{"id":741068,"date":"2026-02-09T20:47:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T20:47:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/741068\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T20:47:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T20:47:16","slug":"bears-have-chance-to-play-2026-season-opener-on-thursday-night-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/741068\/","title":{"rendered":"Bears Have Chance to Play 2026 Season Opener on Thursday Night Football"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Chicago Bears<\/a> had their 2025 season opener on Monday Night Football versus the Minnesota Vikings.<\/p>\n

The Bears had a 17-6 lead in the third quarter after a 74-yard pick-six by Nahshon Wright. However, the Vikings came back in the fourth quarter and scored 21 straight points.<\/p>\n

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Chicago scored a touchdown with 2:02 left, but it wasn’t enough, as the Bears fell 27-24.<\/p>\n

The 2025 season came to an end last night, with the Seattle Seahawks beating the New England Patriots 29-13 in Super Bowl 60. The odds for Super Bowl 61<\/a> have already been announced.<\/p>\n

One thing that hasn’t been decided is who will face the Seahawks on Thursday Night Football to open the 2026 season.<\/p>\n

According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter<\/a>, the Seahawks will either play the Patriots, Los Angeles Rams, San Francisco 49ers, Arizona Cardinals, Kansas City Chiefs, Los Angeles Chargers, Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants or Bears.<\/p>\n

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That’s a lot of teams to choose from, but realistically, the NFL will pick either the Bears or the Patriots.<\/p>\n

The Chiefs would probably be in the running to play the Seahawks in Week 1, but there was a late-season injury to quarterback Patrick Mahomes. Mahomes tore both his ACL and LCL in December, leaving his status for the season opener uncertain.<\/p>\n

A Super Bowl rematch with the Patriots would draw a lot of viewers as well. However, the Bears could also make for an exciting game with the defending Super Bowl champs.<\/p>\n

Chicago had several fourth-quarter comebacks in the 2025 season and always felt like must-see TV.<\/p>\n

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On top of that, the Rams and 49ers are already playing each other in Melbourne, Australia, in Week 1, so that rules them out.<\/p>\n

Out of the remaining teams, only the Chargers had a winning record in 2025, so it’s safe to rule them out as well.<\/p>\n

The Bears could get another shot at Sam Darnold<\/a> if the NFL decides to pair them up with the Seahawks. Darnold spent one season with the Minnesota Vikings in 2024 and beat the Bears twice that year.<\/p>\n

Chicago took Minnesota to overtime in the first meeting, but then lost 30-12 at home in Week 15 of that season. Back then, Matt Eberflus was the head coach.<\/p>\n

Now, the Bears have plenty of upward momentum coming into 2026 with Ben Johnson in charge. Here’s hoping the Bears get another chance to see Darnold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Chicago Bears had their 2025 season opener on Monday Night Football versus the Minnesota Vikings. The Bears…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":741069,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2073],"tags":[390,391,257,7,110,262,58,233,259,2529,16166,10378,249,56,6,499,1878,252,261,3394,234],"class_list":{"0":"post-741068","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-vikings","8":"tag-arizona-cardinals","9":"tag-chicago-bears","10":"tag-dallas-cowboys","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs","13":"tag-los-angeles-chargers","14":"tag-los-angeles-rams","15":"tag-minnesota","16":"tag-minnesota-vikings","17":"tag-minnesotavikings","18":"tag-monday-night-football","19":"tag-nahshon-wright","20":"tag-new-england-patriots","21":"tag-new-york-giants","22":"tag-nfl","23":"tag-patrick-mahomes","24":"tag-sam-darnold","25":"tag-san-francisco-49ers","26":"tag-seattle-seahawks","27":"tag-the-bears","28":"tag-vikings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116042638875256660","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=741068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/741068\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/741069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=741068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=741068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=741068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}