The Chicago Bears lost an ugly one to Green Bay last week. It seemed that was enough to write off the team in the media’s eyes. They didn’t bother to acknowledge that quarterback Caleb Williams didn’t play in that game. The obvious explanation is that the Bears are overrated. Combine that with the unfounded rumors about his hamstring injury a few weeks ago, and Williams had some serious beef with media members going into this week. Head coach Ben Johnson acknowledged as much after the game on Sunday, saying the quarterback looked extra motivated during their study sessions.

It didn’t take long after the Bears closed out a 31-23 victory in Atlanta that Williams was ready to vent some frustration. During an on-field interview after the game, he admitted that one of the incidents that really got him going came from a segment on ESPN Get Up where every member of the panel selected the Falcons to win the game.

Caleb Williams wasn’t done.

A few moments later, after walking into the tunnel, the quarterback approached the locker room. Several media members were waiting outside for the green light to enter. Williams looked directly at them and said, “Ya’ll like that?” It is clear as day that he channeled a lot of personal anger at how his injury was handled, along with the widespread doubts about his team, into that performance. Williams finished 30-of-36 for 305 yards and a touchdown. It was the most efficient football game he has played to date.

It is another reminder that this player thrives on being doubted. All that talk for weeks about him playing up the injury for sympathy and not being that important to the offense was more than enough. Throwing the Falcons pick sweep on top was icing on the cake. In hindsight, we should’ve seen this coming. Caleb Williams has some Michael Jordan in him. The more you question him, the more locked in he gets. If anything, the media did the Bears a huge favor with all of that nonsense.

The Bears will need this version moving forward.

Things don’t get any easier next week. Chicago must return home to host the New England Patriots, fresh off their Super Bowl appearance and winners of 3 of their last 4. Drake Maye crushed Williams in their last meeting two years ago. That is certain to get the Bears quarterback revved up for Thursday night. The good news is that Coach Johnson is pretty good on short weeks. He’s 3-1 as a head coach with 6 days or fewer in between games. Williams will be ready.

If what we saw in Atlanta is the version we see moving forward, the NFL is in trouble. Williams was already tough to defend when he was inefficient. If he’s learned how to accept the easier throws, it will be the equivalent of Jordan learning how to pass the ball in 1991. Everybody knows how that ended. If nothing else, it will certainly be lots of fun to watch.

The Chicago Bears knew they had to take care of business on Sunday against the Atlanta Falcons. That loss last week in Green Bay hurt a lot. They couldn’t afford another one. Not with New England and Seattle lurking around the corner. Thankfully, quarterback Caleb Williams returned just in time, throwing for 305 yards and a touchdown while guiding the Bears to 31 points. The big surprise was the Bears’ defense. Despite being down multiple starters, they held Atlanta to just 7 points through the first three quarters. Falcons head coach Kevin Stefanski admitted that they had some help.

While the Mercedes-Benz Dome was loud for much of the day, it wasn’t because of what Atlanta was doing. There was a massive contingent of Bears fans in attendance, and their noise forced the Falcons’ offense to go with a silent count. That is not something you see in the NFL. Stefanski was asked about the issue after the game. He chose his words carefully, making sure not to disparage Atlanta’s fans. However, he admitted that the team expected the noise from Bears fans might be a problem.

Kevin Stefanski better get used to that.

Atlanta has always been a weird animal when it comes to home games. While the organization has a large and dedicated fanbase, it strangely doesn’t pack the dome as often as you’d think. Bears fans aren’t the only ones who’ve been able to hijack games there. Other teams with fanbases that travel well have done the same. It just seems like the Bears make it more obvious than others. It is a big reason why Chicago is 6-4 in their last 9 visits to Atlanta dating back to 1986. It is a place where they always seem to play well.

It must feel deeply ironic for Kevin Stefanski. Say what you will about the Cleveland Browns. They’ve been a hard-luck franchise for a long time, but you rarely saw their stadium get taken over by opposing fans. Atlanta has been considerably more successful in the past 20 years. Yet even now, they struggle to protect their home turf. Maybe that is why they can’t seem to win with any consistency despite fielding some pretty talented rosters. The Bears sure haven’t had that problem.

This victory is a big one for Chicago.

It can’t be overstated how crucial that game was. Not only does it improve the Bears’ playoff positioning in the NFC, but it also protects them from what should be the toughest part of their upcoming schedule. Next is the New England Patriots, followed by the Seattle Seahawks. Both teams were in the Super Bowl last year and remain among the league’s best. Losing to Atlanta and then both of them would’ve dropped the Bears to 3-5, and in a likely no-win scenario with how good the NFC North has been this season.

