The Bears were NFC North champions ahead of the Packers in 2010 and only lost 21-14 in the NFC Championship Game even with third-string quarterback Caleb Hanie playing most of the second half.

As for the newly crowned Super Bowl champion Giants, they were below the Bears in every NFL power ranking with six games left in the regular season. The Bears were 7-3 after beating the Chargers, while the Giants were 6-4 after losing to the Eagles and Vince Young -- the same Eagles team the Bears beat in Philly with Michael Vick at quarterback.

Even two weeks after Cutler suffered his broken thumb against the Chargers, the Bears (7-5) on a two-game losing streak still were just one spot behind the Giants (6-6) in both the ESPN and Brian Billick (Fox) power rankings.

The Giants won it all with a wide-receiver corps almost as modestly acquired as the Bears -- Victor Cruz was undrafted in 2010; Mario Manningham was a third-round pick (95th overall) in 2008; Hakeem Nicks was a first-round pick, but 29th overall, in 2009.

Manningham, who made a heroic catch to start the winning touchdown drive in the fourth quarter, was taken 25 picks after the Bears selected Earl Bennett. Manningham had 39 receptions for 523 yards and four touchdowns this season. Bennett had a similar season shortened by an injury -- 24 receptions for 381 yards -- except of course, for the touchdowns. Bennett had just one. In four seasons, Manningham has 18 touchdowns. Bennett has six.

That seems to be the difference between a team like the Giants and a team like the Bears. The Giants make big plays in the clutch and they score touchdowns. Bears wide receivers combined for nine whole touchdowns this season -- undrafted rookie Dane Sanzenbacher leading the way with three. Without a ''No. 1'' guy, the Giants' wide-receiver corps combined for 21 touchdowns.

Is Eli Manning that much better than Jay Cutler? Is Kevin Gilbride that much better than Mike Martz? Is Tom Coughlin that much better than Lovie Smith?

I'm pretty sure most Bears fans would say, No. No. And Yes.

Lovie Smith sure seemed like a better coach than Tom Coughlin when Jay Cutler was healthy. But it seems like it was more than just bad luck that separated the two. Coughlin has a knack not only for keeping his quarterback healthy (Eli Manning has started 130 consecutive games since taking over for Kurt Warner in 2004), but for having his team primed to take advantage of every opportunity late in the season.

Of course, if Cutler stays healthy and Manning was injured, it would be non-issue. But Cutler didn't stay healthy. And Manning didn't get injured. After two unlikely Super Bowl titles, there must be something to it. It's hard not to be encouraged when a team of destiny wins the Super Bowl. But you can only take it so far. We've seen enough to know that the Bears might be further way than we think.

Exactly 6,132 words, if you're into numerical numbers. And for the record, not one of them was ''Packers.'' Not even when he was asked directly about closing the gap between the Bears and the Packers did Emery mention the Packers. Doesn't he at least deserve points for that?

While it might have been nice for Emery to throw his new-found weight around at least a little and put Lovie Smith and others in the Bears organization on notice that the status quo will not be tolerated, it was hardly a surprise that he didn't even come close.

But that's not necessarily a cause for hand-wringing and other levels of concern ranging from skepticism to a sense of impending doom that the Bears just re-hired Jerry Angelo. While there's great frustration among fans that the Bears have missed the playoffs in four of the past five seasons (they're one of only 24 teams since 1980 to do that after playing in the Super Bowl), let's not forget that Jay Cutler's broken thumb was the only reason Emery was standing at the lectern in the ''Mugs'' Halas auditorium in the first place.

''This is not going to be where I'm walking around with a big sledgehammer like I'm ruling the roost,'' Thompson told reporters at his introductory press conference. ''This is not a democracy, but this is going to be a place where we work together. We're going to do what's good for the Green Bay Packers. It's not going to be an ego thing because personally I don't have one.''

Thompson had the authority to fire coach Mike Sherman -- it was reportedly a condition of his hiring. The Packers were coming off their fourth consecutive playoff season under Sherman at the time, but back-to-back 10-6 seasons with Brett Favre still in his prime was the reason Sherman lost his GM duties to Thompson in the first place.

But Thompson, like Emery, had no problem working with a coach he inherited.

''We'll work it out. This won't be a problem,'' said Thompson, who was Ron Wolf's right-hand man from 1992-99 and was recommended for the job by Wolf. ''I learned this a long time ago -- you can't force a player on a coach because it's not going to work. There are other ways to go about that.

''If we couldn't come to some kind of agreement, then maybe we look at some alternative -- maybe we do something different.''

When Jerry Rees was promoted to general manager by the New York Giants in 2007, he inherited Tom Coughlin, who had been signed to a one-year contract extension after the 8-8 Giants lost to the Eagles in their playoff opener.

