Thread: It's a good year to stop and smell the roses. Enjoy this season.

Originally Posted by 4DaBERS

How many on this board besides myself and JABF remember the venerable Abe Gibron walking the sidelines? I am occasionally critical of Lovie, but I remember those days when we couldn't BUY a win, even a cheap one. I would rather give Lovie a 10 year extension than to get someone like Abe back again. The point is JABF, you are right, there are plenty of roses to smell this year.

Oh yeah the days of Abe Gibron and Bobby Douglass at QB. We prayed for a .500 season then and just one win over the Pack. Future HOF RB like Don Shy, Cyril Pinder, Joe Moore, Jim Harrison. Not a decent WR in sight or even a QB who could hit one. A 300lb plus Gibron waddling up and down the sidelines cheering his guys on.

I truly thought the old man and Mugs had gone bonkers to ever let the team slip into the kind of state. Those were the worst Bears teams in modern history.

Things are much better these days but expectations are higher too. Until this team does what the '80s Bears did in terms of winning a Super Bowl and stringing together multiple winning seasons and becoming perennial SB contenders they will always be considered to have fallen short of the legends of that past.

This bunch and Lovie have teased us with potential greatness too many times over the years. Now it's time to prove they have it. That's just the way it is.

Originally Posted by bearsinhouston

On top of that, he always looked like he was constipated and then swallowed a lemon to make it better. Neither worked.

Speaking of looking like you swallowed a lemon, I forget the name of the old coach for the Vikings - he was after Gabe though (at least if memory serves me)

You mean Bud Grant, who coached the Vikings from the mid-1960s until the mid-1980s? He was a great coach, but unfortunately, was unable to win any Super Bowls in four appearances in the big game.

My son and I are going to Sunday's Panthers game. I can't wait. This is our first time seeing the team since training camp.

Here are the worst seasons since I've been a Bears fan. There were other seasons I didn't like, but these 32 years were the worst I think. Not just for the losses, but these years were bad to experience IMHO:

Year	W ▴	L	T	Pts	PtsO	PtDif	Coaches	AV	Passing	Rushing	Receiving
1969	1	13	0	210	339	-129	Dooley	Butkus	Concannon	Sayers	Wallace
1973	3	11	0	195	334	-139	Gibron	Douglass	Douglass	Garrett	Thomas
1982	3	6	0	141	174	-33	Ditka	Hampton	McMahon	Payton	Moorehead
1972	4	9	1	225	275	-50	Gibron	Butkus	Douglass	Douglass	Farmer
1974	4	10	0	152	279	-127	Gibron	Chambers	Huff	Grandberry	Wade
1975	4	10	0	191	379	-188	Pardee	Chambers	Huff	Payton	Rather
1997	4	12	0	263	421	-158	Wannstedt	Flanigan	Kramer	Harris	Proehl
1998	4	12	0	276	368	-92	Wannstedt	Engram	Kramer	Bennett	Engram
2002	4	12	0	281	379	-98	Jauron	Urlacher	Miller	Thomas	Booker
1960	5	6	1	194	299	-105	Halas	George	Brown	Casares	Dewveall
1964	5	9	0	260	379	-119	Halas	Morris	Wade	Arnett	Morris
1966	5	7	2	234	272	-38	Halas	Sayers	Bukich	Sayers	Jones
1992	5	11	0	295	361	-66	Ditka	Harbaugh	Harbaugh	Anderson	Davis
2000	5	11	0	216	355	-139	Jauron	Urlacher	McNown	Allen	Robinson
2004	5	11	0	231	331	-100	Smith	Briggs	Hutchinson	Jones	Terrell
1970	6	8	0	256	261	-5	Dooley	Butkus	Concannon	Montgomery	Gordon
1971	6	8	0	185	276	-91	Dooley	Butkus	Douglass	Shy	Farmer
1981	6	10	0	253	324	-71	Armstrong	Fencik	Evans	Payton	Margerum
1989	6	10	0	358	377	-19	Ditka	Anderson	Tomczak	Anderson	Morris
1999	6	10	0	272	341	-69	Jauron	Robinson	Matthews	Enis	Robinson
1967	7	6	1	239	218	21	Halas	Petitbon	Concannon	Sayers	Gordon
1968	7	7	0	250	333	-83	Dooley	Butkus	Carter	Sayers	Gordon
1976	7	7	0	253	216	37	Pardee	Chambers	Avellini	Payton	Scott
1978	7	9	0	253	274	-21	Armstrong	Payton	Avellini	Payton	Scott
1980	7	9	0	304	264	40	Armstrong	Payton	Evans	Payton	Scott
1993	7	9	0	234	230	4	Wannstedt	Dent	Harbaugh	Anderson	Waddle
1996	7	9	0	283	305	-22	Wannstedt	Conway	Krieg	Harris	Conway
2003	7	9	0	283	346	-63	Jauron	Azumah	Stewart	Thomas	Booker
2007	7	9	0	334	348	-14	Smith	Urlacher	Griese	Benson	Berrian
2009	7	9	0	327	375	-48	Smith	Cutler	Cutler	Forte	Hester
1983	8	8	0	311	301	10	Ditka	Singletary	McMahon	Payton	Gault
2011	8	8	0	353	341	12	Smith	Urlacher	Cutler	Forte	Knox

