On the opening possession of the second half Sunday night, Caleb Williams had the ball in his hands with a chance to lead a go-ahead touchdown drive. It was third-and-3 from the 37-yard line, and Williams had a window of opportunity to hit the kind of big play the Chicago Bears offense so desperately needs.
The sequence wasn’t blocked perfectly. Houston Texans defensive tackle Mario Edwards tested center Coleman Shelton with a stunt that dented the pocket in front of Williams. But the rookie quarterback climbed forward, shuffled left and created a throwing window to launch a deep shot to wide receiver DeAndre Carter.
From high above the field at NRG Stadium, it looked as if a big-play touchdown might be unfolding.
At the moment of truth, however, Williams didn’t quite have his base beneath him and his downfield throw wasn’t nearly as precise as he wanted. As Carter broke past Texans cornerback Kamari Lassiter on a corner route, Williams sort of skipped through the air as he threw, his pass drifting left and landing incomplete a yard or so away from Carter.
That was a sequence Williams lamented immediately after the Bears’ 19-13 loss, noting the opening that seemed to be there plus the poor angle safety Calen Bullock had taken behind Lassiter.
“If we would’ve connected on that,” Williams said, “he would have went down the sideline and took it in. We were just right there for having a big explosive touchdown.”
So close. Yet so far away.
That was a prime example of the kind of minor miscues that have triggered major anxiety across Chicago this week. Coming off two sickly offensive performances to open the season, the Bears head to Indianapolis this weekend seeking remedies to enliven a unit that ranks last in the NFL in passing yards, sacks allowed and touchdowns scored while also sitting in the bottom five in yards per play and rushing offense.
For a team with 2024 playoff aspirations and a franchise with a history of underperforming offenses, the first two weeks of struggle were not what the doctor ordered. A highly contagious case of Here-we-go-again-itis has spread rapidly through the fan base.
As the Bears work to keep that contagion from infecting Halas Hall, we offer a six-step prescription to help the offense get back on its feet quickly.
1. Make big plays when big plays are there to be made.
This may be one of the more underappreciated axioms in the NFL. It’s the separator that often distinguishes great quarterbacks and great teams from those constantly trying to figure it all out.
Consider the Bears in that latter caste as they work to learn the art of capitalizing.
Two games into his NFL career, it’s too much to ask Williams to carry the team just yet. But he does have to pick up a reasonable share of the load, specifically as it relates to maximizing his opportunities to make game-changing plays when they present themselves.
Sunday’s third-quarter misfire to Carter was just one of a handful of examples from the first two weeks in which Williams missed a chance to change the game with one throw.
In Week 1, an overthrown deep shot to Keenan Allen on an open out-and-up route qualified as the biggest “What if?” moment for the Bears offense. A back-shoulder miss to DJ Moore late in Sunday’s loss also falls into that bucket.
On Sunday in Indianapolis, Williams might get a half-dozen or so opportunities to deliver the explosive play that turns everything. He must be sharp enough to capitalize.
The good news: Even in Sunday’s loss, Williams had a higher volume of impressive plays than he had a week earlier. Arguably his best throw of the night went to Carter in the second quarter, an absolute fastball on a see-it-and-rip-it seam route near the goal line.
“That was one of the few times Caleb was in perfect rhythm,” Carter said. “His back foot hit and he threw it. He put some zip on it and it was a great ball.”
Carter drew a 24-yard pass-interference penalty on Bullock, who hit him before the ball arrived. The Bears scored their only offensive touchdown of the season two plays later. Carter was among the players who pocketed that sequence as something to derive optimism from.
“We’ve had flashes,” he said. “We just have be more consistent with it all. It’s giving Caleb time back there. It’s him being comfortable with what he’s seeing. It’s receivers running the right routes and being in the right spots.
“When we struggle on offense, I hate that he takes a lot of the heat. But it’s everybody. Hopefully we can all get on the same page this week.”
2. Establish a running game.
While offensive coordinator Shane Waldron was peppered Thursday with questions about how to unclog the Bears’ constipated rushing attack, Colts defensive coordinator Gus Bradley was deep in his own troubleshooting efforts 215 miles south, trying to patch up a run defense that allowed 261 yards to the Green Bay Packers in Week 2 after surrendering 213 to the Texans in the opener.
