Just follow the money and you will soon see just where the Chicago Bears went wrong this season, specifically with rookie No. 1 overall pick and starting quarterback Caleb Williams. Their 30-12 loss to the Minnesota Vikings in Week 15 is their eighth straight, all since the bye week.
It featured many of the issues that have plagued this team all season through two head coaches and three offensive coordinators. This is a good place to start on our checklist of how a franchise can ruin a young QB, and fast.
Bears-Vikings Takeaways: Mastering How to Ruin Caleb Williams
Instabile Chain of Command Bad for Bears QB Caleb Williams
First, it was clearly never the plan of anyone in the Bears’ offices at Halas Hall for the season to go as awry as it has, and that includes the coaching changes.
Even with the outside skepticism about bringing Matt Eberflus back, the Bears touted their improvements on his staff from former offensive coordinator Shane Waldron to interim head coach Thomas Brown, and even defensive coordinator Eric Washington.
In the wake of Waldron’s firing, the Bears moved Brown into the OC role.
That moved Brown closer to Williams, and the rookie – and the team – responded. But the Bears, victims of their own sordid history, broke tradition and fired their head coach.
That once again removed Brown from Williams who has gone back to playing as he did before the previous change. In the meantime, Williams has taken 13 more sacks than the next closest quarterback, CJ Stroud of the Houston Texans.
Williams had the ninth-worst Total QBR entering the contest, per Pro Football Reference.
And yet, the Bears chose to take him out of the rookie’s ear, shifting an even more inexperienced Chris Beatty, former wide receivers coach, to the OC role.
Brown still calls the offense. But there is no way he can dedicate the same time to the QB that he could as his OC. The Bears kept Kerry Joseph in his role as QB coach, one of the few unchanging roles that directly impacts Williams.
Defensive coordinator Eric Washington was a more experienced option at HC as well.
Washington served as assistant head coach during his final year with the Buffalo Bills and has more NFL coaching experience overall than Brown.
Brown may still have head coaching chops to him. But this situation was insurmountable, so getting the most out of it for Williams should have been Job 1. Instead, the Bears won the offseason and now find themselves losing on the field.
How they avoid repeating what they have historically done remains something to monitor.
Ignore the Trenches
If you are not going to be stable on the sidelines, you have to provide some stability for your quarterback up front, and the Bears have failed to do that.
The Bears offensive line is the seventh-cheapest in the NFL, per Spotrac.
That does not mean it has to be as ineffective as it has proven to be. But the proof is in the pudding. Even when taking out sacks Williams has brought on himself, the offensive line is not giving him a remotely consistent pocket or generating consistent push in the running game.
Injuries have played a part in that. Center Coleman Shelton is the only offensive lineman to start every game.
Left tackle Braxton Jones was durable as a rookie but has battled injuries for two years in a row.
He has missed three games this season. His sidekick, left guard Teven Jenkins, has battled injuries his entire career, missing one contest – Week 11 versus the Green Bay Packers – in 2024.
Darnell Wright has also missed a game this season while he has found himself playing with Matt Pryor next to him at right guard.
Therein lies the next issue.
Pryor made his career-high 12th start on Monday. He had not started more than 10 games in any season since entering the league as a sixth-round pick by the Philadelphia Eagles in the 2018 NFL Draft.
Pryor did not start a game in 2023, and he has logged 36 starts in 89 appearances during his career.
He was supposed to be a backup for the Bears.
He began the season behind the Bears’ previous highest-paid offensive lineman, Nate Davis, who was released in November. Ryan Bates was next up at RG. He took Davis’ job first but injuries have limited him to three games.
The Bears traded a fifth-round pick to the Buffalo Bills (and eventually reacquired it to draft Austin Booker) for Bates, who has logged more than four starts one time in his career (2022).
The equity has mostly matched the production for the Bears.
