Bears Week

The Packers host the Bears at Lambeau on Sunday.  So I was looking a little at the Bears history.  In 1965 there were three Hall of Fame players taken in the first round of the NFL draft.  Two of the three Hall of Famers were selected by the Bears: Dick Butkus and Gale Sayers:

Butkus, Sayers, Halas in 1965

The third Hall of Famer ?  Joe Namath, but he went to the upstart NY Jets in the AFL.  

Butkus and Sayers were amazing players the defensive and offensive rookies of the year:

but not super happy about it

  

Sayers in particular was the kind of player that everyone wanted to see - at any time Sayers could run for a touchdown.  Butkus was also very intense and productive but they tend to make more extended NFL Films sequences with John Facenda (voice of God) narration for offense than defense.

a Butkus clip in this post but it's Pat Summerall narrating: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2023/10/a-guy-named-butkus-1942-2023.html

But the thing is:  The Bears never won a championship with Sayers or Butkus.  They won in 1963 and in 1985 and in between was the sound of crickets at Soldier Field.

Maybe if they had drafted Joe Namath ?  But George Halas was famous for throwing nickels around like manhole covers so even if they had drafted Namath I doubt he would have been a Bear.  As evidence: Steve DeLong was the Bears third choice in round 1 but he signed with the AFL Chargers.  The Packers could also have drafted Namath but they were still in the middle of winning with Lombardi.

Here is the list of players taken in the 1965 draft, round one:

I remember Donny Anderson.  He was a good player, selected for the pro bowl (as a punter ?), kind of in the Hornung mold, but not the equal of Hornung on the field.  The Packers also drafted Larry Elkins but he was an AFL signee.

It should be quite a game on Sunday, the first really cold game of the season.

Update 2025-12-7: the Packers won 28-21 over the Bears, sealing the victory with a last minute interception in the endzone by Keisan Nixon of Caleb Willams.

 

second update: Thinking about it the fair thing to note is that the Packers heard the sound of crickets at Lambeau from 1967 to 1996 (29 years) while the Bears went only 22 years between 1963 and 1985.

IOW, Lombardi was an amazing coach, the Packers had 5 championships in less than 10 years. 

 If he had eaten a damn salad or gone to the doctor more I suspect that Washington would have won championships with his leadership.

Best Regards,
Chuck, WB9KZY
http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm