Sports: Chicago Bears Tickets

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The Bears, one of the storied NFL teams was established by the A.E. Staley Company of Decatur, illions in 1919. The Chicago Bears are a professional American football team based in Chicago, Illinois. They are currently members of the Northern Division of the National Football Conference (NFC) in the National Football League (NFL). The team has won 9 total league titles including 8 NFL Championships and Super Bowl XX. The Bears have the most enshrines (26 members) in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The stadium, Soldier Field is located next to Lake Michigan and recently is remodeled in a controversial modernization.

The Bears have played in over a thousand games since becoming a charter member of the NFL in 1920. Through the 2005 season, they lead the NFL in overall franchise wins with 671 and have an overall record of 671-495-42 (going 657-479-42 during the regular season and 14-16 in the playoffs). For the most part, the Bears have stayed in the Halas family. The team is currently owned by Halas' daughter Virginia McCaskey and has been run on a day-to-day basis since 1999 by President and CEO Ted Phillips. The Bears became a dominant team in the early 1940s, reaching the NFL Championship Game five times during a seven season span, while winning four. One famous victory during that period was their 73-0 victory over the favored Washington Redskins at Griffith Stadium in the 1940 NFL Championship Game. The score is still an NFL record for lopsided results.

Walter Payton made an initial impact on the football landscape by winning the NFL Most Valuable Player Award in the 1977-78 season. The Bears' rivalry with the Green Bay Packers is one of the oldest and fiercest in professional sports, dating back to 1921. In the 1985 season, Coach Mike Ditka used 350-plus pound lineman "Refrigerator" Perry as a truly "wide" receiver in a touchdown play at Lambeau Field, flagrantly taunting the Packers. The Packers have also one-upped the Bears from time to time over the years, such as the "Instant Replay Loss" game of 1989.

The Bears have won a total of 9 league championships, including Super Bowl XX after the 1985 season in which they dominated the NFL with their then-revolutionary 46 defense and a cast of characters that recorded the novelty rap song "The Super Bowl Shuffle". After the 1985 Championship season, the Bears remained competitive throughout the 1980s but failed to return to the Super Bowl. They have been defeated at home in the playoffs twice in the new millennium, most recently in the 2005-06 season. The Bears have not played in the NFC Championship Game since 1988, when the San Francisco 49ers beat the Bears 28-3 at Soldier Field. The franchise believes that the trip to the 2005 playoffs is the stepping stone to returning to prominence of American football.