Now, if they can somehow get one of those next two games, they have the struggling Tampa Bay Buccaneers after that before going into the bye week. At worst, they should be 5-4 at the end of that, which is more than workable. Having Williams back is crucial. It’s so clear the offense is different with him on the field. If the defense can keep pulling its weight, this team will be tough to beat.

Caleb Williams missed the past three games of the season with a hamstring injury. People weren’t sure what to expect from the Chicago Bears‘ quarterback. He could be forgiven for looking a little rusty. Going on the road against the Atlanta Falcons is a tough first assignment. Williams would be forgiven for having a slightly off game. Apparently, someone forgot to tell him that. Not only did he throw for over 300 yards in the game, but he also completed his first 12 passes in a row, along with a touchdown on the opening drive.

In fact, it was the most efficient game of his career. Williams finished 30-of-36 on the afternoon, good for an 83.33 completion percentage. Four of those passes were labeled as throwaways, too. That means only two of his passes were true incompletions all day. That performance did something that nobody could have expected. It now puts Williams at #1 in the NFL with a 72.5% completion rate. Don’t forget, just a season ago, he was dead last among all starters at 58.1%.

Caleb Williams is chasing unseen NFL history.

One fundamental truth about football is that you rarely see drastic swings in certain stat categories when it comes to quarterbacks. If somebody hovers around 60-63% completion percentage, that is typically where they stay. The same is true for sacks. Some quarterbacks just tend to take them more often than others because of their play style. Guys don’t magically become great at avoiding them. Yet people are watching Williams in the process of doing both.

In 2024, he had a pressure-to-sack ratio of 28.2%. In other words, 28.2% of the times he was pressured resulted in a sack. That was dead last in the NFL. Last season, that number dropped to 8.6%, the #1 mark in the league. He’d gone from worst to first in a category where that wasn’t supposed to be possible. Now Caleb Williams is doing it again. After having the worst completion percentage last year, he is on pace to finish #1 in 2026. Keep in mind that no quarterback has managed this feat. The closest anybody ever came was Josh Allen in 2020, going from 58.8% to 69.2%. That put him at 4th in the league.

Nothing about this is normal.

Quarterbacks don’t improve to this extent. What Williams is doing is an anomaly. Completely unheard of in the context of quarterback development. It is a testament to the significant work he’s done to improve his mastery of the offense and learn how to play the position in a more traditional style. Head coach Ben Johnson also deserves credit for having a plan on how to get him there. He’s made the completion percentage thing a priority from the beginning. He knows a 70% rate is a winning formula.

Don’t believe it? The Bears are now 5-2 in games where Williams has cracked that mark. They would be 6-1 if not for a blocked field goal in Green Bay. It seems the quarterback is finally starting to understand the importance and is making a conscious effort not to throw away easy opportunities. It might not always be flashy, but it certainly is effective. Now Williams is pushing towards another piece of NFL history.

Kyler Gordon has easily been the most frustrating player for the Chicago Bears dating back to the start of 2025. Up to that point, he’d established himself as one of the best nickel cornerbacks in football. It is why the team handed him a lucrative new contract. They saw a potential building block towards a championship. Then the injury problems hit, and they never seemed to let up. He missed all but three regular season games in 2025, and then missed the first five games of 2026. Fans and even people inside Halas Hall were losing patience.

When the news finally dropped on Saturday that Gordon was activated and would play against the Atlanta Falcons, nobody knew how to react. Getting help in the secondary isn’t a bad thing, but nobody knew which player would show up. Would he be the difference-maker he was between 2022 and 2024 or a shell of himself? The Bears didn’t wait long to get an answer. In a game where they badly needed the defense to step up, Gordon led the way with the best performance of his career, and one of the best by a Bears cornerback in years.

Kyler Gordon was everywhere.

It seems a little overdramatic when you say a team wouldn’t have won the game without this player or that player. In this case, it 100% applies to Gordon. He terrorized the Falcons offense all afternoon. Strangely enough, it wasn’t in his traditional role as a cornerback. It was as a blitzer. Defensive coordinator Dennis Allen sent Gordon after Michael Penix several times and was rewarded with 3 sacks, 3 tackles for a loss, and two forced fumbles. Atlanta had no answers for that all afternoon, and it destroyed their offensive game plan.

This marks the first time a Bears defensive back has managed 3 sacks in a game since 1983, when Todd Bell accomplished the feat. Bell was a safety. Kyler Gordon is the only cornerback in franchise history to pull it off. Doing that in your first game back in months is nothing short of impressive. Lots of people wrote him off. This writer grew skeptical of him as well. Though it was just one game, it was an emphatic statement from him. Gordon can still play like a star.

The timing of this can’t be overstated.

