Jim McMahon was the quarterback now and things were beginning to change. Rookie Willie Gault caught 40 passes for a 20-yard average as the Bears were finally able to exploit defenses stacked to stop Payton.
It was Jim Finks’ final draft in Chicago and it finally gave his first draft choice, Payton, all the help he needed. Rookies Jim Covert, Dennis McKinnon, Mark Bortz, Richard Dent, Dave Duerson and Mike Richardson all were instrumental in putting the Bears over the top.
The record was a modest 8-8, but they won five of their last six and were clearly headed in the right direction. Payton had entered the season with 2,352 carries, fourth on the career list.
“You can’t expect him to go for 20 years,” Sayers said.
Payton ran for more than 100 yards in the first and third games and caught passes for more than 100 in the second. By the fourth, in Baltimore, an injury kept him to four yards in three carries. Ditka had to force Payton to the sidelines.
“We almost had to tie him to the bench to keep him out,” Ditka said. “It was unbelievable.”
The Bears said it was a knee. Ditka later recalled it as an ankle, but he was nursing an injury of his own after breaking his hand on a locker in frustration. Payton never wanted anybody to know about his aches. Sometimes he would feign pain in one body part while trainer Fred Caito worked on the real injury.
In the finale at freezing Soldier Field, the Bears knocked the Packers out of a playoff berth, 23-21. Payton had cracked ribs, which “limited” him to 148 yards in 30 carries.
“There’s nothing amazing anymore,” Ditka said.
Said Matt Suhey: “He carried a couple of times in the first quarter and told me, `I don’t think I can go anymore.’ I said, `Do what you have to do.’ He carried the ball about 10 times in the second quarter and the same thing in the third.”
After adding 1,421 yards to his resume, Payton underwent arthroscopic surgery on both knees to prepare for 1984.
“My 11,000-yard checkup,” he said. “They found what kept me out of the Army. It was in 1972, before my sophomore year at Jackson State. Everybody had to take physicals. It was Vietnam. Doctor told us to squat. I said I couldn’t. Really, I could, but I had a football injury in my left knee. They gave me the name of another doctor to see. He was the same one I had been seeing.”
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September 18
The Bears lose at New Orleans 34-31 even though Payton runs for a touchdown and throws two touchdown passes to Willie Gault.
1983
ATTEMPTS YARDS AVERAGE TD
314 1,421 4.5 6
