We have yet another terrible Caleb Williams hot take. It's tough to keep up with all of the articles and sound bites being released about Williams, all of which have the same intent: clicks and downloads.
This time, it's from Sports Illustrated's Matt Verderame, who suggested in his recap of the Bears-Bills practice that Chicago -- specifically coach Ben Johnson -- is running out of time to get Williams on track.
No, you didn't misread that. The level of panic about Williams suggested by Verderame despite Bears starters yet to take the field in an actual game (including a preseason game) is... shocking.
"Ben Johnson has 23 days to clean up his offense," Verderame wrote.
Twenty-three days? Sure, the Chicago Bears kick off their season against the Minnesota Vikings on Monday Night Football in just over three weeks. But any suggestion that the Bears' offense will be clean and hitting on all cylinders is laughable.
"At some point, Johnson has to get Williams playing better," Veraderame wot, "and right now, the only thing consistent about the Bears’ first-team offense is that it wasn’t operating like a quality unit."
Ben Johnson clarified Caleb Williams, Bears' timeline on offense
Even coach Johnson suggested on Friday that the transition from what the Bears are to what they will eventually become will take time.
He leaned on his experience with the Detroit Lions as an example.
"The learning process, knowing where you start is not going to be where you finish, and making sure we don't bite off more than we can chew here at this point," Johnson said. "We just want to see these guys go out there, play clean football and play fast."
Johnson has a plan. He has a timeline. It won't be influenced by the media, even if the noise gets louder by the day.
It's crazy that we're at this point. Caleb Williams had a solid rookie season. He had the fifth-most single-season passing yards in Bears history. He played mistake-free football and set an NFL rookie record for the most consecutive throws without an interception. Yet, he's become an easy target, even though he's done nothing to warrant it since the final pass of his rookie year.
If Caleb Williams plays well in Sunday's preseason game against the Buffalo Bills, most of this noise will quiet down. At least, it should. But the analytics don't lie. And as long as negative Williams content clicks, it will be published.
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