Don’t forget the situation facing the Bears in this game. They lost Montez Sweat to a PED suspension and Dayo Odeyingbo to a quad injury. Tyrique Stevenson was also declared out with a hamstring problem. The pass defense was dangerously vulnerable against one of the most talented offenses in the NFL. They badly needed somebody to step up. Gordon put on that Superman cape, or in his case, the Spider-Man mask, and played the hero. If this is the guy he is for the rest of the season, the Bears’ defense just got way more dangerous.

The importance of this game was massive. A loss to Atlanta would’ve put Chicago at 3-3 with their next two games against New England and Seattle, the two Super Bowl participants from last season. That type of stretch can often be a season-killer. By taking down the Falcons, the Bears at least gave themselves some breathing space. Gordon deserves so much of the credit for that.

It seems rather prophetic when looking back to August, when defensive coordinator Dennis Allen downplayed the Chicago Bears‘ pass rush problems. He indicated that in the absence of an elite rusher, you needed dependable coverage on the back end to ensure a rush worked as intended. Is it possible Allen knew something was wrong with the secondary and let that concern slip out? If so, we probably should’ve listened. There hasn’t been a more disappointing group on the team this season than Jaylon Johnson and the cornerbacks.

Now, some people may wonder if the struggles have been played up a little too much. Sure, the Bears struggled last week in Green Bay, but that could be a one-week thing. It hasn’t been a problem all season, right? Wrong. Not only have Johnson and Tyrique Stevenson been two of the worst boundary corners in the NFL through 5 games, but a new chart from advanced stats indicates they might be the two worst period. They are in a quadrant by themselves when it comes to yards allowed per coverage snap.

Jaylon Johnson has nothing to explain away these issues.

You can run down the list of numbers and they keep getting worse. Johnson is near the bottom of the league in almost every meaningful category.

• Total yards – 286 (62nd of 65)
• YAC – 81 (50th)
• Yards per reception – 16.8 (57th)
• Passer rating – 118.6 (54th)
• Pass breakups – 0 (52nd)

All of this, plus don’t forget he has just one interception since September 22nd of 2024. Yes, Jaylon Johnson has been bad. This is a case where a really good player fell off a cliff. Stevenson hasn’t been any better. He’s allowed 198 yards, 3 touchdowns, and a 139.0 passer rating.

When you’re this bad on the boundaries, it doesn’t matter how good your pass rush is. All a quarterback has to do is survive just long enough to lob it downfield, and he’s likely to find a completion. That is why you saw Jordan Love hit the Bears for over 30 yards on 6 different passes last week. It is a brutal situation for the team to be in. Nobody saw it coming. Why should they have? Johnson is still only 27. He didn’t have any health issues in training camp. It was natural to assume he’d continue playing at his customary high level.

The Bears really only have two choices.

They can maintain the status quo and hope Johnson finds a groove at some point. Maybe he’s just in a funk and needs to play his way out of it. Or Allen must shift how he’s calling the defense. That means far less man coverage and more zone. This feels like the only way to protect against those deep throws. Johnson’s sudden loss of speed may necessitate it. That isn’t the type of defense Allen wants to call. Unfortunately, he may not have a choice. Sometimes the personnel make it impossible.

One thing that can be said for certain is that this configuration at cornerback won’t continue if there isn’t any improvement. The Bears already showed a willingness to bench Stevenson last season. Would they do the same with Johnson? This coaching staff has made it pretty clear that they don’t reward past exploits. If you can’t pull your weight anymore, don’t expect to be around long.

What’s the old Chinese proverb? A crisis means two things: danger and opportunity. There is no question that the Chicago Bears’ defense is in a crisis. Their cornerback situation looks pretty bad after last week. Jaylon Johnson is a shell of himself. Tyrique Stevenson hasn’t been healthy in weeks. Opponents are taking advantage of them for big plays. Now matters have gotten even worse as the defensive line took multiple hits this past week. Montez Sweat was slapped with a two-game suspension for a PED violation, while Dayo Odeyingbo landed on Injured Reserve with a quad injury.

This has put the defensive line in a tough spot. Aside from Austin Booker and Grady Jarrett, they don’t have any credible pass-rush presence. Defensive coordinator Dennis Allen has no choice but to shuffle the deck and see if someone on the depth chart can step up. Here is where opportunity comes in. It’s been easy to forget that the Bears saw a few of their young guys play really well in the preseason two months ago. One was third-year defensive end Jamree Kromah, and the other was 6th-round defensive tackle Jordan Van Den Berg.

Both have hardly played this year. That is about to change.

The Chicago Bears are ready to test their development ability.

