When the two were in Detroit together, Ben Johnson would let receiver Kalif Raymond in on the occasional secret. He’d show Raymond and play and tell him exactly how an opponent two weeks into the future would play it.
“He’ll blurt something out, like, ‘Yeah, watch this. This same play … watch this in two weeks. …’” Raymond said Tuesday after the Bears‘ first of three mandatory minicamp practices. “He’s like, ‘I already know what this safety is going to do two weeks from now. … In two weeks, watch what we do to this guy.’
“And sure enough you come in two weeks and it’s, like, touchdown.”
Johnson, then, enjoys the cat-and-mouse game that he has to play with opposing defensive coordinators. He’s just not particularly worried about it in June.
“We’re so multiple in what we do and what we put on tape,” Johnson said. “It’s really not a huge concern of mine of teams feeling like they’ve got a bead on it.”
Johnson didn’t merely transplant the Lions offense into his new home last year. He built something different, with pieces from his former place and certain ideas he believes in as a play-caller. Phrasing was different. Most importantly, so were the players.
A year after debuting his Bears scheme, though, there’s no question defensive coordinators around the NFL have spent the offseason studying it, looking for an edge. Johnson is self-aware enough to put credence in the self-scout the Bears perform every week during the season and, more expansively during the offseason. He leans on his coaching staff along the way.
“Watching the way he processes things, the cast that he has around him. … The coaches [are] around him for a reason, because he knows what he’s trying to do, and his ideas.” Raymond said. “He’s got an expansive mind.”
The Bears know what they’ve put on tape; the question is how they want to complement it. Johnson has to strike the balance between continuing to call the staples he believes in, whether he disguises them or not, and adding wrinkles opposing coordinators haven’t seen before.
Johnson keeps up with NFL trends — he’s been using multiple tight ends for years, something the league is finally finding fashionable. Still, he prioritizes the building blocks of his offense— basics that enable him to post a reliable run game and a threatening passing attack, in that order. When Johnson decides to have fun with trick plays, or to put players in unusual spots, it’s only because the building blocks have been strong. The Bears still stress those every day, Johnson said, probably to the point of annoyance. During the early part of this offseason, they spent weeks doing little more than basic fundamentals.
Having quarterback’s Caleb Williams’ improvisational skills helps the Bears be unique, too.
“There is a lot of unpredictability that comes along with it,” Johnson said. “As he continues to grow and develop, if the structure of the play is there for him, then he’ll take it. But what he can do out of structure is really unique and I think it makes us even more difficult to defend.”
Johnson prefers to focus his play-calling brainstorm sessions on finding ways to get his playmakers involved — receivers Luther Burden and Rome Odunze, tight ends Colston Loveland and Cole Kmet and running backs D’Andre Swift and Kyle Monangai — than what’s awaiting him on the defensive side.
“The challenge is making sure that we’re all coordinated and on the same page and putting them all in a spot to succeed,” he said. “But I love the challenge of looking at Luther Burden and how we get him the ball and maximize what he does best, along with Rome and Colston and Cole.
“We have this whole slew of weapons we’re looking to maximize. I think that’s the fun part. The plays don’t matter so much to me; it’s more so, how do we get these guys the ball in space to do what they do so well?’”
At this time last year, the league hadn’t seen Loveland with the ball in his hands. The Bears hadn’t really, either — his shoulder injury kept him from practicing until training camp. Burden was a rookie, too, and was limited by offseason injuries.
Burden grabbed the attention of the league last year — “He’s the truth, nothing but the truth,” Loveland said — while the second-year tight end led the team in receiving yards last season. The Bears’ goal is to keep adding to Loveland’s route tree this year, Johnson said, which should make him even more dangerous.
Coordinators on the Bears’ schedule are already circling those two players.
Johnson is, too, even with their first game more than three months away.
“Yeah, sure, maybe there might be a little more awareness [around the league] now,” Loveland said. “But … there’s a lot of dudes on the field who can make a play.
“So pick your poison.”