I'm a relatively recent convert to Bears Nation. I would always watch the Bears on Monday Night Football in the late 1990s and early 2000s when they'd play the Packers and cringe at how they would almost always get crushed by them. In 2005, I would always pay attention to the highlight reels on FOX and CBS when the games would be discussed. I remember how great that 2005 defense was and just how vanilla the offense did. They went 11-5 and unfortunately lost to Carolina Panthers in the Divisional Round, which I didn't watch because I had yet to really become a full convert to pro football as I was always watching college football, particularly Tennessee and Ohio State. Then 2006 came around, and I had a whole mess of troubles that year. In June, I suffered my third nervous breakdown in six years and had to be hospitalized in a psychiatric hospital plus undergo about a month's worth of outpatient group therapy when my time in the psychiatric hospital was up. I could do literally nothing for better than a year: no work nor school on orders from my psychiatrist. As I do now, I lived then at my parents' house with them and my sister who is autistic. I started watching the Bears for good that fall, living vicariously through them as they would get me through the tough times of being rendered redundant by life. Even though the Yankees were division champions that year, Tennessee had another top 25 team in football, and Ohio State played for the national championship against Florida, it was the Bears that help me out more than any other team. Struggling to just find meaning in living life rather than trying to commit suicide is something you don't ever want to go through, and that's something I always fight through everyday of my life with my bipolar disorder. The Bears got me through that fall and early winter, and no one on this board could've been happier or experienced more joy when they won the NFC Championship Game over the Saints than I did because of what they did for me, nor could anyone have felt so low and depressed when they lost to the Colts, especially since Peyton Manning, who had been my hero as a member of the Tennessee Volunteers, was the man who kicked our asses for us.

The 2010/2011 school year for me was about as hellish as 2006/2007. I had to drop both semesters of school that year due to severe depression, and I just could get myself into a good place mentally. In March of 2011, I was hospitalized again for severe depression and psychotic episodes. In the fall of 2010, I followed the Bears really closely as I had since 2006, watching every game on the computer and TV when they were broadcast live. Once again, I lived through the Bears, reveling in pure ecstasy when they beat the Packers in the third game of the season and loving it when Corey Wootten ended Favre's career. However, I was so depressed even further when we lost to the Packers in the NFC Championship Game that I was nearly inconsolable for about a week. To this day, I still play scenarios in my head over and over, like what would have happened had Rodgers not tripped Urlacher when we was running toward the end zone after the interception around the 15 yard line, and if Hanie hadn't thrown that pick six to B.J. Raji.

So yes, I know some of you will find this crazy, improbable, and even more so something that apparently a facetious crazy man would say, but the Bears are almost like an extension of my being more so than they are for most people. Sure, I don't live in the Chicagoland area or even in the state of Illinois, but the team has gotten me through so many tough times over the years that it's really indescribable. This year's team is reminding me a lot of the 2005/2006 Bears in that they do just enough on offense to back up their killer defense, which may well be the league's best. My best guess is that the Bears will beat the Packers simply because they will be hosting the Packers at Soldier Field in Chicago, though I think that game can go either way. I think that this team will probably go 13-3 or 12-4 and win the division, if they continue to play up to their potential. Minnesota will be tough in December, that much is for damn sure, especially since we play them two times in three weeks, and beating the Lions in January won't be easy either as they will be out for blood and that the game will be played in Detroit. 10-6 is as low as I'm willing to say this team will finish since if the Bears win the next two games (Panthers and Titans), that will put us at 7-1 and one win away from finishing with a .500 record. Our offensive playcalling needs to continue to progress week by week (i.e. - Tice needs to continue to master the art of playcalling and utilizing all of his weapons) as well as Cutler needs to play with greater consistency and the offensive line needs to continue improving all the way around, but with this defense playing like it is, we should be in every game we're in the rest of the way, and that's a nice though to have going forward.