But he supported the move to keep Coughlin. ''I'm looking forward to Tom being there for a long time,'' Reese said. And also gave a vote of confidence to struggling fourth-year quarterback Eli Manning -- though not without a subtle warning. ''Next year the 'young' tag is gone,'' Reese said.

With Coughlin and Manning, the Giants have reached the Super Bowl twice in Reese's five seasons. They upset the unbeaten Patriots in after the 2007 season and face the Patriots in the Super Bowl this week in Indianapolis.

And when it comes to saying nothing, Emery indeed learned from the best. Here's some highlights from Scott Pioli's introductory press conference with the Chiefs in 2009:

''The vision for this football team and the direction that we plan to head in is to build a football team. We built a football team in New England, and we'll build a football team here. My job is not to collect talent. It's to build a team. Individuals go to Pro Bowls. Teams win championships. That's our goal here."

''We're going to build a big, strong, fast, smart, tough, disciplined football team. We'll do that by finding big, strong, fast, smart, tough and disciplined football players.''

Pioli was taking over a team that had gone 4-12 and 2-14 in back-to-back seasons under Herman Edwards. So he had a little more room to wield a big stick.

''There needs to be some changes on this football team," Pioli said. "With the way the team performed this year and what the record is, there needs to be changes. This is going to be a team that is certainly going to transition.''

''The first thing that jumps out about a Herm Edwards team is how hard they play. Herm's players play hard. That's one of the things I really respect about Herm. He coaches with a great deal of passion as well.''

Pioli fired Edwards one week later. But his own first hire, former Bears assistant Todd Haley, already is gone. Pioli hired Romeo Crennel, who has even closer ties to Patriots coach Bill Belichick than Haley did.

The ''Patriot Way'' has an obvious allure. But on your first day on the job, it sounds like any other plan. Here's Thomas Dimitroff from his introductory press conference as the new general manager of the Atlanta Falcons in 2008:

''As far as philosophy, New England is about the team,'' Dimitroff told reporters. ''They have the right people in place who believe in one direction, and that's about winning. I also believe it's about the idea of indisputable role understanding. In New England, everyone knows what his role is. It's spelled out very very well.

''I truly believe that if you are a sound evaluator and you have sound evaluators around you and you have the right coach in position and you have an agreement between that coach and general manager, it doesn't matter who has final say -- if you have that coach and GM who are cohesive and they understand it's a group effort, because it's all about the team.''

Phil Emery couldn't have said it any better.

Well, he could have. He just didn't. For now, that's nothing to get too concerned about.

According to a Patriots spokesman, Licht was not made available to speak at the infamous Super Bowl Media Day. But, Patriots player personnel director Nick Caserio had some brief comments on him.

"He's got a great feel and a great knowledge and understanding of the league and players, and he works well with our staff," Caserio said of Licht. "He's done a nice job for us, since he's come back."

Asked about the Bears possibility, Caserio said, "Jason is well respected in the league.

"He's got a lot of experience. A lot of people who have worked with him had a lot of positive things to say. So we're glad we have him."

The Bears interviewed Licht for a second time last Thursday. But, they named Phil Emery the team's fifth general manager on Saturday and introduced him at a press conference at Halas Hall on Monday.

''What stood out with Phil was the depth of his plan,'' Phillips said Monday at Halas Hall. ''[All five candidates who were interviewed] stated kind of a general vision on how to make the Bears a championship team. But he had an added depth of understanding of what it would take on every level. That's what really stood out.

What was the depth of his vision?

''There's so many different factors,'' Phillips said. ''I think part of it comes from his variety of experiences that he's had. He's worked for a lot of good people and he's taken different aspects of that. But he's his own man. I think you saw it there today. He has good presence. He is not afraid to state what he feels and his convictions and that came through in the interview process.''

''We went through every roster -- literally every team's roster and looked at the personnel people,'' Phillips said Monday at Halas Hall. ''I made the decision early on that I focused in on guys who currently were in personnel departments with NFL teams, so that obviously excluded a number of candidates. [Emery] was on that.

''I went through a long process of talking to a lot of other head coaches, general managers, agents, personnel people and nobody had a negative thing to say about Phil Emery. So I became intrigued early on. It was the way he approached the whole process that made him a final candidate.''

Why did he consider only candidates currently employed by NFL teams?

''As much as there's always a risk involved when you hire someone who has never done that role,'' Phillips said, ''I wanted to find someone who had those traits who could grow into the role and be a future great general manager as opposed to someone who had been one and maybe was out of touch with what's going on in the league for a few years.''

Phillips was asked if the authority given to Emery takes the role of Bears' general manager to a new level.