Jones was a fifth-round pick in 2022. Jenkins, a second-rounder in 2021 and a holdover from the previous front office regime. Meanwhile, Wright is a former first-round pick, but one who has had a turnstile next to him during his entire tenure.
Shelton has logged the most starts among the group over the past two seasons. He is the 52nd highest-paid player at his position, 40 spots behind Bates.
Bears general manager Ryan Poles has drafted two offensive linemen in the top 100.
Rookie Kiran Amegadjie, who started in Jones’ place on Monday, was a third-rounder this year and joins Wright on that list. Including Jenkins, the Bears have three top-100 picks along their offensive line.
Bonus: the Bears also spent well at running back only to go minimalist on his blockers. Again, draft pedigree does not guarantee NFL production. However, when the results speak as loudly as they do, the issue seems fairly clear.
Ignore the Trenches Part II
One sneaky way to help a rookie is by putting him in advantageous situations. The Bears figured their defense would do that for Williams. However, an even more effective way to undermine your rookie QB’s success is to weaken what had been the backbone of your team – the defense.
The Bears let veterans Justin Jones and Eddie Jackson go, and one of their other more-seasons veteran leaders, DeMarcus Walker, took a step back in that capacity this season to focus on his production.
There is a clear leadership void on this team.
Furthermore, losing Jefferson has exposed a run defense that is far leakier than anyone could have expected. And it is at least a fair connection since he is the most significant loss up front.
Nose tackle Andrew Billings is now out for the season, and Zacch Pickens has failed to provide a proper complement to an encouraging season from Gervon Dexter, who also missed the game on Monday.
Behind them are journeymen Byron Cowart, Chris Williams, and recent addition Jonathan Ford.
The Bears have one of the most expensive defensive lines, but that is largely tied to Montez Sweat. And the group they find themselves among has not produced much either.
The Bears entered the week tied for the seventh-fewest sacks. Their highest-paid defensive lineman and the reason the unit ranks so highly on the pay scale, Sweat, has just 4.5 sacks after notching 12.5 last season.
Dexter a second-round pick in 2023, is the highest Bears draft pick along the defensive front.
Pickens, a third-rounder, is next. After them is fifth-round rookie Austin Booker and then Dominique Robinson. The latter has been inactive for all but three games this season.
What’s worse, the Bears’ run defense has allowed twice as many rushing scores through 15 weeks in 2024 than they did in 2023. A defense that, like the offense, was built from the backend up.
They have suffered from injuries and inconsistent play in the secondary and cannot stop the run.
Keep Being You: Vikings Show Bears the Way at QB
When you do what you have always done, you will get what you have always gotten. This may be the most confounding aspect of the Bears’ rebuild.
Ryan Poles came from Kansas City. The Chiefs let Patrick Mahomes sit for a year before inserting him into the starting lineup. Sure, they had a capable starter in Alex Smith who afforded them that luxury. They revamped their offensive line too, but we already covered that.
However, the Bears made no efforts to add an experienced QB to the room.
At best, that QB could have served as a mentor for Williams through the trials and tribulations of a rookie season.
At worst, he would have given them an alternative to start the season, either while Williams learned or while they saw just how all of their offseason changes played out. The Bears can turn to the story of David Carr for an example of what happens without proper infrastructure.
Coincidentally, the Vikings showed the Bears what can go right when you plan accordingly.
The Vikings selected J.J. McCarthy with the No. 10 pick in this year’s draft, nine picks after the Bears drafted Williams. That was after they signed Sam Darnold in free agency.
Lo and behold, McCarthy suffered a torn meniscus and underwent season-ending knee surgery in August. More importantly, though, Darnold has played at an All-Pro level after his career got off to a rocky start. The right situation matters.
New names in different roles. Same results. The Bears have not proven they can create such an environment.
Williams is not ruined, and has been one of the more encouraging parts of the season, even with his growing pains. What is typically viewed as problematic for young QBs – changing coaches – does not have to be. Whomever the Bears hire next, they have their work cut out for them.
