Chicago Bears: These quarterbacks have made us who we are

You kind of have to list them together, because they represent how even when well-intentioned the position goes straight to hell for the Bears.

I’ve decided to list Steve Walsh first here, though that’s not how it was supposed to go. After Dave Wannstedt’s first season as the Bears head coach, when he was still considered the hot thing, he basically demanded to overhaul the quarterback position from Jim Harbaugh (and no one objected).

The Bears brought in Erik Kramer for big money, pretty much because he waxed them twice the previous season with the Lions. And if you think that’s a silly reason to sign a player, it has been the free agent policy of pretty much every team in town.

Don’t believe me? The White Sox traded for Carl Everett like 12 times. Doug Gilmour was a Hawk. I could honestly keep going for a few hours.

Anyway, Kramer lost the job to Walsh somewhere in that season, because yet another Bears regime became infatuated with a QB who couldn’t throw it far or hard enough to have it intercepted. Defensive backs would become mesmerized by how long the ball hung in the air like the knight charging the castle in Holy Grail. Anyway, Walsh would author a playoff win in Minnesota that year, and no Bears QB would do it again for 12 years.

What the….12 YEARS?! 12 YEARS! 12 YEEEEEARRRRRRS! (Jeremy Piven in Grosse Point Blank voice).

The following season, Wannstedt figured he’d better play the guy the Bears spent gobs of money on, and the Sega Bears were born. Kramer threw for 3,800 yards that season, which doesn’t seem like a lot to anyone else now but is still enough to give any Bears fan the vapors. And that’s still a Bears record. It’s a Bears record 23 years later in a league that has specifically set itself up to have just about anyone with a functioning arm and normal oxygen intake to chuck the thing around and rack up 3,500 yards passing. And one Bear has surpassed that.

I’ll have a bourbon over poison, please.

Sadly, Wannstedt’s calling card was defense, or so we were told, but they couldn’t stop a walrus in the sand that year and missed the playoffs.

Also, an honorable mention to Dave Kreig, who replaced Walsh as Kramer’s backup the year after the Sega Bears. Yes, Dave Kreig and his golf ball-sized hands had to start 12 games for the Bears when Kramer got hurt. I’m fairly sure he fumbled 87 times. Maybe it just felt like that.