The breakthrough everyone has been waiting for from Bears quarterback Caleb Williams might be happening.
This is the best he has played, doing so against tough opponents in the thick of a playoff race, and it’s possible he has turned a corner. If that proves true, it would vastly change the Bears’ playoff prospects after they finish the regular season Sunday against the Lions.
Williams averaged 274 yards passing, threw six touchdown passes and no interceptions and compiled a 103.1 passer rating over his last three games — all against solid teams with significant stakes. The highlight was his 46-yard touchdown pass in overtime to beat the Packers, but he also lit up a strong Browns defense and sparkled in a shootout loss to the 49ers.
“I said it’s going to start showing here soon, and that’s a small sample of that,” said Williams, who traced his upswing back to feeling comfortable in coach Ben Johnson’s offense around midseason even though that statistics didn’t reflect it. “I’ve got to keep growing, keep getting better, so I can go out there and keep giving my team the best chance to win.”
That last part is key.
Just a month ago, Johnson said the Bears, then 9-3, were winning “in spite of our passing game, not because of it,” implying that equation was unsustainable. That’s no longer the case, and if the Bears won when Williams struggled, imagine what’s possible if he soars.
He buried the Browns, who rank second in total defense and 13th in opponent passer rating, with a whopping 10.1 yards per pass. Pro Football Focus scored his winning touchdown pass against the Packers as the best throw of the NFL season. And the Bears wouldn’t have had a shot against the 49ers — they fell short at the 2-yard line in a 42-38 loss — without Williams throwing for 330 yards and two touchdowns.
That push put him 270 yards away from becoming the first Bears quarterback to throw for 4,000 in a season. With 109 yards against the Lions, he’ll break Erik Kramer’s 1995 record of 3,838. He’s done that while throwing interceptions on just 1.1% of his passes, matching the franchise record he set last season.
The Bears’ quarterback whiplash has been brutal. Hope surged with former first-round picks Mitch Trubisky and Justin Fields, only to plunge. So this team has been here before, but it’s always been different with Williams.
It was evident the first time he hit the practice field that his ceiling was higher than that of Trubisky or Fields. There were flashes of elite talent even in the chaos of his rookie season, and as he wraps up his second, Johnson sees him ready to take off.
Williams will make his 34th start Sunday, Trubisky and Fields already were declining at this point. By the end of Trubisky’s second season as a starter, coach Matt Nagy was publicly venting that he hadn’t mastered the offense and wasn’t good at reading defenses. Fields was a turnover machine and couldn’t reliably pass for 200 yards.
Williams, meanwhile, is on his way up. This is only the beginning.
Johnson, who has credibility because of his expertise and track record of honesty, said he’s settled into the offense and “the conversations we have now are a little bit more advanced.” He pointed out Williams’ savvy recognition of coverages and “control” of pre-snap shifts and motions.
“He has a great grasp on what we’re trying to get done, and that’s showing up now on game day on a consistent basis, so he is able to play a little bit faster,” Johnson said. “He’s just playing really confident right now.”
There are many next steps for Williams, most notably improving his throwing accuracy and becoming more precise and efficient in the quick passing game, but with what he’s done so far, there’s good reason to believe he’ll take them.