Clearly, there is no love lost between the Green Bay Packers and their NFC North archrivals, the Chicago Bears. After a week of trash talk from the Bears leading up to the game, the Packers and their recently acquired star linebacker, Zaire Franklin, had the last laugh, making his feelings clear in a postgame interview after the Packers blew out the Bears.
Packers LB Zaire Franklin Shuts Down Bears On And Off The Field After Big Win
The Athletic’s Matt Schneidman shared Franklin’s interview in which the linebacker said, “They do a whole lot of weird stuff. Since I been here, they do a whole lot of stuff that they worried about us. We worried about ourselves. Hopefully they learn to stop dissing us. Real talk.”
In the week leading up to this matchup, the Bears’ promising second-year receiver Luther Burden III ignited the rivalry by sharing that his coach, Ben Johnson, said to the team, “Beat them real bad, and make them quit.”
However, the opposite happened on game day. The Packers destroyed them 31-7, and Franklin played a huge role in shutting down the Bears’ offense, which managed only 81 total rushing yards and 165 passing yards.
This might be a good lesson for the young receiver: avoid giving his opponents bulletin-board material moving forward. Some coaching messages perhaps are best kept in-house, as the Packers did their talking on the field.
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Franklin clearly didn’t take kindly to what Burden had said, as he told reporters in one final barb, in reference to Burden: “We got guys that never really made a real play in this league talking about making somebody quit. That’s weird; we don’t do that. He quit today, by the way. He didn’t want to play anymore.”
Burden, who ranks 59th on PFN’s WR Impact Metric, managed only 47 receiving yards.
Franklin, who arrived via trade from the Indianapolis Colts, where he was an All-Pro, had a big game. The linebacker recorded 9 tackles, a forced fumble, and a pass defended. This performance further cemented Franklin as one of the league’s leading linebackers.
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After their humbling defeat, the Bears take on the Atlanta Falcons’ explosive offense led by Bijan Robinson next week, while the Packers, now 3-2, host the Dallas Cowboys at Lambeau in a huge game for both sides.
This article originally appeared on Pro Football Network.