The Chicago Bears and Philadelphia Eagles get set to play one of the most intriguing games of the opening NFL playoff weekend. It’s the defending Super Bowl champions facing a team that hasn’t been in the postseason for eight years. One is at home and boasting a 12-4 record and the other snuck in at 9-7 yet everybody seems confident that team will end up prevailing.
Why? The common explanation is experience. They’ve been here before. They know how to elevate their game when the lights come on. The Bears, for all their considerable talent, are new to this. Odds are they won’t understand how to turn up the juice right away, giving Philly the opening they need to knock them out.
Except it’s never that simple in the playoffs. If it were the most experienced team would win every single time and everybody knows that doesn’t happen. Instead there might be another key reason one of these two teams will emerge victorious. Does their prior history against each other offer any insight?
Chicago Bears and Philadelphia Eagles victors had better pass defenses
One always has to look at history to at least try to get an indication of why a rivalry swings in favor of one team or the other. To this point, the Eagles hold a slight edge over the Bears two games to one in playoff meetings. Are there any trends that would help explain that? It turns out there is. Each game reveals that whoever had the higher ranked pass defense that season ended up winning the game.
Subscribe to the BFR Youtube channel and ride shotgun with Dave and Ficky as they break down Bears football like nobody else.
1979 – Eagles (4th) beat Bears (5th)
In these situations where the two pass defenses are closely matched, it comes down to who has the better quarterback and that was undoubtedly the Eagles. They had Pro Bowler Ron Jaworski who threw three touchdowns in that game. The Bears had Mike Phipps, a washout from Cleveland who completed just 13 of 30 passes with two interceptions. The defense actually held Jaworski in check in the first half but he struck twice in the second to give his team the victory.
1988 – Bears (9th) beat Eagles (28th)
People will say that the only reason the Bears won this game is that of the infamous fog bank that enveloped Soldier Field at halftime, making vision almost impossible. However, that’s not true. It hampered both teams. The fact is Eagles QB Randall Cunningham threw for 407 yards that day, but Chicago also intercepted him three times. Mike Tomczak also threw three picks as well but he had the game’s lone TD pass which proved the difference.
2001 – Eagles (2nd) beat Bears (29th)
People laud the 2001 Bears defense so much but the fact is it was a highly flawed unit. They were suffocating against the run but quarterbacks had a lot of success against them and it came back to haunt the team in the playoffs. Donovan McNabb picked them apart for 262 yards and two touchdowns. Jim Miller and Shane Matthews combined for 89 yards and three interceptions. It wasn’t a fair fight in any respect.
2018 – Eagles (30th) at Bears (7th)
Thus we arrived at meeting #4. This marks the first time since 1988 that the Bears have the decisive advantage on this front. Philadelphia has struggled against the pass all year, giving up multiple 300-yard passing games. This is due to constant injury problems in their secondary. Meanwhile, the Bears have one of the best secondaries in football led by Kyle Fuller and Eddie Jackson along with that fierce pass rush.
The division at quarterback isn’t even as wide as it used to be. Nick Foles is the more proven player but Mitch Trubisky is by far the most competent passer the Bears have fielded in any of the previous three matchups. If the trend holds up, then Chicago should tie the series up with a win on Sunday.
