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Bears head coach Ben Johnson.
Chicago Bears head coach Ben Johnson’s comments about Matt LaFleur have resurfaced online ahead of Week 14’s game against the Green Bay Packers.
The buzz for next week’s divisional matchup reached a fever pitch on Black Friday when the Bears knocked off the Philadelphia Eagles — the defending Super Bowl champions — for a 24-15 victory that moved them to 9-3 in their first season under Johnson.
As a result, the stakes for the Bears’ road matchup with the Packers are straightforward: the winner will walk into Week 15 in sole possession of first place in the NFC North.
Naturally, the high-stakes matchup has led to many — including ESPN’s Adam Schefter — revisiting the comments Johnson made about LaFleur during his introductory news conference on January 22 after the Bears hired him as their new head football coach.
“I know this is the toughest division in football right now,” Johnson said in January. “There are three teams that made the playoffs this year. I’ve got a tremendous amount of respect for the coaches and players in this league, having competed against them for the last six years. Dan Campbell, Kevin O’Connell, you’re talking about two guys that are up for coach of the year awards as the season ends here.”
“And to be quite frank with you, I kind of enjoyed beating Matt LaFleur twice a year.”
The sound byte from Ben Johnson’s introductory press conference as Chicago’s head coach that will be replayed over and over until the Bears play at Green Bay next Sunday:
The Bears (9-3) will kick off against the Packers (8-3-1) at 4:25 p.m. ET on December 7.
Matt LaFleur Responded to Ben Johnson’s Dig in April
Johnson’s comments about LaFleur seemed intended to rile the Bears fan base about his intentions to assert dominance over the Packers in the division. After all, LaFleur’s Packers have only lost to the Bears one time: in 2024’s regular-season finale when the Bears blocked a last-minute field goal to defeat their rivals for the first time since 2018.
But as for the jab that Johnson took at him, LaFleur said he found it “interesting” when talking about it on the “Bussin’ With The Boys” podcast during the offseason in April.
“I was waiting for this,” LaFleur said when asked about Johnson. “I don’t know Ben Johnson. Do I have beef? I don’t know Ben Johnson. I respect him as a football coach. He did a nice job [for the Lions]. I thought the press conference was interesting, but I don’t have beef with him. I don’t get all into that stuff.”
Is there beef in the NFC North?
While there might not be actual “beef” between the two NFC North coaches, it will be interesting to see how they each broach the subject this week, both in terms of what they say about each other before the matchup and how they interact after the game.
Of course, nobody should expect the head coaches of one of the NFL’s oldest rivalries to be buddy-buddy with each other, even if there is likely a mutual respect between them.
Bears Will Clash With Packers Twice in Next 3 Weeks
Excitement has built at a league level for the Bears and Packers’ upcoming matchup, as the NFL demonstrated last week when it announced it had decided to flex the kickoff from its original 1 p.m. ET time to the premium afternoon game slot at 4:25 p.m. ET.
For the Bears, though, the battle with the Packers won’t end after just one week.
The Bears, who are trying to make the playoffs for the first time since 2020, will face off against the Packers twice in the next three weeks, a pivotal stretch of games that will go a long way in helping them solidify their standing in the North — for better or for worse.
Winning even one of the two matchups would go a long way for them in the standings, but two consecutive losses could put them in do-or-die mode down the final two-game stretch of the season against the San Francisco 49ers and Detroit Lions — two teams that are currently vying for wild-card spots in the NFC’s side of the playoff bracket.
It all starts next week with Week 14’s game in Lambeau.
Jordan J. Wilson is a sports reporter who covers the NFL and MLB for Heavy.com, with a focus on the Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packers. He has previously covered all levels of sports — high school, college and pro — for a variety of publications including The Indianapolis Star, The News-Gazette, Springfield State-Journal Register and Peoria Journal Star. More about Jordan J. Wilson
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