The Chicago Bears quarterback, Caleb Williams, has faced high expectations throughout his football career, from winning the Heisman Trophy at USC to being selected as number 1 in the 2024 draft. Last season, the player failed to achieve the goals he had set for himself, which influenced his performance. This led Williams, 23 years old, to publicly express his ambitions for 2025, including throwing for 4,000 yards and completing 70% of his passes. Despite these ambitious goals and the expectation of becoming Chicago’s franchise quarterback, Williams claimed not to feel external pressure to fulfill those promises. “Pressure isn’t something for me,” Williams said on ESPN 1000’s “Waddle & Silvy” show. “I don’t look at it that way.” Williams added that his focus is on his work and the team’s performance, without worrying about external opinions. In his rookie season, Williams threw for 3,541 yards, 20 touchdowns, and 6 interceptions, positioning himself as the fifth-best performance by a Bears quarterback in a single season. Reaching 4,000 yards in 2025 would make him the first quarterback in franchise history to achieve it.
Although he will have to wait until September to start working on that goal, the quarterback possibly had his best practice of training camp on Thursday, where the unplanned moments served as a learning ground for Bears coach Ben Johnson.
Coach Johnson praised Williams’ growth during the first eight days of training. “He knows what’s coming, and we’re getting to the point where I don’t even have to say much,” Johnson said. “He’s as hard on himself as I am on him, and he gets disappointed when we’re not running the plays in the meeting like we should or we’re not taking the right fall or our eyes aren’t in the right place.” “It’s getting to that point where it’s more self-correction, and we’re off and running from there. I’m very excited about his mental state,” he concluded.
