Ben Johnson did not need long to understand what the Green Bay Packers represent in Chicago. Colston Loveland has now revealed just how aggressively the Bears coach has embraced the NFL’s oldest rivalry.
During an appearance on The Pivot Podcast, Loveland discussed the added intensity surrounding games between the Bears and Packers. According to the Chicago tight end, Johnson does not treat Green Bay like another opponent on the schedule.
“Coach Johnson, he’s really about that, too,” Loveland said. “This is how it’s supposed to be. We should hate each other. This is what rivalry is about.”
There is no bland coaching language hiding in there. No respect for the opponent. No reminder that every game counts the same.
Johnson wants the Bears to hate the Packers. Subtle stuff.
Ben Johnson has restored the bitterness to Bears-Packers
The Bears and Packers have been playing since 1921, but the rivalry became painfully one-sided before Johnson arrived in Chicago. Green Bay dominated the series for years, leaving Bears fans with history and very little recent bragging material.
Johnson refused to accept that arrangement.
Loveland compared the feeling surrounding Packers week to Michigan’s rivalry with Michigan State. While he acknowledged that the NFL version operates on another level, the message inside Halas Hall was impossible to miss.
“That’s all anyone talks about,” Loveland said. “The owners, the GM, it’s like, ‘We’ve got to beat Green Bay. We must beat Green Bay.’”
That last sentence explains Johnson’s approach better than any rehearsed press conference answer could. Beating the Packers is not merely preferred inside the Bears organization. It has become an expectation stretching from ownership to the locker room.
The rivalry needed that edge again. A century of history means very little when one team repeatedly treats the other like a scheduled inconvenience.
Johnson has given Chicago more than empty rivalry talk
It would be easy for Johnson to win over Bears fans by mocking the Packers and delivering fiery speeches. Chicago has heard plenty of bold promises before. The difference is that his players have embraced everything accompanying the performance.
“We’re just bought in,” Loveland said. “He’s doing everything we’re doing to a certain extent. So, it’s like, we’re going to ride with this guy.”
Loveland also credited Johnson’s preparation for Chicago’s success in close games. The Bears routinely rehearse two-minute drives, comeback situations and other late-game scenarios that eventually decide divisional matchups.
“Shout out Coach Johnson,” Loveland said. “That’s the biggest thing: finish. We work two-minute more than anyone, and we work end-of-game situations.”
The hatred may grab the headline, but preparation gives it credibility. Johnson is not asking the Bears to manufacture anger for one week and hope emotion carries them past Green Bay. He is building a team designed to handle the pressure that arrives with those games.
For years, Bears fans watched the Packers enter the rivalry expecting to win. Johnson has spent his time in Chicago attacking that assumption from every possible direction.
He has changed the tone, raised the temperature and made his feelings painfully clear.
The Bears are no longer supposed to admire the rivalry’s history. They are supposed to hate Green Bay and start writing a different version of it.
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