Through just five games this season, Bears receiver Brandon Marshall has destroyed the Bears all-time record for receiving yards in a season with 496. The previous record was set by Curtis Conway who managed 424 yards in all 16 games of the 1996 season.
Cursed for decades by the super-boring T-formation, the Bears threw their first pass in 1963 by accident after the QB was reacting to a bee sting. They attempted a total of four forward passes in the 1970s, completing none. Then, after brief success in the mid-’80s, the Bears decided to focus on being awful at moving the ball. This all changed three years ago when they traded for Jay Cutler, their first quarterback who had previous experience throwing a football.
Cutler’s arrival in 2009 propelled the Bears passing attack into the ’90s, and Marshall into the Bears record books. After his 24-yard TD reception in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s Bears-Jaguars game, Marshall broke two other records, including most reception TD’s in a season (3) and passes caught in a season (35).
