Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

Was this one of those fluke situations? What happened to the Packers this season? Appears their defense is what carried them. But, I've heard in some circles that the '63 Chargers would've bested them?

Not sure if it was a fluke, but the Bears definitely had some good fortune in 1963. Here is what happened to their big rivals in the West...

Colts - transition year from 1950's Colts to 1960's Colts, with several rookie starters and a rookie coach in Don Shula. Started the year 2-3 and never really was in the race.

Lions - Alex Karras (HOF IMO) was suspended, loads of injuries on defense (especially in the secondary), and the Lions give up 100 more points in 1963 than 1962. Just not as dominant on defense.

Packers - Hornung was suspended...Tom Moore replaced his production but the Packers probably missed Hornung's ability to come up clutch in big games. What really hurt the Packers was Bart Starr missing 4 games. They acquired Zeke Bratkowski in midseason, but the backup duo of Zeke and John Roach went 11-30 with 5 INTs in the important late-season matchup against the Bears, losing 26-7.

Bears - veteran team (especially on defense) that stayed relatively healthy all year. Giants YA Tittle suffered a knee injury at the end of the regular season and they did not have an established backup. In the title game, the Bears scores were setup by bad INTs from Tittle. Not sure if Bears offense could have done enough to combat a healthy Tittle...but who knows.

Those Bears had one of the best and most overlooked defenses in NFL history. They held opponents to just over 10 points and they gave up a total of only 10 points in two wins over the Packers, who averaged better than 26 points a game that season. Their pass defense was especially good. They gave up only 10 TD passes while intercepting 36 passes and holding opponents to a 31.3 passer rating.

There are those who think the 1963 Chargers might have beaten the Bears. I think the over/under on Bears' interceptions against Rote would have been 7 and I would have bet the over. The Bears would probably have had at least one pick-six and maybe more.

The Giants came out on fire in the 1963 NFL Championship game with a Tittle-to-Gifford TD pass and could have had another one had Shofner not dropped it. Once Tittle hurt his knee, they didnt feel a backup could come in and be effective against that George Allen coached defense.

I truly believe the weapons the Chargers had, would have given the Bears a great game had both teams played each other.

I appreciate the insight you guys have provided about this topic. Just seems like they were kinda an outlier in that era that was mostly Packers, Colts, Giants and Browns. I guess the '60 Eagles could be put in the same category?

Also a very good D benefitted from Turnover luck with a +27 turnover margin - a little like the 2009 New Orleans Saints - they were always a strong D but were more opportunistic than in the surrounding years and in the small sample size of 14 games having a handful of turnovers go your way can turn 11-1-2 back to 9-3-2.

I think much of this was attributable to George Allen taking over from Clark Shaughnessy as DC. Clark was a genius, but a somewhat crazy genius particularly on the defensive side of the ball, he had players moving all over the place, jumping in and out of gaps and all sorts of things that provided for splashy plays but probably weren't entirely sound.

The Bears, prior to 1963, had been a good to very good team for most of the half past decade and along with a few key vets from the 1956 team had done well in the draft and Bill Wade helped stabilize the QB position. Factor in a few teams being down and George Allen and Halas being great coaches you had the perfect set up for a "one off" team to bubble up.

As "lucky" as the Bears were in 1963 they were as unlucky in 1965 when the team was stellar on both sides of the ball but were now dealing with two elite level franchises (Packers and Colts) in the same division(and actually split matchups with both of them in the regular season...while having a better scoring differential for both matchups). They got off to an 0-3 start but from Week 4 on, they had the best record in the West and tied for the best record in the NFL.

Hail Casares wrote:The Bears, prior to 1963, had been a good to very good team for most of the half past decade and along with a few key vets from the 1956 team had done well in the draft and Bill Wade helped stabilize the QB position. Factor in a few teams being down and George Allen and Halas being great coaches you had the perfect set up for a "one off" team to bubble up.

As "lucky" as the Bears were in 1963 they were as unlucky in 1965 when the team was stellar on both sides of the ball but were now dealing with two elite level franchises (Packers and Colts) in the same division(and actually split matchups with both of them in the regular season...while having a better scoring differential for both matchups). They got off to an 0-3 start but from Week 4 on, they had the best record in the West and tied for the best record in the NFL.

It's a great point, if you just look at the talent on the team the Bears were as good as any from 1958 - 1965 and were somewhat unfortunate on the back end of that period to overlap with the Packers.

rhickok1109 wrote:Those Bears had one of the best and most overlooked defenses in NFL history. They held opponents to just over 10 points and they gave up a total of only 10 points in two wins over the Packers, who averaged better than 26 points a game that season. Their pass defense was especially good. They gave up only 10 TD passes while intercepting 36 passes and holding opponents to a 31.3 passer rating.

There are those who think the 1963 Chargers might have beaten the Bears. I think the over/under on Bears' interceptions against Rote would have been 7 and I would have bet the over. The Bears would probably have had at least one pick-six and maybe more.

From what I've read and heard from Coach TJ, George Allen was pretty innovative in regards to developing zone defenses. The zone defense had been rudimentary in the 1950's, and Allen was the first DC to have a variety of zone coverages. Coach TJ got into the specifics of how Allen's Bears and Shula's Lions paid attention to landmarks on the field, adjusting their zones to accommodate the ball being on a hashmark, etc. The 1963 Bears were (arguably) the first NFL team to feature a lot of odd/even defensive line fronts. The AFL had been using odd/even fronts, but this hadn't been used in the NFL very frequently. Allen was innovative in that sense, too.

Two things tangentially related to this thread. First, I think its interesting that the three DCs who had success developing zone defenses...Noll 61 Chargers, Shula 60s Lions & Colts, Allen 63 Bears...became 3 of the most successful HCs in the 1970s and had continued success with the zone defense. Second, when the NFL narrowed the hashmarks in the early 70's, they thought this would increase offensive production because it would be harder for the defense to defend both sides of the field. In reality, this actually made things easier for the defense to play zone because fewer adjustments had to be made in defending the wide side of the field. I think that is a big reason why hardly anyone was playing man-to-man further into the 1970s, and why offenses became completely stagnant by 1977.

The Bears were 20-6-2 between 1962 and '63.

The Bears were more solid than spectacular on offense in those seasons. Billy Wade was the QB, a veteran who threw interceptions. They had Willie Galimore at running back in '63 but he died in an auto accident during training camp before the '64 season. This was a middle of the pack offense but it was all they needed in 1963.

Where the Bears were spectacular in those years was on defense. George Halas allowed George Allen to run the defense. The Bears out-scored opponents by better than 2-1 that year. They intercepted 36 passes and finished the season ranked first in total defense.

The Bears had a lot of unhappy players in 1964, for a variety of reasons. The Galimore's death, along with another player in the same accident, shook them up. The players were unhappy about the way Halas treated them after winning the championship. When the Bears allowed Allen to slip away, they might have thrown away a chance to have a very special stretch of seasons. Imagine Allen as a young coach with the Halas' guidance.

The 63 team was a glimpse at what could have been for the Bears franchise, IMHO.