Caleb Williams‘ Sam Darnold Score: 3/10. Williams is on much steadier ground now than he was coming off a somewhat spotty rookie year. For his sophomore effort, Williams won 11 games while throwing for 3,942 yards and compiling a 27:7 TD-to-INT ratio. That’s the kind of season you want to see out of a No. 1 overall pick. The trick will be performing like that again, hopefully many more times, until he’s 15 years into a Hall of Fame track. Then Bears fans will be able to breathe a little.
Do they have a Dark Side? In Johnson’s first year at the helm, Chicago averaged 5.7 yards per play and ranked ninth in EPA per play (0.03) on offense. That might not look like much compared with what Johnson put up in his three years running the show in Detroit (the Lions averaged 5.9 yards per play or better in 2022-24, while finishing fourth, fourth and second in EPA per play, respectively), but it was downright revolutionary for the Bears, who last topped 5.5 yards per play in 2016, under the three-headed QB monster of Jay Cutler, Matt Barkley and Brian Hoyer. The offensive line is a concern, but if Johnson can keep things cooking in Year 2, this could be an attack that pushes Chicago into the upper reaches of the NFC standings again.
Who is their Seahawks-ian building block? Montez Sweat, Edge. Sweat might be even more of a Williams-type acquisition than Williams was. When the ‘Hawks traded for Williams in 2023, they were about to begin a 4-6 slide that knocked them out of the playoffs. When the Bears acquired Sweat from Washington in October of 2023, they were 2-6 and still far from relevance — or, frankly, having an obvious pressing need for a costly (in terms of draft compensation and, eventually, an extension) mid-career pass rusher. But Sweat made an immediate difference, and when the stakes got suddenly higher last season, he was already in position to give the Bears a 10-sack effort. He’s a great example of a groundwork-laying piece who comes aboard before the final vision comes into focus.
Bottom line: Are the Bears too good already to make this list? The results from 2025 say yes, but the previous 12 years say no. Between Lovie Smith’s last season (2012) and Johnson’s first, Chicago went 76-110, with two winless playoff appearances. There is enough youth in the mix, and the defense is worrisome enough, that the Bears might end up being a popular candidate to regress in 2026. But if the defense tightens up and Johnson’s offense helps the team win double-digit games in back-to-back seasons, it won’t be crazy to think back to the Super Bowl ceiling of the last Chicago team to pull that off, back in 2006.
