Ben Johnson walked into Halas Hall in 2025 with questions about Caleb Williams. Not whispered ones. Real ones — about accuracy, about whether Williams could operate inside a structured offense, about whether he processed fast enough to survive in the NFL.
A season later, Johnson is saying those doubts are gone. He’s saying it out loud, and he’s saying it with his name attached.
“I don’t have any concerns in those areas,” Johnson said. “He showed it to me. Now it’s just a matter of time,” according to Dan Pompei of The Athletic.
How Johnson Builds Trust With His Quarterback
Johnson doesn’t coach quarterbacks the way he might coach anyone else on the roster. He explained why in the same piece.
“If I go into the quarterbacks room and I’m hard on the starting quarterback, it typically breeds resentment more than it helps. But you can break down barriers if it’s just the two of us and we can go back and forth and tell each other our versions of the truth. That’s where our defense mechanisms come down. And Caleb is extremely coachable. I wasn’t sure about that when I came here.”
That last line matters. Coachability isn’t something you can scout on tape. It shows up in film sessions, in how a player responds when he’s told he’s wrong, in whether he gets defensive or gets better. Johnson didn’t know which version of Williams he was getting. Now he does.
The Numbers Behind the Confidence
Johnson’s read isn’t just a feeling. Williams backed it up on the field in his first year running Johnson’s offense.
| Category | 2025 Total |
|---|---|
| Passing Yards | 3,942 (Bears single-season record) |
| Passing Touchdowns | 27 |
| Interceptions | 7 |
| Rushing Attempts | 77 |
| Rushing Yards | 388 |
| Rushing Touchdowns | 3 |
Williams set a franchise passing record in his second NFL season and first under Johnson. He did it while adapting to a new system, a retooled receiving corps, and a head coach who by his own admission wasn’t sure what he was getting when he took the job.
What’s Driving Williams Now
Johnson also touched on the mentality Williams brings to the building — not just the tape.
“He sees it like a challenge, like he’s going to be ready for the opportunity — that’s what’s really cool about him,” Johnson said. “But then there are some things that you really have to stay on him about, drill it 100 times.”
That’s not blind praise. Johnson is still coaching him hard. He’s just coaching a player he now trusts will take it the right way.
Why It Matters Heading Into Saturday
The Bears won the NFC North last season, and the pressure this year isn’t about proving they belong — it’s about proving last year wasn’t a ceiling. Chicago opens its preseason schedule against the Browns on Saturday at Soldier Field, the first live look at Williams and Johnson’s offense since the calendar flipped to 2026.
None of this is confirmation of anything beyond what Johnson said in the room. It’s one coach’s public read on his quarterback, delivered on the record. But for a Bears team trying to build sustained credibility rather than a one-year bounce, having the head coach publicly close the book on his own early skepticism is the kind of signal that carries weight heading into the season.
