To this day the Chicago Bears teams of the 1980s remain the most revered in team history. Of course, this is due mostly to that unforgettable 1985 team that won the Super Bowl. There were other iterations though too. The ’84 team set the league record for most sacks in a season. The ’86 team allowed the fewest points in NFL history.
Even the ’88 team carved their own niche by winning the infamous “Fog Bowl” and reaching the NFC championship. Yet some look back on that era with a great degree of disappointment. Why? Namely, because it’s felt those teams achieved far less than they should’ve. Some of the players have said as much themselves, believing that group had two or even three more Super Bowls they left on the table.
These leads to the inevitable question. Where did things go wrong? There are plenty of theories. The quarterback position was always an issue. Mike Ditka created a rift in the locker room. They simply lost their edge. All of those theories have some validity. However, their problems were rooted before they even began to show in the late ’80s.
Departure of Jim Finks started the slow decline of the Chicago Bears
One of the people who still never get enough respect for that success the team had 30 years ago was Jim Finks. He’d been their GM since 1974. Not only had he pulled them out of the worst losing drought in franchise history, but he also built the foundation of that championship team that would come a decade later.
Subscribe to the BFR Youtube channel and ride shotgun with Dave and Ficky as they break down Bears football like nobody else.
Just check out the list of players he added from 1975 through his final year in 1983:
- Walter Payton
- Dan Hampton
- Otis Wilson
- Mike Singletary
- Todd Bell
- Jim McMahon
- Jimbo Covert
- Dave Duerson
- Richard Dent
- Mark Bortz
The final four names on that list arrived in 1983 alone. This begs the question. Why in the world did Finks leave when it was clear he was at the peak of his powers? It stems from a longstanding disagreement with owner George Halas who’d chosen to hire Ditka as head coach without his consent. Finks resigned after that year.
His loss was felt as the decade progressed. From 1979 to 1983, the Bears had drafted nine Pro Bowlers. In the five seasons after he left? They managed only three. This has led many to wonder what would’ve happened had he stayed. Based on his return to the NFL in 1986, they got a pretty good idea.
Finks turned the Saints, yes the SAINTS, into contenders.
He took over New Orleans that year, a team who’d never produced a winner in their history. In just that first offseason, he managed to add five future Pro Bowlers to the roster including Sam Mills, Vaughan Johnson, and Pat Swilling. Finks ended up drafting eight Pro Bowlers during his run there. So it was clear his eye for talent had no diminished.
So why bring up all of this and what does it have to do with the Bears of today? The simple answer is they are unlikely to suffer the same fate that team did 34 years ago.
The architect of these new Bears isn’t going anywhere
Like Finks so long ago, Ryan Pace inherited an absolute mess when he arrived in 2015. The Bears were an old team with most of their star players gone or long past their primes. It was a team with no future. So he made the difficult decision to blow it all up. He turned over the roster from top to bottom, overhauled the coaching staff and aimed to build a winning culture from scratch.
It was a painful process at times, but suddenly here the new Bears are. They’re 10-4, winners of the NFC North and considered a contender to reach the Super Bowl. Almost all of it was brought together by him. His draft prowess to this point has been strong with seven of his picks being selected as Pro Bowl starters or alternates.
Not only that but unlike Finks, he has complete solidarity with his head coach. Where one had the guy forced on him, Pace handpicked Matt Nagy to run this show. The two are completely in sync and it’s shown from the beginning. That is why this Bears team could be set up for even greater success than those great ones of the 1980s.
Namely, because the man who built it will actually be along for the ride this time.