The authority -- the contractual authority that Phil has is the same as what Jerry Angelo had,'' Phillips said. ''He contractually can hire and fire the head coach. He can contractually have final say on the 53-man roster. The reality is just as with Jerry and Lovie -- when I hired Jerry I said this, when I hired Phil I said this: 'I expect not to ever have to pick up your contract and read the language between you and Lovie.' The idea is you work together to find the best team for the Bears.' I don't know of a single team that's been successful with a general manager jamming players down a coach's throat.''

Did the Angelo-Smith relationship splinter toward the end?

No. Not at all,'' Phillips said. ''Let me say this about hiring Jerry Angelo: I'm glad I hired him in '01. He brought a lot of success to the Bears. We had a lot of good years. Now it's time for a new, fresh look at the team.''

Phil Emery looked the part Monday at Halas Hall: the nice, safe, typical Bears choice as their new general manager: He's not Jerry Angelo; He embraced Lovie Smith as his head coach; He likes the scouting staff and everything else at Halas Hall; He's a team player who won't throw his new-found weight around; he offered good ideas with no specifics; and he's a first-time GM whom the Bears didn't have to break the bank to sign.

Those are first impressions based upon Emery's introductory press conference. Sometimes those can be deceiving. If the Bears fail to make the playoffs for the fifth time in six seasons since going to the Super Bowl in 2006, then we'll know if the earth has moved at Halas Hall. Or if they've just hired a new Jerry Angelo with a little better stage presence.

Other than that, there wasn't much to go on. Emery wants to win championships. He wants to build a consistent contender. He plans to build through the draft. He will specify roles for everybody under his authority and hold them responsible for meeting specified standards. There was no further insight into the ''depth of vision'' that separated him from the other candidates Ted Phillips considered for the job.

That doesn't mean he'll fail. It just means he's no different than any other general manager or personnel honcho the Bears have hired since Jim Finks left the organization in 1984 after acquiring 21 starters who would win Super Bowl XX.

Here are some of the highlights from Emery's press conference:

''I don't look at it in terms of standards ... My whole mindset is I'm here to help this team. I'm a teammate. Yes I'm in a leadership role. But I'm here to provide support, help, guidance and talent towards winning championships. I'm going to do all [I can] to develop within that role and to sync with coach Smith and to help bring those championships.''

On his role as general manager:

''Our goal is to win championships. We will have clear roles in this quest. When you define their roles and set a standard for them and the standard for them is to develop expertise in their roles. They will be evaluated and be held accountable just as I am evaluated and held accountable. And that will permeate throughout our organization. It's my job at every level of the football operations department -- personnel, coaching, video, athletic training staff, equipment staff, player programs -- to hold everybody to that standard.''

On upgrading weaknesses in the current roster:

''When it comes time to publicly assess our needs or publicly talk about players that we may target, we will not do that. Because I feel that's a competitive disadvantage to do so. We will know internally what our needs are. We will know internally the players we are going to target. We will not give away our competitive advantage to outline who those individuals are or at what position they are.''

On using the franchise tag on Matt Forte:

''[The franchise tag] is a tool that has been collectively bargained, that is fair to the player and fair to the club. That's part of the collective bargaining agreement. It is a tool. That doesn't mean we're gonna use it.''

On his decision-making style -- is he a consensus-builder or the ultimate authority?

''There's going to be a lot of voices that are involved. It'll be very professional. It'll be very thoughtful. It'll be people working together. We may have disagreements. But the professionalism comes in learning how to agree to disagree, and move on to the next player, where we can find a common ground and that player fits our system, our coaches, our community. It will be segmented.''

So if everybody in the room likes, say, Michael Floyd and you like someone else, which player do the Bears draft?

We're going to draft the best player for the Chicago Bears. Do I have a voice in it? Absolutely. But one thing I've learned is that listening to voices that you've tasked with an expertise is awfully important. And if you rely on yourself all the time... sometimes, you need that outside voice, to open up your mind to other possibilities. And I'm very open to those discussions.

There will reach a point during this process, where it will be coach Smith and myself developing the plan at the end. And it will be on players that him and I agree upon, in sync, that these are the right players for the Bears. That's where the heaviest influence will come.''

On catching up to the Packers:

''What we want to do is look at our team and add players, add playmakers. If we keep doing that, and primarily through the college draft, and fill in where we see strengths in pro free agency, we'll close the gap. And that's what our focus is: Find the right players for us, and that gap will get closed.''

On having the authority to make changes on all aspects of the football operations:

I do have that authority. But again, am I going to hold people to standards and evaluate them in an everyday, in terms of their contributions to our goal, absolutely. Is my [thinking], 'Jeez, I've got this authority, so I need to use it everyday?' No, my [mindset is] using my position of leadership in helping people reach those goals. To be an educator, to be a leader.''

On having control of the 53-man roster:

''I have full control, yes. But again, that's where my
head's at. My head's at working with coach Smith towards developing consistent championships.''