Packers Humiliated: The Playoff Choke and Future

Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes

For the second time this season, they did not lose to the Bears. They handed them the game. The Packers stopped doing the most basic things in the second half and took their foot off the pedal. This team couldn’t handle momentum like adults and choked their season away like they had done in multiple games this year. For the second time in a season, the punk who runs the Bears gets the last laugh, and we are to blame. 

Look, rivalry juice is part of the NFL. But Ben Johnson went full try-hard villain. Between the extra postgame theatrics and the tone he set, he made it personal in a way that screams “I’ve been waiting to do this on camera.” 

This is not to say the Bears don’t deserve it because they do; they completed the comeback (twice) and advanced, and that’s football. I will not sit here and complain that they don’t deserve where they are right now. They do. They had the fire to come back and take full advantage of another soft performance by the Packers. 

But if you are Green Bay, you let your rival back in the game twice, and now they are dancing on your grave along with the entire league. How can anyone who is part of or roots for this team not feel humiliated? The postgame show had chants of “F–k the Packers,” and the media was eating it all up! Social media is flooded with brutal, pathetic stats that prove this team’s lack of drive or fire. 

ESPN framed it as the capstone on a late-season collapse; the kind where confidence erodes, the margin for error disappears, and suddenly every mistake becomes a two-score swing. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Packers Offseason Gut Check

There will be plenty of time to discuss which moves the Packers should make this offseason, including in the draft and through player acquisitions. In this moment, however, this team, including us as fans, needs a reality check. 

Packers Nation, we need to move on from the past. It has been 15 years since that magical run in 2010. We wanted to compare this year to that run, but one of the major things they had that the 2025 Packers did not was the drive and determination to reach the ultimate goal. The ability to close out games and not let teams creep back in, and if they did, still have the stones to make a big play when it mattered. 

Get tougher in high-leverage situations

LaFleur basically said it: composure in the biggest moments wasn’t there. That’s coaching, leadership, situational reps, and accountability. If you keep melting when momentum flips, it doesn’t matter how pretty the offense looks early in the games. Outside of the 2023 Packers team, we have not seen a group with the same intensity and drive as the 2010 team. They blow leads, play soft and lethargically. 

Bottom Line: Make “situational football” a priority. Red zone, four-minute offense, two-minute defense, third and fourth down stops. Live there.

Stop giving away games with self-inflicted garbage

You can lose because you ran into a great or hot team that did everything to win. You cannot lose because you are undisciplined, late to making adjustments, and mentally checked out. That is on coaching; that is on the players. It shows there is no leadership or accountability. Micah Parsons provided that leadership on defense. When he went down, there was no one to step up.  

The one player whom I have to honestly take my hat off to is Romeo Doubs. We may never see him in a Packers uniform again, as he is a Free Agent, but in his return to Chicago after he botched an onside kick, the man showed the world he is made of something. He came to play and let the demons of the past stay there. That is the kind of player you want. That is what this team needs and lacks. 

When the Lights Fade, Accountability Begins

The Packers get to sit in this one, and they should. Losing to Chicago in January after building a big lead isn’t just painful. It’s humiliation with a rival logo stamped on it. It’s the kind of loss that stains a season.

And if this offseason turns into the usual “run it back, but healthier” script, they’ll end up right back here, watching someone else celebrate while Green Bay fades quietly into the winter.

Because that’s the part everyone sees. The jokes. The chants. Bears fans dancing on your grave, the rest of the league piling on, the whole football world pointing and laughing. Not because the Packers got out-talented, but because they showed their lack of drive.

They didn’t close. They didn’t have the backbone when it mattered.

Remember this pain.

Fix it.