A heightened focus on defending the pass may have been a convenient excuse for Bradley and the Colts in Week 1. But with Malik Willis making his first start for Green Bay last weekend, the Packers’ dedication to running the ball may have exposed the Colts run defense as truly porous and one the Bears should be able to attack.
The Colts’ 474 rushing yards allowed is the highest total through the first two weeks since 1978, when Tony Dorsett and Leroy Harris were trampling the Baltimore Colts. For perspective, the 2023 Bears allowed only 476 rushing yards over their final eight games.
So, yes, the Bears — even with their own struggles — should lean into exposing the Colts’ vulnerability early Sunday.
There may be a major psychological component to gashing the Colts for a few big runs right away, triggering Indianapolis’ doubts as to whether it can get that area of its defense shored up quickly enough.
“Not only might that demoralize them, but it could give us a needed confidence boost as well,” Bears tight end Cole Kmet said. “Once you see a couple runs hit like you want them to, it gives you more confidence in it. And then, obviously, that gives your play caller more confidence to keep calling things like that.”
3. Stick with the run.
And then stick to it some more.
Even if the Bears get off to a slow start on the ground, the prevailing sentiment inside the locker room is that the truest way to get a reliable running game unlocked is to keep turning the key.
“So much of it is just keeping at it,” center Coleman Shelton said. “So often we have been one thing away. One person messes up over here. Or something else happens over there. It feels like once we get it to click, we’re going to go.”
A dependable running game should open play-action opportunities while also taking pressure off Williams. The chance to find that dimension in the offense should emerge Sunday.
“When we get the looks we want,” Kmet said, “we have to be able to hit it and we have to be able to gash it.”
Kmet understands the NFL is a correction-based league and the Colts have been putting extra emphasis this week on strengthening their run defense.
“But it’s not like they haven’t been trying to stop the run the first two games,” Kmet said. “They can try to make their corrections. But we’re going to try to expose them where we think they’re weak.”
Consider that a subtle nudge to Waldron.
Through two weeks the Bears have totaled only 155 yards on the ground, with 38% of those coming from Williams. Bears running backs have averaged a paltry 2.5 yards per carry, including lead back D’Andre Swift’s 48 yards on 24 attempts.
Williams pinpointed the rushing attack as the one thing the Bears offense should be able to do well really soon.
“We’re trying to figure out which runs exactly fit well with our personnel and the people we have,” he said. “That’s going to emerge here really soon. And it’s having confidence and staying steadfast with that, with the running backs, receivers, tight ends, everybody having confidence that we are going to break through and figure out exactly what our personality is with the run.”
4. Show some nasty.
If the Bears are looking to establish an offensive identity that includes a hell-raising offensive line, that wasn’t evident in Houston. The Texans controlled the line of scrimmage all night and terrorized the Bears with front-four pressure plus an array of aggressive blitzes.
Williams was sacked seven times and hit 11 others. In the fourth quarter, he seemed to be hanging in the pocket like a birthday pinata, getting spun and then walloped over and over and over again.
He admitted both after the game and three days later that his body felt the toll of Sunday’s beating. “I’m a little bruised up still,” Williams said Wednesday.
For the offensive line, bolstering the protection and establishing the running game will revolve a lot around their communication and attention to fundamentals and details. But it also will require heightened tenacity from a group that may not have a bona fide butt-kicker as its obvious tone-setter.
“You have to have guys who have some nasty to them,” former NFL guard and Fox Sports commentator Mark Schlereth said this week. “You have to have a couple guys who are a little bit salty.
“We’ve all got that one friend where, when you go out drinking, it’s your job to babysit him because he’s going to try to fight somebody. Like, you have to have that one guy in your group where, when it gets a little bit heated, he wants to fight. There has to be some of that. And then there has to be some finish.”
Developing a more noticeable edge will be part of the evolution for the Bears line. But, particularly when it comes to protecting Williams, Schlereth also heaps significant responsibility on Waldron as a play caller to find an ideal blend of passing plays that lessens the demands on his line.
Three-step drops, swing passes, screens, play-action bootlegs, seven-man protection plays. It’s about finding cheat codes to reduce the number of plays during which the five offensive linemen have to bust their tails to pass protect properly.
It’s also imperative the line shows some nasty.
“You have to have the attitude as a group that ‘we set the tone,’” Schlereth said. “That has to be something that is preached and is worked on. You finish every drill, you win every drill and you finish every play.
“And if you can finish a dude to the ground and put your helmet in his jaw and try to break the damn thing, then that’s what you do.”
