Say nothing of the amount of success that Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams may go on to have during his professional career, it’s a very possible that the 1st overall pick of the 2024 NFL Draft will go down as one of the most noteworthy players in the century-plus long history of the National Football League’s oldest franchise.
This may sound hyperbolic, especially considering the fact that the Chicago Bears have sent more players — including legitimate NFL icons such as Dick Butkus, Mike Ditka, Gale Sayers, Walter Payton and Brian Urlacher — to the Pro Football Hall of Fame than any other team. But no matter what happens, we’ll always remember the name Caleb Williams, no matter which potential path his career heads down.
There are plenty of not-so-great ways things could turn out. Caleb could end up being a bust, though that feels significantly less likely now after just four games under new head coach Ben Johnson than it did at the conclusion of his rookie season, when there was only an occasional glimmer of hope. Even with the offense not operating consistently as you’d like, there’s been more than just a glimmer this year.
I suppose Caleb could end up sticking a painted middle finger up to the entire city of Chicago and opt to leave as soon as he possibly can if it’s true he didn’t want to play for the Bears in the first place, but considering the way he’s embraced the city and seems to be gelling with Ben Johnson, that seems unlikely too.
Caleb could end up just a league-average starting quarterback who plays all of, or at least the majority of his career in Chicago, but even in that scenario, it would feel like he ended up a bust just because of how high the expectations were when he arrived. Poll 100 unbiased football fans, and this is probably the outcome they would predict.
But then there’s the chance that Caleb Williams actually is everything Bears fans hoped he would be when he threw up that Bear claw on draft night. The one who bucks a trend that has been ongoing far longer than he’s been alive. The franchise quarterback. The superstar. The savior.
That seems to be who members of the Chicago Bears organization believe Caleb Williams is.
What the Chicago Bears Are Saying About Caleb Williams
What we knew about Caleb Williams heading into the NFL was that he possessed the sort of raw skills that very few individuals who have stepped on a football field ever have. The combination of his arm, his deceptive athleticism and his improvisational chops made him feel like a can’t miss prospect. But what the Bears seem to be gushing the most about when it comes to the 23-year-old quarterback is his ability to get better in the game’s most tense moments.
“When the game’s on the line like that, for a lot of people, their heartbeat is starting to go a little bit faster. His tends to slow down a little bit,” Ben Johnson said of Caleb Williams, per Dan Wiederer of The Athletic. Whether this is medically/scientifically accurate, I have no idea, though I have to be honest, I’d be interested in seeing what any athlete’s heartbeat was like during the clutch moments of a game.
(Hey Next Gen Stats, maybe we could do something with this instead of learning that every really fast player in the NFL runs about 21 miles per hour?)
Regardless though, it’s something that others within the Bears organization have noticed too.
“When he gets into those situations, he’s just poised,” running D’Andre Swift said. “Real calm. You can see it in the way he’s commanding the offense and with his execution.”
“His competitiveness in crunch time kind of takes over,” offensive coordinator Declan Doyle added. “That’s what makes him him.”
It’s paramount that a team has this exact belief in their starting quarterback, but even more important is that the quarterback has that belief in himself.
Despite all of the pressure, the scrutiny and the failures of his rookie season, Caleb Williams’ belief in himself hasn’t wavered.
“You take a deep breath, and you give yourself some positive information, positive affirmation. Then you go out and be as calm as you can for your guys. You look at those guys in the huddle, and you give them the information we all need to be able to go out there and be confident, to make the plays we need to go down and win the game,” Williams said of those crunch-time moments. “It’s time to go win the game. And there’s nothing else that matters.”
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