The rivalry between the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears is among the best in all of sports, not just the NFL. Two of the most impassioned fanbases happen to be pitted against each other, and there is no love lost to say the least.
When the teams first meet again at Lambeau Field this next season in Week 5, it's very likely Packers superstar Micah Parsons will be recovered from his torn ACL and ready to play.
One Bears expert, and indubitably, many of their fans, feel a bit slighted by the NFL schedule makers. There's an implication that some favoritism is afoot. Maybe that's the case, but why is that a bad thing? Allow me to share the take, and a counter-take to the take.
Bears expert laments how much the NFL 'loves Green Bay' with timing of Week 5 matchup
FanSided's own NFL lead editor Ryan Heckman, a massive Bears supporter and frequent Bear Goggles On contributor, served up his opinion on a perceived injustice in the NFL's schedule release at Chicago's expense:
"The Packers open the season with four very winnable games before they go into a tough stretch. Do we think it is any coincidence the league gave them a cakewalk schedule for the four (likely) games Micah Parsons misses? Come on, man. They face the Vikings, Jets, Falcons and Bucs. All four of them are coming off losing seasons. The NFL loves Green Bay, but we already knew this was true."
The most straightforward rebuttal to this is, "Deal with it?" But we'll go a little deeper.
It's clear that, even after the Bears' best season in many, many years, the Packers still live rent-free in their heads. In fact, there's a compelling argument to make that if the recently released Brandon McManus didn't forget how to kick a football, Green Bay would not have blown a 21-3 lead on Wild Card Weekend last year and would've blown out the Bears in the playoffs.
Instead, as was the case throughout much of the 2025 campaign, Caleb Williams pulled some downright ridiculous throws out of his rear, McManus missed multiple critical kicks, and the Pack lost 31-27.
Did we mention Parsons wasn't available for that contest? Right. He wasn't.
Shouldn't the Bears faithful want the Packers at full strength, so that there aren't such obvious caveats to when they actually win (for once)?
It's not like Chicago has some devastating gauntlet to open the season either. Three of their first four games are at home. The season opener is at Carolina, a reigning division champ who won the NFC South with an 8-9 record. Then, the Vikings and Jets come to town, with a Monday Night Football showcase against the Eagles sandwiched in between. Is that so bad?
Anyway, to one of Heckman's other points, yes, there's a lot for the NFL to love about the Packers franchise.
Green Bay is the only publicly-owned team. An iconic brand. A small-market team that wins at as consistent a clip as any other organization. Shoot, the Super Bowl trophy is named after their most legendary coach, Vince Lombardi.
The on-field product for Green Bay is better when Parsons is out there. If the Bears beat the Packers with Parsons, it reflects better on them, drives more interest to their team, and furthers the notion that 2025 wasn't a fluke.
Thus, the schedule makers who did the Packers an alleged favor actually benefited Chicago's bottom line, too. Imagine if Green Bay is 4-0 entering Week 5.
What do I mean by 2025 being a fluke for the Bears? Well, how often can you bank on seven fourth-quarter comebacks in a season? Not often. How often can you count on leading the league in takeaways two years in a row? Not often.
Those who love them some Bears will contend that, with a second year in Ben Johnson's system, Williams will leap to another stratosphere. And while I personally view Chicago's decision to move off wideout DJ Moore as one of the biggest addition by subtraction transactions in recent NFL history, will that be enough to overcome Williams' shockingly scattershot accuracy? I'm not convinced.
The wide variance in Williams' performance is a stark contrast to the far superior consistency of Packers QB Jordan Love. There's no question that Love has way more command at the line of scrimmage, and he has comparable arm talent to make stupid-good highlight reel throws.
In terms of opponents' projected over/under win totals, too, Chicago has the sixth-toughest schedule in the NFL, compared to Green Bay's 15th-most difficult, per Sharp Football.
There is a world where Williams absolutely explodes in 2026, completes more routine throws, and ascends to true superstardom. To be honest, he's probably a year off from that type of trajectory. In the meantime, Bears fans will keep coping with conspiracy theories and excuses to justify their validity, whilst the Packers quietly go about their business and, in all likelihood, keep beating the snot out of their most hated adversary more often than not.
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