Mike Brown- My Favorite Chicago Bear

He was always a little undersized for the position. And in a lot of ways, his lack of size caused all of those freak injuries. His body simply couldn’t hold up to the big, bruising play of the NFL. After all, the guy was listed as 5-10 and probably was more like 5-8. But despite his height restrictions, Mike Brown played like he was a 6-4 250 pound linebacker. Mike Brown played the game like an ’85 Bear- relentless, aggressive and with a strong dose of smack you in the mouth football. He was the Kevin Garnett of football always giving you 100%. In his 9 years as a Chicago Bear, I never once left a game thinking that Brown had let us down. He was always the guy with the nose for the football, almost always in the right place, and forever the guy who played with his heart on his sleeve. Mike Brown is a professional football player and I thank him for that.

I still remember the 2001 season like it was yesterday. It was post 9/11 but football, like it always does, made things seem better. On October 28 against the 49ers in overtime, Garcia passed to TO who saw a converging Brian Urlacher. As he often does, he put up the alligator arms, got clocked by Urlacher and of course, Mike Brown was there to pick off the ricochet football. 33 yards later and a touchdown, the Bears won the OT thriller.

Just one game later against the Cleveland Browns, I-Truth and I were sitting in the stands as the Bears were getting spanked by the Browns. With no hope left, I-truth and I actually left the stadium (We’ll never forgive ourselves for this). As we exited we heard the loud thunder of fan applause. We immediately sprinted past the security telling us that we couldn’t re-enter. (What were they going to do? There was no way anyone except Usain Bolt could have caught us that night.). We entered the game, the score was tied on a hail-mary from Shane Matthews to James Allen of all people. Overtime. Again. The 2^nd week in a row. And of course, just like a Hollywood script, Mike Brown picked off the first pass of OT, took it back 16 yards for the game winning touchdown. That was Mike Brown, always in the right place, forever playing 100%.

And that’s how I will remember Mike Brown. I’ll try to forget all the injuries or Steve Smith’s touchdown against the Bears in the playoffs when he made Brown twirl around in circles. That all happened of course, but it couldn’t take away from how really important he was to those great Bears’ defenses. When he went down in the Super Bowl year (as well as Tommie Harris), I knew the Bears could never win that game against Indy. And unfortunately, for him, it happened too often during his career. And every time he got hurt, the Bears imploded on defense. And this is no exaggeration. When Brown went down, the touchdowns kept coming as Danieal Manning, Payne and Chris Harris flopped in their leading roles.

You never could quite understood what made Mike Brown so great. He wasn’t fast enough, big enough, tall enough, or quick enough. But he was always there in the right place, forever playing as if it was his last game. Mike Brown is and always will be one of my favorite Chicago Bear’s players. And to that I say, thanks and good luck.

Here are some of Brown’s career accomplishments….

PRO CAREER: All-time franchise leader with 7 career defensive TDs, 4 by INT returns - tied for the Bears all-time record - and 3 fumble returns - also a franchise record… Earned first Pro Bowl selection and tabbed second-team All-Pro by the Associated Press in 2005… Tied for third among active Bears with 15 career INTs (Vasher and Tillman, 17)… Since entering the NFL in 2000, Brown is tied for 6th in INT returns for TDs… Tops franchise list for career fumble return yards with 221 on 7 fumble recoveries including TD returns of 3, 62 and 95 yards, the latter of which is the second-longest in team history behind George Halas' 98-yard fumble return (11/4/23)… Led team in INTs in consecutive seasons (2001-02)… All-Pro performer in 2001 with career-high 5 INTs, highlighted by three-game INT streak kicked-off by game-winning INT returns for TDs in overtime against the 49ers and Browns in back-to-back games - an NFL first… Became just the 7th Bears rookie since 1974 to record over 100 tackles, registering 102 stops, and was also the first Bears rookie since 1993 (Myron Baker) to record a defensive TD.