Bear Digest

The key to getting Caleb Williams working like a Ben Johnson QB

The Bears are starting over in many respects with Caleb Williams this year and if they can get him thinking and working at one particular style of play they'll find the progress comes faster.

Gene Chamberlain

Caleb Williams rolls away from the Lions while looking for a receiver in their game at Soldier Field last year.
Caleb Williams rolls away from the Lions while looking for a receiver in their game at Soldier Field last year. / Mike Dinovo-Imagn Images
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The Ben Johnson plan for converting quarterback Caleb Williams to his style of offense is becoming more apparent with each comment the Bears coach makes.

At the owners meetings, the Bears coach described the process which he earlier had characterized by saying it needs to be torn down and started over.  He rephrased that for more specifics at the owners meetings.

“I don’t know if there’s any undoing, but there are some things that we’re going to encourage that he looks to do a little bit different,” Johnson said.

From that respect, it really is teaching the most fundamental things over again.

“You go back to the basics,” Johnson told reporters at the NFL owners meetings. “And so it’s the fundamentals of the quarterback position. What’s our footwork going to look like, under center, from the shotgun? What are we calling the formations, what’s the defensive identification going to look like so that we’re all speaking the same language?

“We got to get on the same page because it will be a little bit different for him than what he experienced last year. If we can mesh together and start speaking the same language that’s when things will really start to take off.”

Getting the ball out of Williams’ hand faster is as essential as his pass blocking and play of others around him within the offense. Pro Football Focus had his average time to throw at 3.03 seconds.

“I don’t know what the number was in terms of seconds that he held on to the ball before releasing it but we would certainly like to bring that number down,” Johnson told reporters. “Part of that is how well can we scheme (targets) No. 1 or No. 2 in the progression open for him.

“The protection up front can get better, the route runners get to their spots faster, we can move the pocket a little bit more. There’s a lot of things that we have at our disposal that can help with athletic process.”

One area where Johnson is certain his QB will need to go through some transition is the play-action passing game because it means so much to the offense and Williams has such limited exposure to playing under center.

Jared Goff threw 205 play-action passes last year, the most in the league. Williams last year was 20th in the league in play-action attempts with 95.

It’s so much a part of what Johnson did in Detroit, and it requires a quarterback to be under center most of the time.

“He’s been predominantly a shotgun quarterback for most of his high school and college career,” Johnson said. “And so he’s very comfortable there.

“So we’re going to work to see the comfort level under center and how much of that applies. We had a lot of success where I was last, that going under center for the run game did translate and play-action. Whether that works for us in Chicago time will tell but there’s a lot of ways to skin a cat.”

Johnson did admit the play-action will be critical just from the standpoint of keying the whole offense.

“I’m more prone to the play-action game underneath there because I do think the longer action, the longer fake does tend to hold the second level (linebackers) for a little bit longer,” Johnson said. “That’s where you get your chunks and your shots behind him.

“So there is merit for looking to develop that part of his game. And The truth is even if we do invest and we decide that’s not the direction we want to go too far in, it’s still really worthwhile for him to have that time on because it’s going to translate to the shotgun as well.”

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.