that we’ll be able to put up points. We’ve got too many playmakers on this team and too many guys that, once they get the ball in their hands, they can do some good things. So, I don’t think it’s going to be an issue.”

Meanwhile, on third down, Green Bay’s offense ranks 19th with a 37.4 percent conversion rate while Chicago’s defense ranks third at 33.3 percent.

Only the Colts’ Anthony Richardson has a lower third-down completion rate than Love’s 45.5 percent.

“The efficiency on first down is outstanding,” Bears defensive coordinator Eric Washington said. “They're skipping third down in some cases because they're so good on first down. They're going first down, second down, first down. When they do get to a third-down situation, they're situations that are manageable for an offense and kind of tough to defend as a defense.”

Latest Green Bay Packers News 

The #Packers have dominated the Bears for about three decades. Brett Favre dominated the Bears. Aaron Rodgers dominated the Bears. Jordan Love dominated the Bears last year.

Here are three reasons why that domination will continue. ⬇️https://t.co/wtA1Fltfi7

— Bill Huber (@BillHuberNFL) November 17, 2024

Three reasons why Packers will beat Bears | Saturday’s transactions | Jordan Love vs. Aaron Rodgers through 25 starts | Xavier McKinney channels Vince Lombardi | Appendicitis sidelines MarShawn Lloyd | Packers-Bears final injury report | Packers-Bears: Five keys | NFC North power rankings and previews | Brenton Cox gets his chance | Lukas Van Ness’ homecoming | Game preview: Packers at Bears | Jordan Love returns to Chicago | Xavier McKinney has beef with D.J. Moore | Updated playoff probabilities | Packers-Bears: TV, history, betting, notes | Packers-Bears matchups | No easy solutions on offense | Bears change offensive coordinator | Packers On SI Consensus Power Rankings