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The Charter: A Chicago Bears Podcast

Bears Drop Finale, Turn Focus to Packers in Wild Card Round

The Charter: A Chicago Bears Podcast

Chicago Sports Network

Sports, Football, Sports:football

4.4699 Ratings

🗓️ 6 January 2026

⏱️ 45 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ruthie Polinsky and Clay Harbor recap the Bears’ regular-season finale loss to the Lions, unpacking the biggest moments and evaluating how the performance sets the tone heading into the playoffs. They spotlight Colson Loveland’s impact in the loss, assess the main lessons from the game, and identify encouraging signs to take away despite the disappointing result in Ruthie's "Silver Linings" segment. Later, the focus turns to a Bears-Packers Wild Card preview, breaking down the key storylines in a postseason meeting between longtime rivals. The guys then get “Wired In” with a closer look at Caleb Williams’ season, including his near-4,000-yard campaign and a new Bears single-season passing mark, before wrapping up with what’s trending across the NFL as the coaching turnover begins.

Transcript

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0:00.0

What's up, everyone? Welcome back to the Charter podcast, brought to you by St. Xavier University.

0:09.5

I'm Ruthie Polinsky. He is Clay Harbor. Clay Harbor, former NFL tight end and my bestie.

0:17.3

We are here to mourn the regular season finale loss, but to also talk about who's coming to town,

0:28.2

the Green Bay Packers, who the Bears will be seeing for the third time in six weeks.

0:32.8

There's a lot to get to, Clay.

0:34.7

Let's start with the game against the Lions.

0:36.9

I don't think anyone

0:38.9

really saw that sort of performance coming from the Bears after what we saw in San Francisco,

0:45.0

particularly on the offensive side of the ball.

0:47.4

Yeah, absolutely, Ruthie. I think you're right on target, as always, the bear's offense.

0:55.0

You expected more.

0:58.5

It's tough because they only had a few drives in the first half.

1:06.4

Obviously, when you're outplayed 20 snaps to 40 snaps, your time of possession was nearly doubled by the lions.

1:08.4

You really have to take advantage of all of these possessions, and that's

1:12.5

something the Bears weren't able to do. And I think that, you know, that was telling in the

1:17.5

defense. They were admirable in the fact that it was Ben that, but don't break, only gave up

1:22.7

19 points. There are some positive things you can take away from there. But I know Ben was really

1:28.6

hard on the offense, Ruthie. But to me, what I'm more concerned about moving forward is this

1:34.1

defense, even though they only scored 19 points. I hear you. I think that, and really it was 16,

1:39.3

right, up until that final drive for the Lions. Yeah. So I think there's a lot to be said about, yeah, what's more concerning the offense or

1:49.3

the defense?

1:49.9

I think what concerns me, and this might be a cop out, Clay, what concerns me is just

...

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