The Chicago Bears made their run last season on the back of quarterback Caleb Williams. Plenty of critics have tried to downplay that, stating he wasn’t as good as it seemed. Bears fans won’t be gaslit. They know what they saw. The majority of their biggest wins last season came because of plays Williams made. Those seven 4th quarter comebacks don’t happen unless the quarterback creates magic. It’s not like his stats were bad either. By every metric, he put up what could be argued was a Pro Bowl season.
He broke the franchise single-season record with 3,941 yards, 27 touchdowns, and just seven interceptions. There were also over 300 yards rushing and three touchdowns. That is the best season of production any Bears quarterback has ever had. Yet people miss why it was more impressive than Williams gets credit for. Leave it to ESPN to hammer this home, albeit unintentionally. It came courtesy of their latest wide receiver rankings, voted on by actual people in the NFL. You’ll notice something immediately.
- Ja’Marr Chase
- Justin Jefferson
- Jaxon Smith-Njigba
- Puka Nacua
- Amon-Ra St. Brown
- CeeDee Lamb
- George Pickens
- Nico Collins
- A.J. Brown
- Davante Adams
Honorable Mentions: Malik Nabers, Brandon Aiyuk, Tyreek Hill (and others receiving votes: Alec Pierce, Tee Higgins, DK Metcalf, Terry McLaurin, Garrett Wilson, DeVonta Smith, Ladd McConkey, Brian Thomas Jr., Jaylen Waddle, Chris Olave)
Caleb Williams wasn’t carried by a stacked supporting cast.
This isn’t a case where a loaded wide receiver group lifted the quarterback to big production, as has happened in the past. No Bears player received a single vote in those rankings. Not D.J. Moore, not Rome Odunze, and not Luther Burden. This doesn’t mean the Bears lack talent. All three of those players are quality pass-catchers. None are stars, at least not at the moment. Yet Williams managed to utilize their strengths, along with tight ends Colston Loveland and Cole Kmet, to produce a better passing season than anybody in modern franchise history.
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Maybe this will hammer home that what he accomplished deserves more credit. People talk about the completion percentage and all that. They don’t bother pointing out the 29 dropped passes and the multitude of miscommunications created by poor routes. Good quarterbacks push through such problems and get it done anyway. Williams did that over and over all season. Maybe he will soon have a top 10 wide receiver, but that is not the case right now, and it doesn’t seem to matter.
Don’t expect the Bears to alter their approach.
Make no mistake. They’ve invested heavily in their quarterback over the past two years. They spent their 1st and two 2nd round picks last year on a tight end (Colston Loveland), a wide receiver (Burden), and a left tackle (Ozzy Trapilo). This year, they added center Logan Jones in the 2nd round and a tight end (Sam Roush) and a wide receiver (Zavion Thomas) in the 3rd. While they may not have true star power, they certainly have talent. That should be enough to keep Caleb Williams on track towards the pinnacle of the NFL.
That doesn’t mean they’ll break the bank to go hunting for a star. Head coach Ben Johnson is a firm believer in offensive distribution. He wants everybody involved. The more the better. It keeps defenses guessing, which doesn’t always happen when you condense the field to two or three targets, even if they’re great. Williams embraced that philosophy last season, targeting seven different players at least 48 times. Don’t expect that to change, especially after losing Moore to the Buffalo trade.
