One year after parting from Matt Eberflus, the truth about Caleb Williams’ development is harder to ignore. DH

The Bears quarterback has led wins in eight of nine weeks but basics like his passing mechanics continue to hold back the consistency of the offense.

It will be a year ago on Thanksgiving when the Bear reached the height of their frustration under former coach Matt Eberflus.

How things have changed for the team, although they haven’t completely improved much individually for quarterback Caleb Williams.

Williams sees the team totally unified now even while it seems they’re waiting on him to conquer throwing inaccuracy.

“I’ve spoken on it multiple times now; it’s the belief,” Williams said. “When you have a certain amount of belief between all three phases, from the players and special teams, defense and offense, that belief becomes contagious.

“That’s something that Ben (Johnson) has provided in us and the other coaches have provided in us and instilled in us, is that belief, and in the coaches. You have belief in the coaches. Obviously, we believe in each other out there, but you have belief in your coaches and in between the players, you can do a lot in the field. We’re coming out with these wins.”

Obviously, these recent ones have been a little bit closer than we wanted to be, but that’s what the NFL is. We’re going to keep growing and try and focus on winning games.”

The mechanics of success

It might be easier if he could get his passing mechanics ironed out, though. At 59.2% for the season and after completing less than half (10 of 21) in the first half last week, he has determined it’s all about his fundamentals.

“I was exactly where I should have been in the sense of dropping back and all of this,” Williams said. “I think my base got a little wide and my legs weren’t fully under me yet early in the game for some reason.”

How he solves this is pretty boring and pretty basic.

“Just doing a better job in warmups, making sure that my legs are a little bit more warm if I do ever feel that kind of feeling I felt early in the game and just focus on that,” he said. “And then, other than that, my base got a little wide and things started getting high on me. So just circling back to the small details that go into it.”

Johnson called 18 straight passes Sunday and it wasn’t a bad idea to try to force the bad throws out of him. He completed 9 of 14 in the second half.

Williams said film of all the passes showed him “…I think it was my footwork and just my legs just not being under me.”

Avoiding really big mistakes

It hasn’t been an issue because he has avoided interceptions, with none since they lost against Baltimore. It’s been four-plus games or 152 passes. What really needs to improve is where he places the ball for receivers so they can run with it.

“It’s all about ball location at the end of the day,” offensive coordinator Declan Doyle said. “So we want him to play within the rhythm of what we’re asking him in the concept.”

Williams throws numerous off-platform or even side-armed passes in every game. It’s not easy to be accurate this way.

“At times there are going to be off platform throws where there’s a guy in your face or you’re on the move or something like that,” Doyle said. “You’re trying to limit those as best you can with the protection, being clean and giving him a pocket to operate from.

“Yet at the same point in time, that’s why he’s a guy that gets taken first overall is, he does have the ability to play from some different arm slots. That’s something that every snap it’s, again, it’s different. We want to try to eliminate the variation there, and yet if he has to step up and make a funny body throw, the biggest thing is that the ball location is premium.”

Staying in the pocket

Trying  to keep Williams in the pocket and on time with throws is probably a lost cause because he has been playing this way his whole career. It led to the strip-sack he took Sunday. But they can curtail some is inclination to escape and throw.

“When you have special talents as players, you don’t always want to rely on that,” Williams said. “You want to focus on the small details. You want to focus on the execution. You want to focus on what you were taught, what you’ve learned, what’s been instilled in you throughout the whole process, and let the talent come out when it’s needed.

“That’s always going to happen when it needs to happen. I think that’s what I’ve been harping on for myself. Let those plays happen, and I’ll have a counter for everything if those moments happen. That’s something that I harp on for myself. Just get the ball out. Protect the O-linemen, get the ball out. Give a good runner’s ball so that receivers can go be explosive, because we have special, talented players when they get the ball in the hands, not including myself. Just being able to try and be the point guard. Then, when it’s time to go make plays, time to go win the game, go win.”

It’s been a year since Eberflus and in this season, Williams is completing more big pass plays, but the wildness remains. He’s at the same interception level with four on the year after six all last year but his completion percentage is more than 3% wors than his 62.5% of last year.

Fortunately for the Bears, everything else with the team looks dramatically improved.