NFL 2017-18 Week 4 Thursday Night Football Preview

Chicago Bears (1-2)

at

Green Bay Packers (2-1_

I do not have time this morning to do a full blog post on predictions for this upcoming week in the NFL, although I will try to get around to that perhaps by tomorrow. However, there is a game tonight, and so it seemed like a good idea to at least make my prediction for this game, specifically.

The NFL's oldest rivalry gets another chapter added to it tonight, as the Chicago Bears go to visit the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field. Both teams are coming off impressive wins. Chicago managed to stun the heavily favored Steelers last weekend at Soldier Field, while Green Bay managed to escape a surprisingly tough challenge from the visiting Cincinnati Bengals. The Packers are, understandably, fairly heavy favorites to win this one.

Chicago has an opportunity here, if they can pull this one off, to stay relevant in the NFC North. Minnesota and Detroit are also 2-1 and looking good, and so the Bears cannot afford to lose this game to the Packers, which will drop them to two games behind both the Packers and the winner of Sunday afternoon's showdown between the Lions and the Vikings. For Green Bay, it is a chance to establish themselves, once again, as one of the best and most consistent competitive teams in the NFC, and especially in this division, as well as continuing their recent dominance over the Bears, their oldest and, for now, weakest division rivals.

Believe it or not, despite having met the better part of 200 times, this all-time rivalry between the two teams is actually tied right now. Both teams each have won 93 of the meetings. This game will break the tie, always assuming that it will not itself end in a tie.

There was a point when the Bears owned a decisive advantage with an 80-57 record, but this rivalry has more or less been owned by Green Bay since around the time that Brett Favre took over as quarterback for the Packers. 

Since then, the Packers have consistently fielded highly competitive teams, as evidenced by their three Super Bowl appearances, with two of them being wins, during the Favre and now Rodgers eras. In the meantime, the Bears went from greatness in the 1980's to much more modest, and much less frequent, success. There have been some successful seasons here and there, including one season in 2006-07 when Chicago made it all the way to the Super Bowl (only the second Super Bowl appearance in franchise history). However, the Bears have not been able to enjoy lasting success, and they bottomed out last season, finishing with a dismal 3-13 overall record. 

So, what will happen in this particular game?

Well, my official prediction is that the Packers will win tonight.