EA Sports has released their Madden 2009 team and quarterback ratings and early indication is that the Bears will be horrible.

Via Awful Announcing, the ratings have the Bears as the third best team in the NFC North, ahead of only the Detroit Lions, and Rex Grossman as the starting quarterback.

Two interesting things to note here: One, the gap between the haves and have-nots in the NFC North is wider than anticipated. The Packers (91) and Vikings (90) are light years ahead of the lowly Bears (80) and Lions (78). And two, Packers rookie quarterback Brian Brohm (80), is better than Rex Grossman (79).

You would imagine that the Bears walloping 80 is attributed to an uncertain offense dragging the team’s overall rating down. It’s not made clear, but if I had to guess, I’d say the offense is 74 with the defense picking up the slack at 86.

As far as Brohm being better than Grossman, I’m a little surprised. I can’t believe John Madden putting his stamp of approval on giving a predecessor of ex-Packer quarterback and long-time man crush, Brett Favre, anything over 50.