The five craziest stats from the Packers' unbelievable comeback against the Bears
The oldest rivalry in football produced one of its most memorable games Sunday night. The Green Bay Packers pulled off an unbelievable comeback win over the Chicago Bears despite heading into the fourth quarter down 17 points.
The game featured a number of improbable moments, including Aaron Rodgers’ return from a knee injury, Kyle Fuller’s dropped interception and Randall Cobb’s clutch touchdown.
In the end Aaron Rodgers did his thing, leading the Packers back to win the contest 24-23.
As expected, the performance led to a number of incredible stats. Here are five of the craziest numbers from the Packers’ wild comeback over the Bears.
The Bears had a 98.2 percent chance to win the game
After Rodgers was flagged for intentional grounding with 1:52 left in the third quarter, the Bears had a 98.2 percent chance to win the game, according to win probability. The number is calculated based on the score, possession and many other factors.
It’s unclear whether the “Is Aaron Rodgers playing quarterback” calculation was working Sunday night.
Packers had never won a game down 17 points in the fourth quarter
How improbable was the Packers’ comeback? In the 107 previous instances where the Packers trailed by at least 17 points in the fourth quarter during the regular season, the team was 0-107. This was the first time the Packers were able to complete a comeback in that situation.
Khalil Mack may have done something that’s never been done before
Our own Shalise Manza Young touched on Khalil Mack’s exceptional game, noting that his first-half performance may have resulted in something we’ve never seen before.
NBC flashed a graphic saying Mack was the first player to record a sack, interception, touchdown, forced fumble and fumble recovery in a single half – it also said since 1982, but that’s the year the NFL started keeping sacks as a statistic, so Mack could be the only player ever to do that in one half.
Aaron Rodgers dominated while playing on one leg
When Rodgers left the game with a knee injury, he was 3-for-7 with 13 yards. After coming back, Rodgers went 17-for-23 for 273 yards and three touchdowns. That’s good for a 152.7 passer rating. He did all of that basically on one leg.
Rodgers told Packers that it would be pistol or shotgun entire second half. No drop backs
The knee limited his movement.
— Eric Edholm (@Eric_Edholm) September 10, 2018
Oh, and one of those incompletions came on a throwaway to run out the clock at the end of the game.
The Bears offense failed to produce after two strong drives
On their first drive of the game, the Bears offense looked effective and modern. On their second, they looked capable. On nearly every other drive, they looked like the same old Bears.
After starting touchdown-field goal the Bears next 6 possessions looked like this.
3 plays 4 yards
4 plays -3 yards
3 plays 5 yards
12 plays 60 yards FG
3 plays 8 yards
3 plays 9 yards— Peter Bukowski (@Peter_Bukowski) September 10, 2018
Five of the next six Bears possessions failed to produce double-digit yardage. While you can’t expect a team to score every time it gets the ball, the Bears’ failure to sustain drives and run out the clock allowed the Packers — and Rodgers — enough time to complete their unlikely comeback.
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Chris Cwik is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at christophercwik@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Chris_Cwik
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