I usually try to publish my impressions of the Bears at the end of preseason. But here we are, in week 5, the Bears are taking an early bye week, and I'm just now getting around to writing the first blog post about them this season. This is mostly due to the fact that I really haven't been able to tell what to make of the Bears yet, under first-year head coach Ben Johnson. It's been a wild, up-and-down start to the season.

The Bears looked unstoppable offensively, in the 2nd preseason game. They cruised up and down the field, everything seemed to work, and they crushed the Buffalo Bills. But the Bills weren't playing many (if any) of their starters. So ... good for you ... I guess? Your first-string unit playing a heavily-scripted gameplan steamrolled the Bills' 2nd team unit running basic coverages. It was really hard to judge the Bears after that game.

Perhaps, if the first unit played similarly well against the Chiefs' defensive starters in the following week, then I could get excited. But that didn't happen. The Bears looked sloppy and had trouble moving the ball against a Chiefs team that was playing most of its defensive starters. So that was worrisome...

The Bears did manage to win both of those games (and tie their preseason opener against the Dolphins, in which neither team played any starters). So I guess the preseason at least showed that the Bears' backups can likely be counted on in a pinch. That's something.

Photo credit: Ashlee Rezin, Sun-Times.

Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams have had a rough start to their first year together.

Then the regular season started, and the first 2 weeks did not look good. The Bears got off to an early lead against the Vikings on Monday Night in the opening week, only to melt down in the second half and loose the game. Then week 2 happened. The Lions absolutely crushed their former offensive coordinator's new team, 52-21. The offense looked bad, and the defense looked worse. Could it be that Johnson and his staff did not know how to coach and call a defensive game? If so, that's really bad, because the offense wasn't looking very good either. You would hope that an offensive-minded coach would at least move the ball and score a lot of points, even if their defense is giving up a lot of points. But you aren't going to win many games if you give up 52, no matter how good your offense is.

The Bears have been on a roll in the offseason for the past few years. First, was pulling off the blockbuster trade in 2023 to get D.J. Moore from the Panthers, and their 2024 1st round draft pick. That 2024 pick turned into the #1 overall pick in 2024, which the Bears used to draft Caleb Williams (along with their own 9th overall pick, in which they drafted Rome Odunze). Now, in 2025, they managed to sign Ben Johnson (perhaps the most sought-after head coaching prospect in 2025). They also walked away from the free agency signing period with a revamped offensive line that should give Caleb Williams much better interior protection in 2025.

The Ben Johnson hire, by itself, was enough for many people to crown the Bears "offseason champs" for the third year running. But I was a bit hesitant. I was hoping that they would get the trifecta of also having an exceptional draft. And my definition of "exceptional draft" was to somehow manage to select Boise State running back Ashton Jeanty. Jeanty was a controversial topic among Bears fans. Conventional wisdom says that drafting a running back early in the first round is a waste of draft capital. But I think this is wrong for 3 reasons.

Photo credit: Boise State Football.

I was 1 thousand percent on the Ashton Jeanty bandwagon.

The case for drafting a running back (named Ashton Jeanty)

The first is that the NFL is changing. It isn't the "passing league" that it was for most of the 2000's and 2010's. Passing production has tapered off for the past few years, and even elite quarterbacks like Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Matt Stafford are struggling to put up 300 yards and more than 1 or 2 TDs on a week-to-week basis. In fact, in 2024, not a single QB reached the 5,000 yard mark (Joe Burrow was the top passer, with 4,918 yards). And that is despite the fact that there's a whole extra, 17th game on the schedules now! The reason for this is that defensive coordinators are getting sick of getting torched for 4 or 500 yards and 4 TDs every game. They're building defensive rosters specifically to stop the pass, and are moving away from run-stuffing Cover 3 and Cover 1 schemes in favor of calling a lot of Cover 4 and Cover 2 in order to limit offenses' ability to throw down the field. This has opened up space underneath and lead to a resurgence of elite running backs, with Saquan Barkley having one of the best years of any running back ever, breaking the single-season rushing record (including playoffs) on route to leading the Eagles to a Super Bowl victory.

The second reason is that I firmly believe that teams should prioritize drafting for need, unless there are simply no good options at those needed positions, when your pick comes around. Running back was one of the Bears' top needs this season. Only offensive tackle was arguably a more important need.

Photo credit: AP Photo / David Longstreath.

Jeanty's 2024 season was 2nd only to Barry Sanders.

Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, is that Jeanty was an elite prospect -- possibly a generational one. His 2024 season is 2nd only to Barry Sanders in terms of rushing yards, and he's tied for 7th overall for TDs. The only reason that Ashton Jeanty did not win the Heisman is that Travis Hunter was an ultra-rare 2-way player, who excelled at both offense and defense. I totally understand selecting Hunter for the Heisman, even though my vote would have been for Jeanty. Honestly, I think the committee should have award co-Heisman trophies to both Hunter and Jeanty, due to the unique circumstances surrounding this year's award (having a 2-way player, and a record-book bell-cow running back).

