The summer of Caleb Williams is over. A pivotal season for the Bears QB is about to get serious.
· Yahoo Sports
CHICAGO — The viral video was a Chicago sports fan’s dream.
Caleb Williams, with his beard freshly shaved, mustache remaining, looked into the TV camera and pointed. The camera panned from Williams in his front-row seat behind the Cubs dugout to the dugout itself, where Cubs star Pete Crow-Armstrong waved to his fan club before coolly turning back toward the action on the field.
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When the camera panned back, Williams and Bulls forwards Caleb Wilson and Matas Buzelis pounded on the roof of the dugout as the Cubs faithful cheered behind them. With help from the two Calebs and Buzelis, the Wrigley Field crowd started chanting, “P-C-A! P-C-A!”
It was Sept. 3, just hours after the Bears wrapped up their final practice of the summer. Coach Ben Johnson had given the players three days off over the Labor Day break, their last free weekend for a while.
Williams took advantage of the free time by heading to the ballpark to support his buddy Crow-Armstrong, who clubbed his 39th home run that night — and this week hit his 40th and 41st and is the odds-on favorite to win the National League MVP award.
“I like being out with the people supporting one of my friends, Cubbie Pete, and so it was just kind of spur of the moment,” Williams said. “(I) wanted to sit out there.”
It was, perhaps, the last great hurrah for the summer of Caleb.
Labor Day has come and gone. Kids are back in school. The hype has been a runaway train since the Bears became the feel-good story of the NFL a year ago and won their first playoff game in 15 years.
To recap the offseason: Williams made a cameo in a rap video for “Made It on Our Own” by Yeat and EsDeeKid; he was selected for the cover of Madden NFL 27; his autographed jersey reached Pope Leo XIV in Rome; Hallmark selected the Bears for its next holiday movie; and Williams was a featured guest on two of the biggest internet shows — “New Heights” with the Kelce brothers and “Hot Ones” with Sean Evans.
It was a whirlwind eight months. But things are about to get real. The Bears open the season against the Carolina Panthers on Sunday at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, N.C.
The fun and games are behind them.
“Sure, we want to do big things this year,” coach Ben Johnson said this week. “But really what’s most important to us is that we’re laying the foundation the right way. We talked about it this morning — it’s all about having a great practice, great meetings today.”
That’s what Williams has been trying to do every day since last season ended on a snowy January evening against the Los Angeles Rams at Soldier Field. Johnson and general manager Ryan Poles devoted the last eight months to improving their team with the hope that it takes the next step from surprise contender last season to perennial contender for years to come.
The Bears have had flash-in-the-pan seasons over the last 25 years but haven’t found a way to sustain success. That’s the challenge Johnson and Poles face now.
A lot of that rides on Williams’ shoulders. He has been in the spotlight nearly his entire life, from being a top-rated high school recruit to winning the Heisman Trophy at USC in 2022 to becoming the No. 1 NFL draft pick in 2024. After a somewhat underwhelming rookie season, Williams reminded everyone last year why he was the top pick.
Heading into the 2026 season, Williams is around eighth on the list of MVP favorites, depending on the sportsbook. His name is listed among the likes of Patrick Mahomes, Dak Prescott and reigning MVP Matthew Stafford. Since its inception in 1957, only one Bears player has won the award: Walter Payton in 1977.
Bears fans for generations have dreamed of having a top-tier quarterback. If Williams takes the steps forward the team is hoping for, his inclusion in the MVP discussion would be warranted — not some pipe dream from a long-beleaguered fan base.
PCA might not be the only MVP candidate in town. Could Sunday afternoon be the beginning of another magical run?
“It all matters now,” Williams said. “Everything we did, everything we’re going to do on that (practice) field out here is going to matter on game day.”
‘It’s going to be that much harder’
In some ways, another miracle comeback from the “Cardiac Bears” felt inevitable. Johnson’s team already had erased a late deficit against the Rams to force overtime in the divisional-round playoff game Jan. 18 on the lakefront.
Hours earlier, Williams stood on the sideline and marveled at his home stadium as Jim Cornelison sang the national anthem.
“It was one of the coolest, most surreal, kind of movie feelings,” Williams recalled last month. “Just sitting on the sideline, just like: ‘Wow, I’m here. We’re here. Let’s go out here and show up and make some plays and put on for this city.’ ”
Williams threw a movie-like touchdown pass to tight end Cole Kmet to force overtime. Everything that could go wrong on that play did. Pressure arrived quickly, and Williams backpedaled a cartoonish distance before lofting a prayer that somehow found an open Kmet in the end zone.
A short while later, he had the offense moving toward scoring range, needing only a field goal to win and advance to the NFC championship game.
On second-and-8 near midfield, Williams dropped back and threw a pass intended for wide receiver DJ Moore — but something was off. Moore went one way and Williams’ throw went another. Rams cornerback Kam Curl caught it for an interception that turned the tide. The Rams offense moved methodically downfield to set up the winning field goal.
All these months later, despite the off-field fun and the optimism heading into 2026, that loss still stings. For Williams, it comes in little moments when he’s flipping through his social media feed.
“It still bothers me today, every single time the play pops up or the Cole Kmet play pops up. It feels like it was for nothing in that sense,” Williams said.
As Kmet said in April of the touchdown: “I have to remind people we lost the freakin’ game.”
Johnson has spent the last six months doing his best not to talk about last season. It’s over. It has no bearing on what will happen in 2026.
That’s what he has preached to his team, too, starting with his end-of-season news conference just days after the loss to the Rams.
“The truth is it was really hard to accomplish what we accomplished, and it wasn’t good enough,” Johnson said Jan. 21. “And it’s going to be that much harder to put ourselves in that position again next season.”
