Chicago Bears players weren’t sure what to make of Ben Johnson when the team hired him in January of last year. All they knew was his reputation as one of the NFL’s top offensive minds, fresh off immense success in Detroit. While they meant good things for quarterback Caleb Williams, some were skeptical he could translate that to an entire team. He was young after all, only 38 years old. Too many previous head coaches came in around that age, thinking they had all the answers, only to realize they weren’t ready. Longtime safety Kevin Byard had seen it before.
It didn’t take Johnson long to disabuse players of that notion. He promised, in his introductory press conference, that guys should get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Nobody was quite sure what he meant at the time. Byard soon found out in training camp. He told Jordan Schultz of The Schultz Report that in his decade-long NFL career, it was the hardest one he’d ever experienced. Keep in mind, this is a man who had Mike Vrabel as his head coach for a large chunk of it. That should tell you how maniacal Johnson was.
Players hated it. However, it didn’t take long to realize the underlying goal behind such an approach.
Ben Johnson embraces a philosophy that goes back decades.
Everybody is always focused on the games and their results. They never see the work that goes into practice every day. The best teams, based on history, are the ones who practice the hardest. NFL icon Vince Lombardi had a telling quote about this during his run with the Green Bay Packers.
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“We win our games in practice. We learn and follow the fundamentals of our game better than anyone in the league. All of our games are won in practice.”
The best way to understand a player is how they perform when they’re exhausted and hurting. Only long, grueling practices can offer answers to that question. Too many head coaches nowadays care about practices being crisp and structured.
Not Johnson. While he demands the same high level of execution, he does everything possible to simulate a game atmosphere. That includes conducting brutal live tackling drills, allowing players to go full speed. The goal is not to punish them. It is to get their bodies and minds calloused to the grind of an NFL season. Including the playoffs and Super Bowl, there are 20-21 games to be played. Only the toughest and best-conditioned teams survive to the end.
This game has no room for mercy.
Ben Johnson cares about his players. That has been obvious from the beginning. However, he also understands the fundamental law of football. It isn’t for cowards. If you can’t handle tough practices, there is no way you can be trusted deep in the 4th quarter of a tight game. That goes back to another Lombardi quote.
“Fatigue makes cowards of us all.”
The Bears’ head coach needs to know who he can trust when the chips are down, and one last effort is needed to cross the finish line. It’s apparent his message got through since the team led the league with seven 4th quarter comebacks. Chicago was learning about the value of true hard work and sacrifice.
It certainly doesn’t sound like Johnson has any intention of changing his way. He said the Bears were starting over from square one, having to rebuild the team again, most likely with a long list of new faces. They must all learn the core necessity of hard work. We will find out this summer who can take it and who may soon be looking for a new home. One thing Byard probably won’t admit publicly is that signing with the New England Patriots gets him away from those practices.