The Bears got the head coach that they wanted, and which (I think) all of us Bears fans expected them to hire. Within a day or 2 of the Lions losing to the Washington Commanders in the divisional round of the playoffs, former Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson signed on to be the Bears' next head coach. This is something that, honestly, should have happened last year. Matt Eberflus' coaching tenure was a train wreck, and as soon as the Bears decided they were going to move on from Justin Fields and draft Caleb Williams, they should have also parted ways with Eberflus. Instead, they repeated the same strategy that has already failed for them twice before: of drafting a new quarterback, who's rookie development would be stunted by a lame duck coaching staff.

Such unbelievably incompetent management!

So are Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams doomed to repeat the failures of John Fox and Mitch Trubisky, along with Matt Nagy and Justin Fields? Obviously, only time will tell.

There are a few positive signs here. Johnson successfully rehabilitated Jered Goff's career after Goff was traded to Detroit. So he does have that history of turning things around for a struggling quarterback. Goff has been fantastic as a Lion (except for that final playoff game). He's been highly efficient, and has been good at protecting the football.

Photo credit: Photo/Paul Sancya / AP.

Ben Johnson has already shown that he can help rehabilitate a struggling quarterback.

A lot of Goff's success can be traced to Johnson's success as a schemer and play-caller. So Bears fans should also have some confidence that the Bears' play-calling, blocking, and route concepts will be much more competent in 2025 and beyond. We hopefully won't see all the schematic failures that we have seen the past few years.

The Bears finally did it! They finally fired Matt Eberflus. This is the first time in the Bears' hundred-plus year history that they fired a head coach during a season. If you ask me, this is long overdue.

Even back in the preseason and early in the regular season, when the Bears were looking pretty good, I was skeptical of the coaching staff. I was surprised that Eberflus survived last year. Back when everyone thought the Bears were tanking the 2023 in order to draft Caleb Williams, I was insistent that tanking and retaining Eberflus would be a bad idea. I'm not going to re-hash that entire rant, but the core thesis is that it is impossible to tell if a team or coaching staff is tanking on purpose, or if they are just bad. In the case of Eberflus and his coaching staff, it looks like they were just bad.

I hate to say this, but I told you so!

Matt Eberflus was fired after multiple controversial losses.

This firing comes on the heels of a heartbreaking loss to the Lions on Thanksgiving day, in which the Bears mis-managed the clock at the end of the game and forfeited their opportunity to stop the clock and kick a game-tying field goal in the final seconds. This capped a 6-game loosing streak in which the Bears gave up a Hail Mary on the final play against the Commanders, and also mis-managed the clock in other games, with an opportunity to tie or win.

The Chicago Bears have seen a turnaround the past few weeks. The Bears started the regular season 1-2, and looked like they might be repeating the same disastrous mistakes that they made with both Mitch Trubisky and Justin Fields. I have not liked Matt Eberflus or his coaching staff these past couple years, and I was hoping that the Bears would look for a new head coach. I feared that when the Bears drafted Caleb Williams, they had drafted a potentially elite quarterback in the last gasp of a lame duck year for the coaching staff. I feared that coaching staff would stunt Williams' development with poor coaching and play-calling. Williams did not look very impressive in the preseason (the backups sure did, though), and he struggled the first few weeks behind awful pass protection, an un-reliable rushing game, and play-calling that failed to put him in situations in which he could succeed and build confidence.

Those days feel like ancient history though. The Bears have now won 3 straight, going into their bye week. Not only are they winning, but they are winning decisively, and looking like a well-rounded powerhouse. Williams is in the top 15 in both passing yards and passing TD. The offense is scoring over 30 points per game in its wins, and the defense is giving up an average of less than 17 points per game. At the same time, they have scores on special teams, and rookie punter Tory Taylor is looking like an instant all-pro.

Photo credit: total apex sports.

Punter Tory Taylor is making life very easy for the defense.

Things seem to be on track.

But "seem" might be the operative word there. I still have concerns.

Those 3 wins came against some of the worst teams in the NFL this year. All 4 of the teams the Bears beat have 1 win each through 6 weeks. In fact, the only 1-win teams that the Bears haven't beat yet are the Patriots and Browns (thought the Bears will have a shot at the Patriots next month). The Texans are the only good team that the Bears have played so far, and they lost a frustrating match against a mediocre Colts team. The good news is that the Bears were at least competitive in those 2 losses, losing both games by a single score.

In any case, the Bears have shown that they can beat up on bad teams, but they have yet to show that they can truly win against Playoff-caliber teams. And that's worrisome, because all of the NFC North is looking like potential playoff teams this year! They will get a chance to prove themselves after their bye, when they will go on the road to play the NFC East-leading Washington Commanders. Then they will have a couple more cupcake games against the Cardinals and Patriots, before starting a brutal gauntlet of a schedule that includes all of their NFC North divisional games, as well as road matchups against the 49ers and a home game against the Seahawks. The Vikings (in particular) are one of the surprise success stories of the league so far, as they remain unbeaten through 6 weeks (5 wins because they already had their bye).

The Bears could very well go into divisional play with a record of 6-3 (or even 7-2), but they will need to at least split those divisional games, and win at least 1 of the non-divisional games against the 49ers or Seahawks, if they want a shot at a wildcard playoff berth. And honestly, I'm not yet convinced that they can do that.