Preview: Green Bay at Chicago

by Brandon on Dec 20, 2007 1:26 AM CST in Green Bay Packers News

I couldn't preview this game without knowing who Chicago will start at quarterback. QB Kyle Orton will get his 2nd start of the season.

If QB Brian Griese got the start then Chicago would have a chance to win. He's got a mediocre 75.6 passer rating this season, but in his six starts, he's had two bad games against Detroit while his passer rating never fell below 89.2 in his other four starts. In sixteen career starts, Orton has had a passer rating above 89.2 in two of them, and has a career passer rating of 59.7. They have no chance to win with Orton as their starter.

Chicago has kept the score within eight points in their last four losses, although they were blown out last week at Minnesota and only kept the final score within seven points because Minnesota's QB Tavaris Jackson was a turnover machine. Turnovers and special teams might keep this game close and I'll guess the Packers win 20-12.

Teams	FO Ranking	NFL Ranking
Packers Rushing Offense	11	28
Chicago Rushing Defense	4	25

It was no fluke that they held Minnesota's RB Adrian Peterson to under four yards a carry last week. The Packers run offense had an off week at St. Louis, but RB Ryan Grant ran for a career high in yardage the week before. The Packers run offense against Chicago's run defense should be a good matchup.

Teams	FO Ranking	NFL Ranking
Chicago Rushing Offense	32	32
Packers Rushing Defense	8	15

The Packers run defense was playing great until they struggled in the first half at St. Louis. Chicago and the other RB Adrian Peterson is barely averaging over 3 yards per carry and can't run against anyone. Chicago won't run the ball anywhere.

Teams	FO Ranking	NFL Ranking
Packers Passing Offense	5	2
Chicago Passing Defense	21	26

Statistically the Packers pass offense should roll on Sunday, but there are some signs that this might be a close battle. The pass offense has been slowed since QB Brett Favre's injury at Dallas, plus it will be cold, and possibly wet, in Chicago. Also, Chicago finally got starting CB Nathan Vasher back after he missed most of the season, and he had an interception against Minnesota last week. CB Charles Tillman had a monster game the last time they played and forced two fumbles. Favre will rack up yards and move the ball, but they could have trouble with turnovers.

Teams	FO Ranking	NFL Ranking
Chicago Passing Offense	26	14
Packers Passing Defense	15	14

Ignore Chicago's pass offense rankings with Orton at QB. He isn't mobile and isn't accurate. He completed a lot of passes in college because Purdue ran a spread offense with a lot of short passes which boosted his completion percentage and kept his turnovers low, but Chicago expects him to complete passes further downfield. The Packers pass defense was better early in the season, but has been trending towards average in recent weeks. Also, DE Aaron Kampman has to be looking forward to abusing RT Fred Miller. That should be more than adequate to shut down Orton.

Teams	FO Ranking
Packers Special Teams	5
Chicago Special Teams	1

The special teams have carried the Packers the last two weeks, but Oakland and St. Louis have awful special teams units. Chicago has the best special teams in the NFL. KR Devin Hester is dangerous and K Robbie Gould has probably never missed a field goal against the Packers. This should be another good battle.

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Comments

20-12?