Kromah was consistently productive in August, collecting 10 pressures and 3 sacks across his three appearances. Van Den Berg has 7 pressures. Neither has gotten much action since, though. Van Den Berg only has 28 pass rush snaps total in 5 games. Kromah hasn’t even suited up. It is likely Allen doesn’t trust them enough to handle heavier workloads. Van Den Berg had technical issues that were pretty apparent despite his explosiveness. Kromah was held out because of Daniel Hardy and James Lynch. Hardy is a special teams ace while Lynch is a primary run defender.

Things have changed. The Chicago Bears haven’t added anybody to the roster this week despite the losses of Sweat and Odeyingbo. That is a clear sign they plan to promote some of their backups into the rotation. Kromah and Van Den Berg sit atop that list. Talent has never been the issue with them. Kromah has great size and power to go along with a consistent motor. Van Den Berg is explosive and quick, fighting through blocks with relentless aggression. Yes, they’re untested.

Sometimes, a guy just needs a chance.

So much is on the line in Atlanta.

Right now, everybody predicts the Bears defense to get railroaded by the Falcons. You can understand why. Two of their best pass rushers are out. Their run defense was already inconsistent. Now they have to go against Bijan Robinson and Drake London. The only way this doesn’t end in a disaster is if somebody steps up. It can’t just be Booker and Jarrett. That front has to set the tone. Big contributions from unexpected names often drive road wins. Imagine if Kromah and/or Van Den Berg deliver.

If nothing else, this will give the Bears a clear view of how good or bad their depth situation really is. Atlanta’s offensive line is pretty good, especially along the interior. If they shut down Chicago’s front and those two are invisible? General manager Ryan Poles deserves criticism for not being more proactive in finding help earlier. On the other hand, if one or both of them step up, the Bears have something to build with.

The Chicago Bears haven’t been aggressive at the trade deadline for the past two years. Not since acquiring Montez Sweat in 2023 has general manager Ryan Poles taken a big swing. He has instead opted for smaller deals to help improve the team on the margins. People are waiting to see what happens a few weeks from now. The Bears are 3-2 and in the thick of the NFC playoff race. A crucial stretch of their schedule is coming up and could make or break that. If they can maintain their winning record, it stands to reason they will look for more help before the deadline, right?

Bleacher Report indicated that the Bears are expected to be one of the most aggressive teams on the market. This stems from their pressing need to bolster a weakened defense.

“The Chicago Bears are sitting at 3-2 and chasing the undefeated Minnesota Vikings in the NFC North. While Caleb Williams’ hamstring injury played a role in both losses, a suspect defense hasn’t helped.

The Bears’ defense has looked respectable at times, but it ranks 22nd in yards per carry allowed and 30th in net yards per pass attempt allowed. Don’t be surprised if general manager Ryan Poles looks to bolster the defensive front and the pass rush in the coming weeks.

Chicago’s defense has produced 12 sacks, but it also just lost Montez Sweat to a two-game suspension for a violation of the league’s PED policy.”

This follows the line of thinking that many covering the Bears have speculated since the season began. If any moves were made around the deadline, they would be on the defensive side. The only uncertainty at this point is which position they decide to target if and when that happens.

The Chicago Bears suddenly have a tough decision.

For weeks, the assumption from everybody was that any move they made would be on the defensive line. Most likely, it’d be an edge rusher of some kind. That is why you’ve recently heard rumors linking them to Khalil Mack. However, things have become more complicated. The loss in Green Bay last week exposed serious issues in the secondary, particularly at cornerback. Jaylon Johnson has looked like a shell of the player he was in 2023 and 2024. Kyler Gordon still hasn’t returned, and Tyrique Stevenson is battling a hamstring problem.

Knowing defensive coordinator Dennis Allen and how he thinks, it’s possible the Chicago Bears may prioritize finding cornerback help rather than another pass rusher. His defense requires solid coverage on the back end to function properly. Johnson’s decline has really left the team in a tough spot. Maybe a prominent name will be available if the edge rusher market gets too hot. Answers to these questions aren’t likely to arrive for another few weeks. The Bears aren’t yet in a spot where they’re confident in which direction they’re heading.

A win in Atlanta might change that.

It would give them another win over a key NFC wild card threat and some cushion for the brutal two-game stretch against the New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks. If they can reach 5-3, that pretty much gives them the green light to make a move. Poles is likely already working the phones, gauging who may or may not be available. Much depends on which teams conclude that their current season is a wash and that it’s time to start preparing for 2027.

This is one area Poles has excelled. He typically has a pretty good feel for which teams are selling. That is how he landed Sweat in 2023 and Joe Thuney in 2025. It is all about timing. There is no shortage of struggling teams as the deadline approaches. The key is differentiating between those committed to a rebuild and those who likely think it’s just a bad season and that they need to freshen things up for next year.