Welcome to SB Nation FanPulse — a survey of fans across the NFL, powered by SurveyMonkey. Each week, we send 32 polls to 100+ plugged in fans from each team. Bears fans, sign up HERE to join FanPulse.
The best rivalries are between two teams that are equally matched, so from a historical standpoint, it doesn’t get much more even than the Chicago Bears vs. the Green Bay Packers. It was just last season that the Packers finally overtook the Bears for the all-time lead in their series and they now lead 93-96-6. It took back to back Hall of Fame QBs (Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers) for the Packers to finally catch up and pass the Bears, but the problem with this rivalry is that both teams haven’t been evenly matched for a long time.
The Lovie Smith coached Bears’ teams gave Green Bay a good run, but before that there were always huge swings of dominance by either side. Before this last GB run, the Bears were 27-13 between 1973 and 1993. Before that, the Packers dominated through the 60s.
So while the Bears were mostly down the last quarter century, some of Green Bay’s fans started to view Minnesota as the bigger threat.
Our fanbase still has plenty of disgust towards Green Bay, but their fans are starting to view the Vikings as their number one rival. I suspect that changes if the Bears can go on a run under head coach Matt Nagy and general manager Ryan Pace.
From a geographical standpoint, it makes sense for Minnesota fans to view Green Bay as their biggest rival. Plus the Vikes have been in the playoffs 14 times since 1992, and then there’s the whole Brett Farve thing. After the Packers dumped him, he ended up in Minnesota for a couple years.
The thing I find the most interesting is these FanPulse results, is that the Detroit Lions didn’t receive one vote from Bears or Packers fans as their rival, and that they weren’t even listed on the Vikings’ FanPulse. The lack of respect is real for Detroit fans. It’s no wonder that fanbase is always so angry.
Anything stand out to you about these results this week?