Bears Chairman George McCaskey echoes fan sentiment: playoff success is just the start. The Super Bowl remains the ultimate, unfinished goal.
The Chicago Bears turned a corner in 2025.
The team reached new heights in just the first year of Ben Johnson's tenure in the Windy City. They made the postseason for the first time since 2020 and won the NFC North for the first time since 2018.
After taking down the Green Bay Packers in the Wild Card, the Bears won their first playoff game since 2010.
The magical season came to an end for the Bears in the next round. They lost to the Los Angeles Rams in the Divisional Round 20-17 in overtime.
It was great to see the franchise finally get over the hump. However, Bears Chairman George McCaskey, like many Bears fans, isn't ready to get complacent just yet. According to NFL.com's Kevin Patra, McCaskey was proud of his team but knew that the job wasn't finished.
The Bears have their sights set on winning a Super Bowl.
"It was a great run," Bears chairman George McCaskey told the team's official website last week at the Annual League Meeting. "It was a miraculous run. Surreal run. But ultimately, we fell short of our goal. The goal is to win the Super Bowl. So there's some more work to be done. I think we have a good core of players. They fight like hell for each other. They fight like hell for their coach. I think they're confident that he will find some way for them to win, and that's a great and elusive ingredient in our great game. He's already said that complacency is not going to be an issue. What do we have to be complacent about? We haven't achieved our goal."
I think if you ask any Bears, they would be happy with how their team did, and they should be. Chicago fans haven't had the feeling that the 2025 season gave them in quite some time.
Johnson did a great job in 2025, but it's great to hear that McCaskey has high standards for the franchise. He showed how close he is with the fans before one of the several meetings with the Packers last season.
McCaskey was taking pictures with Bears fans, and a Packers fan tried to photobomb them, prompting the owner to shove him out of the way in hilarious fashion.
The Bears have all the pieces in place to make another run to the playoffs.
On offense, Caleb Williams, Kyle Monangai, Rome Odunze, Luther Burden and Colston Loveland are back. Ozzy Trapilo will be returning to the starting lineup once he recovers from his patellar injury.
Defensively, they lost a lot of pieces. Starters like Nahshon Wright, Kevin Byard, Jaquan Brisker and Tremaine Edmunds are no longer with the team. Jaylon Johnson, Montez Sweat, Kyler Gordon and other key starters return.
Coby Bryant, Devin Bush and Neville Gallimore were the most significant free-agent acquisitions.
However, it won't be easy to get back to the playoffs. This league is very unforgiving, and it will be a challenge to even get close to repeating what happened in 2025.
The Bears have their sights set on one goal, and everyone from the owner to the players is focused on it in 2026.