In this series, I will be looking at the history of coaches, quarterbacks, rushers, and receivers for all 32 franchises. For coaches and quarterbacks, I will be looking at how much their franchise’s career records (regular season only) would change if we removed the games with that person. For rushers and receivers, I will note how many times that player was the team’s leading rusher/receiver over the course of their time with that franchise (regular plus postseason).

Previous Teams:

AFC East: Dolphins, Bills, Jets, and Patriots
NFC East: Cowboys, Eagles, Giants, and Redskins
AFC North: Steelers, Browns, Ravens
NFC North: Packers, Vikings

When it comes to Chicago football, there’s only one Papa Bear. The Bears have been a successful franchise, winning 56.4% of games over the team’s nearly 100-year history. But under Halas, Chicago won 67.1% of their games; under all other head coaches, Chicago has won just 50.4% of games. Therefore, “games with Halas” has improved the team’s all-time winning percentage by a whopping 6.0%, the fourth most ever behind only Don Shula in Miami, Bill Belichick in New England, and Paul Brown in Cleveland. The second-most successful coach was Da Coach, Mike Ditka, who posted a 0.631 winning percentage over 168 games. On the flip side, John Fox and Dave Wannstedt have harmed the franchise’s winning percentage the most. The full results below:

For quarterback records, this data only goes back to 1950, so the best quarterback in franchise history isn’t included here. From 1950 to 2018, the Bears have a 0.506 winning percentage, but without Jim McMahon that number falls to 0.491. Playing opposite an all-time great defense, McMahon posted an outstanding 0.754 winning percentage as a starter, which included a 22-game winning streak. Even with McMahon, if you remove games started by Ed Brown (who has the best yards per completion average in history), the Bears would have a sub-.500 winning percentage since 1950. Meanwhile, the quarterback who most cratered the franchise’s winning percentage is Bobby Douglass, who is notable for averaging 2.25 rushing yards for every pass he threw. As always, I also recommend sorting this table by games started: you will see that Jay Cutler has started the most games for the Bears at quarterback since 1950, and that he was perfectly average.

At running back, Bears fans can boast about two Hall of Famers during the Super Bowl era and a few other really good running backs. Walter Payton led Chicago in rushing yards in 164 of his career games (playoffs included), the second-most of any player with one team in history (Emmitt Smith, of course, being first). Gale Sayers was a superstar for a short period of time, but still cracks the top five here. Matt Forte, Thomas Jones, and Neal Anderson were workhorse backs that played at a high level during their time in Chicago.

And then there’s Rick Casares, who was an immediate star and the best fullback back in the NFL until Jim Brown arrived. In 2001, recruiting analysts said there were only five players in history who could have made the jump from high school directly to the NFL: Junior Seau, Randy Moss, Andre Carter, Herschel Walker, and Casares. And I didn’t forget about Beattie Feathers or Bronko Nagurski, but their careers ended well before 1950.

At wide receiver, Chicago has a much less impressive history. Harlon Hill was great, but it is telling that no Bears receiver since 1961 has been able to lead the team in more games than he did during his 8-year stint in Chicago during a dead ball era. Brandon Marshall and Jeff Graham led the team in receiving yards during half of their games, but each only stayed in the windy city for two seasons.

That’s it for the Chicago version of this series. Please leave your thoughts in the comments.