Deal with it, Green Bay: The Bears have turned the tables on the Packers at last (or have they?)

As the Bears and Packers warmed up for their NFL-record 213th game against each other, this one in the wild-card playoffs at Soldier Field, it only seemed as though the Packers had won something like, oh, 200 of the previous 212.In fact, that would be giving them too much credit by almost double. The victory tally was Packers 109, Bears 97, with six ties — fairly close, taken over the long arc of rivalry history.But let’s not kid ourselves: Over the last three-plus decades, the rivalry has been as evenly matched as a lone poppy-seed bun against a barrel of bratwurst. Any sentient Bears watcher has the green-and-gold-tinged bruises to prove it. Related Halas Intrigue podcast: Picking a Packers-Bears playoff winner Bears or Packers? Here’s how you voted on rivalry’s epic playoff clash Bears predictions: Round 1 playoff game vs. Packers Still, the fans in navy blue and orange flocked eagerly to the frigid lakefront Saturday, full of hope, excitement and swaggering confidence.Because the 2025 season was — is — going to change everything.You know, maybe.Win or lose Saturday night, the sense of a change of course in a purportedly unsurpassed pro football rivalry was going to linger. Yes, on one hand, it could easily be argued that a “rivalry” in which one side had lost 50 times in 65 tries entering this game wasn’t much of a rivalry at all. But the Bears have so much going for them these days, it’s nearly impossible not to get swept up…

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