What It Means to Beat Chicago

It's very important this season, in a tight race for the NFC North title, that the Packers win all their division games. Two more remain against Chicago and Detroit. In a worse case scenario, if the Packers win at Chicago and beat Detroit at Lambeau, plus manage to win one of the other remaining four games, then they would finish 8-8 with a 5-1 record in the division. That's not a great season, but it might be good enough to win the division this year.

The 37-3 crushing of Chicago in week 11 did remind me of when the Packers crushed the Vikings last year in week 10 by a score of 34-0. The two wins were very similar. They were both similar dominant performances. The Packers didn't rely on any big turnovers to run up the score. They just outplayed them on offense and defense in almost every way. Was this a sign the Packers took a step forward and were ready to run the table?

Unfortunately not. After the Packers crushed Minnesota, they played seven more games and went 5-2. They actually had a better record (7-1) before that win than they did after it (5-2). Plus they had two very disappointing losses at Dallas and at Chicago. They played great, but it was just one game and not necessarily a sign of great things to come.