5. ‘Execute down the stretch.’
After all that went wrong Sunday, the Bears somehow had a chance to win on their final possession, taking over with 1 minute, 37 seconds remaining and down by only six points. The chance to salvage a win from an ugly offensive performance was within reach. And that’s an experience Williams and his offensive mates should both embrace and appreciate.
“That’s what the game is,” Bears coach Matt Eberflus said. “That’s why we all play this game in the NFL. That’s an exciting moment. And that’s what it comes down to: one-score games in the fourth quarter at the end.”
Eberflus also had a bold-lettered reminder for his team: “You have to execute down the stretch.”
On Sunday, the Bears didn’t.
After Williams hit Rome Odunze for a 27-yard completion to open the final drive, the offense stalled. Tight end Gerald Everett dropped a pass on first down. Then came the fatal blow courtesy of a Danielle Hunter sack, with the four-time Pro Bowl edge rusher torching right tackle Darnell Wright and burying Williams for an 8-yard loss.
A 1-yard Williams scramble and a fourth-and-17 incompletion followed, and that was that. The Bears had their first loss and an on-film reminder of Eberflus’ directive.
You have to execute down the stretch.
Finding a finishing touch will be part of the growth process for Williams and the offense. It’s a challenge so many young quarterbacks take on but so few master. As the Bears offense evolves and seeks to create momentum, the greatest belief will come from the ability to produce in the clutch.
6. B-R-E-A-T-H-E.
We’re modifying the 2014 Aaron Rodgers-ism just a touch here but offering one of the most significant coaching points for the Bears this season, especially early on.
B-R-E-A-T-H-E.
Perhaps this should have been the first step in the prescription. Perhaps Eberflus should have hired a yogi and started the week with a lengthy meditation session.
Whatever the case, breathing remains an important task for everyone involved in this work-in-progess offense with a new coordinator and a rookie quarterback.
For those in the outside world prone to hyperventilation, Sunday’s loss provided a trigger with no shortage of extreme reactions and suggestions to combat the misery.
Bench the entire offensive line!
Fire line coach Chris Morgan!
Fox Sports talking head Colin Cowherd even fast-forwarded to a dire mid-October hypothetical in which the Bears are 2-4 entering their bye week with the national noise becoming deafening.
“If they lose three of the next four games,” Cowherd said, “you will hear Lincoln Riley rumors. I promise you.”
OK, everybody. Let’s slow down juuuuuust a little bit.
Tracking Caleb Williams: How the Chicago Bears QB is performing in his rookie season
Are we really listing coaching candidates for a 1-1 team in mid-September?
B-R-E-A-T-H-E.
As pronounced as the offensive struggles have been, no one inside Halas Hall was delusional enough to believe this Williams-led attack would become a high-powered machine before Halloween.
The Bears may be one big play or two from easing a lot of their offensive angst and a big win or two from establishing a clear direction.
“In pro football, offense is so much about rhythm and timing,” Carter said. “We haven’t really shown that yet. But that helps the quarterback out. It helps the coordinator out. All those things.
“If we hit a couple more plays that right now we’re barely missing on, it will be a different feeling. … It’s not like we don’t have the answers to the problem. If it’s just one play here, one play there, we’ll feel a lot better soon.”
More good news: The Bears’ next four games come against teams that started the season 0-2, all with defenses that rank outside the top 20 in yards allowed. The Bears are a one-point road underdog against the Colts on Sunday but should be favored against the Los Angeles Rams, Carolina Panthers and Jacksonville Jaguars in the next three games.
A follow-up evaluation during the Week 7 open date seems most prudent before more drastic measures are taken or a more dire diagnosis is provided.
Even with a few more aches and pains expected, the Bears always understood the long view of what they’re grinding to accomplish: developing Williams as a complete NFL quarterback while trying to open a window of sustained competitive relevance.
So that’s the final piece of this prescription. Some good ol’-fashioned oxygen.
B-R-E-A-T-H-E.
Waldron has taken that guidance to heart, a loyal subscriber to the motto “Be where your feet are planted.” He retains a grounded perspective of the offensive performance through two games.
“It has been a learning and growth experience,” he said Thursday. “We’ll have plenty of opportunities to learn from and opportunities to grow and move forward.”
Sunday offers the next opportunity. And for those still vulnerable to pigskin panic? We’d suggest grabbing a bulk supply of paper lunch bags before kickoff.