In the months since, the Bears have reimagined certain areas of their roster. They retooled at safety, where first-round draft pick Dillon Thieneman will start. They jettisoned the entire defensive tackle position other than veteran captain Grady Jarrett. Perhaps most notable, the Bears traded Moore — a player once viewed as a franchise cornerstone — to the Buffalo Bills, paving the way for Rome Odunze and Luther Burden III to take the spotlight at wide receiver.
Despite all of that, this season will weigh heaviest on Williams’ shoulders. It almost always does with the quarterback.
As Williams embarks on Year 2 in Johnson’s offense, he’s not learning the basics anymore. That was apparent throughout training camp. His command of the offense was on display, from his presnap confidence to his comfort with top targets such as Odunze and tight end Colston Loveland.
“He’s getting to the point now when things aren’t right, he gets pissed off, which is what the best ones do,” Johnson said. “He’s really hard on himself, first and foremost, and so he gets upset with himself. But now it’s to the point where, if we’re that close and somebody didn’t get his depth or ran the wrong number of steps or whatever that is, he’s not afraid to let them know.”
His teammates feel that too.
“I just feel like he’s more vocal, he’s more confident in play calling, getting the plays out to us,” Burden said. “Knowing how to get the ball there, knowing when to get there, timing and stuff like that.”
Ball placement was a big point of emphasis over the offseason. There’s a difference between a ball the receiver should catch and a ball that hits the receiver perfectly in stride.
During his playing days, Bears quarterbacks coach J.T. Barrett spent time on the New Orleans Saints practice squad. He had a front-row seat to the tail end of Drew Brees’ Hall of Fame career. What struck him about Brees was how detailed he was in that area.
“I was fascinated with how, if the ball was slightly over a receiver’s head, he would be like, ‘Hey, I’ll get you a better ball,’ ” Barrett said.
Johnson has talked about setting a 70% completion rate as a goal for Williams. But that remains aspirational for a quarterback who completed only 58.1% of his passes last season. Realistically, the Bears are hoping for a modest improvement in that area this year.
Barrett said there were times last year when he got on Williams in the film room about his ball placement, and the quarterback responded with, “Well, the receiver should catch it.”
Barrett isn’t hearing that excuse anymore. Williams is putting the responsibility on himself.
“Especially with his talent, at the end of the day, he’s one of the most talented cats out here,” Barrett said. “So with that, putting the pressure on yourself to make sure that you’re making everybody else’s job easier.”
‘I’ve always been a shot taker’
In his lone preseason appearance last month, Williams saw Loveland streaking open down the middle of the field. It was first-and-20 from the 27-yard line after a penalty moved the Bears offense backward against the Cincinnati Bengals at Paycor Stadium.
Williams saw a busted defensive coverage and decided to go off script and take a deep shot for Loveland. The throw was off the mark and fell incomplete despite Loveland’s leaping effort.
After the game, Johnson seemed unhappy with the decision.
“I probably would go somewhere else with the ball on that one,” he said.
He elaborated a few days later that he would’ve liked to pick up a few yards after the penalty had put the offense in a hole.
“First-and-20 we might just take the aggressiveness level down a notch and make sure we keep getting back on track,” Johnson said.
It was a rare moment of conservatism for a coach who likes to keep his foot on the gas. His quarterback is the same way.
Johnson’s offense is all about seeking explosive plays, whether that’s in the running or passing game. Look no further than the playoff interception against the Rams. The Bears needed only a field goal to win, yet Johnson kept pushing.
“I don’t think Ben has ever mentioned the word ‘efficiency,’ ” offensive coordinator Press Taylor said this summer. “We talk about explosives. We are trying to attack a defense.”
In the NFL, a play is considered explosive if it’s a run of 10 yards or more or a pass of 20-plus yards. Per Sharp Football, the Bears ranked seventh with a 6.4% explosive-play rate last season. Not surprisingly, the teams ahead of them were the best offenses in football: the Patriots, Rams, Lions, Seahawks, Bills and Ravens.
“I don’t know that you create explosives,” Bears running backs coach Eric Studesville said. “You maximize explosives. When the window comes, you’ve got to maximize that opportunity for it. Be in the right place, the right timing, all the blocks have to occur at the same time and then we’ve got to be where we’re supposed to be to maximize the efficiency of a play.
“That’s where it comes from. You create them conceptually but maximize them when they actually happen.”
Studesville was speaking about the running game, but the same applies to the passing game.
There’s a yin and yang to what the Bears are asking Williams to do. Do they want his completion percentage to improve? Yes. Do they want that at the expense of explosive plays? No. They don’t want to coach away the magic that makes Williams’ game special.
“If there’s a shot, take it,” Williams said. “If not, get down to the checkdowns. But I’ve always been a shot taker.”
That’s not changing anytime soon.
Expect more of the same from Johnson and Williams this season. Johnson will remain aggressive on fourth down. He’ll continue to emphasize his tight ends to create mismatches. He’ll lean on his running game. And Williams will keep being aggressive.
“I can put the ball anywhere,” Williams said, “knowing I’ve got special guys out there on the edges, wide receiver — they’re special talent — and knowing I have an ultimate coach and play caller that supports me and supports us.”
Looming over a pivotal season for Williams is this: When it ends, he will be eligible to negotiate his next contract. He remains under team control through 2027, and the Bears have a team option for 2028.
But his long-term future will be a topic of discussion come January. These days, that conversation starts at $50 million per year for quarterbacks, and players such as Mahomes and Prescott have surpassed $60 million per year.
Whatever happens in 2026, big decisions are looming for the Bears.
“I obviously want to be here forever,” Williams said. “That’s a goal of mine, when I made my goals, is to be at one place until I’m done.”
Williams fully embraced summertime in Chicago, but the summer of Caleb is over. A long, crucial season lies ahead.