The next step for Bears QB Caleb Williams: winning on the road, even if it's close to home
An hour or two before the Bears kicked off in London, coach Matt Eberflus asked quarterback Caleb Williams how he was feeling.
“He goes, ‘Man, I’m spinning it today,’” Eberflus said “I asked why and he goes, ‘There’s no wind.’”
When you play your home games on the blustery lakefront, other stadiums, be they domed or open-air, foreign or domestic, can feel luxurious by comparison.
Williams’ two losses this season, though, have been in the Bears’ only true road games. That’s the latest in a series of narratives the rookie quarterback has a chance to change Sunday. It's his biggest test of the season — a game at the five-win Commanders, Williams’ hometown team, with his friends and family watching.
It will be Williams’ homecoming. The Commanders’ stadium is only 10 miles from the apartment on 77 H Street NW, where Williams lived on his own while attending Gonzaga College High School a block away.
“I've used all my tickets,” he said with a smile. “And for the people that are coming, I'm excited, for sure.”
As always, the Bears bring the baggage of the past with them. In their last 20 road games against winning teams, they’re 1-19, with the outlier being a 2021 Week 5 victory against a distracted 3-1 Raiders team. The next day, Raiders coach Jon Gruden resigned following an email scandal.
To win on the road Sunday, the Bears will need Williams to play better than he did in Houston and Indianapolis. Williams went 56-for-89 for 537 yards, two touchdowns, four interceptions and a 68.4 passer rating in Weeks 2 and 3. The Bears averaged four yards per play.
In the Bears’ home games — and London was one, both technically and in spirit — Williams has gone 74-for-110 for 780 yards, seven touchdowns, one interception and a 105.1 passer rating. The Bears averaged 5.1 yards per play.
Eberflus didn’t put much stock in Williams’ road performances this season — “We’re talking about a small sample size here at the beginning of his career,” he said — and simply stressed the value of improvement. Williams has done plenty of that since his last road game in Week 3.
“He’s a few weeks away from that right now,” Eberflus said. “So he’s in a good spot.”
His teammates think so too.
“His struggles came in Houston and Indy as you've seen, we've all seen, and he's bounced back and been on a roll since,” receiver DJ Moore said. “So I think hopefully he got that out of the way.
“He'll just go stay on this roll.”
A Bears offense that scuffled to start the season has been creative, varied and effective since. The Bears averaged 18.5 points per game in Weeks 1-2 and 27.8 points in Weeks 3-6.
Williams has had four different leading receivers in terms of yards in six games: tight end Cole Kmet, wide receiver Rome Odunze, running back D’Andre Swift and Moore.
“He’s been able to do a really good job of mixing it up in terms of who he’s going to week-to-week — targets with this guy, or targets with that guy, especially situationally,” Eberflus said.
If playing a home is an added motivation, Williams isn’t saying. He wasn’t lacking focus in the first place.
“Caleb is such an elite competitor,” offensive coordinator Shane Waldron said. “His focus and his drive is being the best he can be at his position and knowing the sky is the limit for that final outcome when it is all said and done.
“What drives Caleb every day is to be great, and he works at it. … The results I think will speak for themselves as time goes on.”
What has made Williams’ rookie season so satisfying to watch has been the way the Bears have identified weaknesses for him to work on — and how quickly he’s improved them. When he needed to check the ball down more against the Colts, he did, throwing for 363 yards. When he needed to go deep more, he threw for five completions of 25 yards more against the Panthers. When he needed to use his legs against the Jaguars’ man defense, he ran for 56 yards.
Now comes the next step — winning on the road.