Are you nuts? I predict the Packers stomp all over the "Bad News Bears", at least 31-14. I mean come on. The Bears got really lucky the first time, and they have absolutely nothing going for them besides Devon Hester. The defense sucks and the offense is even worse. Overrated Brian Urlacher has an "arthritic back", which means he's getting too old to be playing NFL football, and that new lineman Toeaina was doing more for the Bears defense than Brian was! Granted Urlacher did have 2 sacks Monday night against the Vikings, but that's like the most sacks I've seen by him in a long time. The fact is the Bears are the worst team the NFC has to offer right now. Lovey Smith doesn't have a clue as to how to coach a football team, and I have been waiting for him to get fired. They should fire him and Ron Turner, as well as Orton, Grossman, and Griese (or as I like to call them "The 3 Stooges" lol). You'd think Kyle would have done a lot better since he's been benched forever. If I were him I would've been doing a LOT of practicing at passing in that time. I actually thought Chicago would have a better chance with him as QB after what I saw Grossman and Griese do, but I was wrong. He seemed to do WORSE than Grossman (and that's really saying something!). If I were Hester, I'd put myself up for free agency and get with a winning team, instead of wasting the talent on the Bears. I was kinda mad that Mike Gullick had the nerve to say that the Cowboys are better than the Packers on ESPN's Hot Seat this week. He said that GB doesn't have a running game and that the Cowboys do, yet had he been paying attention last weekend he would've seen quite the opposite. Tony Romo constantly threw the ball to no avail, and the running game was non-existent. And he seemed to forget about that awesome running TD we scored on Dallas early on in that game. Plus it's total BS that Dallas has 11 guys going to the Pro Bowl and we only got 4. I mean WTF?!!! Dallas won't even last through the playoffs, and I've been saying all season long that GB is going to the Super Bowl. I've also told people that this will be our magic season, and so far it has been. Here is my big prediction: Packers vs. Patriots in the Super Bowl!!! It'll be a fight to remember, and we'll come out on top. We more than likely will be the ONLY team to beat them this year, unless the Dolphins pull a rabbit out of a hat this week. The Patriots will falter eventually. I just hope that Brett doesn't retire after this Super Bowl victory and sticks around at least 2 more years to help this relatively young team reach a level where they can carry on without him, and hopefully they will have a decent QB to take his place. Aaron Rodgers is definitely not our QB of the future.

GO PACK GO!

by Packers4ever on Dec 20, 2007 2:58 AM CST reply actions

We Agree To Disagree

In week 5, Chicago was playing bad, they were loaded with injuries, and yet they still managed to win 27-20 at Lambeau. The Packers had blowouts in their last two wins, but they dominated on special teams and that just won't happen against the best special teams unit in the NFL, and that should help make this game close. If there are no turnovers, then Chicago could get blown out because their offense will do nothing with Orton at the helm. They are far from the worst team in the NFC as long as San Francisco and Atlanta are around.

Dallas S Ken Hamlin, Pro Bowl. Every diehard fan in Seattle probably got a good laugh out of that. Dallas has some legitimate Pro Bowl players, but they got preferred treatment. It's been that way my entire lifetime.

I've been wishing Favre would return every season, and swearing up-and-down that he can still play at my old blog after the 2005 and 2006 seasons. He can still play, and only now that the rest of the offense has returned has everyone else noticed it. I'm still taking a year-by-year approach, but I've have never seen any sign that he can't play. He should come back again next season. Still if something does happen, QB Aaron Rodgers has proven this season that he can play and he could be a pretty good QB, although I'm not his biggest fan either.

by Brandon on Dec 20, 2007 11:41 PM CST up reply actions

I got the Pack, 24-14

Lets face it, its a rivalry game and that means all stats, all meaningful predictions go right out the window when it comes to playing the Bears. These guys always give us a helluva fight, and its almost always a close one. They'll put a few on us, maybe in the third or fourth quarter when guys get tired, but hopefully by then it will be over. The Bears still have a defense to fear, not as much as it used to be, but we should not be getting ahead of ourselves or be looking for a trench fight to get even. Just do what would have won it for us the first game, move the football methodically, and quit turning the ball over. On a side note, I will just state this here.. *Aaron Rogers is the future of this team.* This guy is a S-T-U-D. Amazing confidence and field presence (he learned from the best) and his arm is more than adequate in terms of strength and accuracy. He's taken major strides since playing a few meaningless pre-season games, where he maybe didn't look so good... but what he did in Dallas against a playoff team was nothing short of amazing.

by Billy on Dec 20, 2007 6:59 AM CST reply actions