Among the NFL’s heirloom teams, the Chicago Bears are one of those still alive from the last century; the pride of the league’s founding father, George “Papa Bear” Halas. From their neoclassical stadium to their dogged tribute to their 101-year-old owner mother and the “Bear Weather” (ie: just other team), everything about the franchise is old school. The fact that the Bears are even in a position to select a quarterback with the first pick in this month’s draft comes nearly 30 years too late in a league dominated by the passing game. What’s noticeable is that the passerby isn’t 1940s comeback hero Sid Luckman, a Harvard guy, or some other statuesque golden boy. This is quarterback Caleb Williams, the poster boy for Generation Z.
On paper, Williams appears to have exactly the resume that said family matriarch Virginia McCaskey might describe as “the cat’s pajamas.” He went to USC, a college football program that many Notre Dame fans in Chicagoland at least respect. He won the Heisman trophy, putting him in the same league as the Bears’ first two-way star, Johnny Lujack. And Williams played most of his college games at the L.A. Memorial Coliseum, one of the few stadiums that could rival Soldier Field’s antiquity; so there should be no snobbery about the patchy quality of the Bears’ natural home turf.
Relating to: Bears to Jets: Teams that should round out this year’s NFL draft
The problem is that paper is a relic of the analog world, the world the Bears once dominated, where they won eight championships before the Super Bowl era. Williams, on the other hand, is a product of our constantly online age. Tom Brady wasn’t even born when he was drafted and was marching to the beat of his own drum. The 22-year-old has been preparing himself for the games by listening to John Legend’s Ordinary People, which is not Zoomer at all, which is… a choice. She pushes the boundaries of fashion and strikes an infamous pose for GQ in a red dress, white gym socks and sneakers. This did not sit well with old-school football fans. “I’m not taking him with my No. 1 pick,” a Barstool sports commentator said on TikTok. “I’m not even going to explain it. I’m trading the pick.”
And when Williams arrived at a USC women’s basketball game this month with her nails painted to match her pink iPhone and wallet, keyboard enthusiasts lost their minds once again. Some speculated this as a sign that Williams might be gay and therefore unfit to be. the face of an NFL franchise. (Leave aside the fact that Williams has a girlfriend and also Carl Nassib about how few people care about the sexuality of professional football players.) “The most important qualities of a leader are to be confident, to be self-assured, to be brave and to take care of everyone. “I want to follow you,” NFL Network’s Kyle Brandt said defending Williams.
Like many modern exemplars of masculinity, Williams often paints his nails for an extra touch of flair, and sometimes gives subtle messages to his rivals. Fuck UTAHBut his letter for a 2022 game against the Utes was less subtle, and Williams was doomed to disgrace after leaving USC without ever beating the Utes. Bears legend Jim McMahon’s headbands mocking commissioners seem quaint by comparison.
Williams isn’t just disrespectful. He’s irrepressible, taking to social media to dunk on writers who dare suggest to him “never experienced any negativity” – which is a way of suggesting that they are playing against the Black athlete stereotype. Williams was also among the first college football stars to utilize the transfer portal; He clearly moved from Oklahoma to USC to continue developing under coach Lincoln Riley, while also starting to prepare for the pro game under former Arizona Cardinals head man QB whisperer Kliff Kingsbury. currently running the Washington Commanders offense. Until a few months ago, there was speculation that Williams was tying his fate with Kingsbury and D.C. (his hometown franchise with the second pick in this year’s draft). More A more likely landing spot than Chicago, where he allegedly has no interest in playing.
All of this has deepened Bears fans’ devotion to quarterback Justin Fields, whom the team drafted 11th overall just three years ago. When Chicago hosted Atlanta on New Year’s Eve, 62,000 fans at Chicago’s Soldier Field chanted “We want the Fields” as they led the Bears to a 37-17 victory. The road leading to the Bears’ suburban practice facility was lined with campaign signs reading “In Justin We Trust.” But in March, Chicago shipped Fields to Pittsburgh, essentially making room to bring in Williams; In fact, it makes Fields, the typical young football player with something to prove, seem like an old curmudgeon.
Williams could have turned pro at the end of the Heisman season in 2022, but opted to stay in school to avoid being drafted first overall by Carolina from Clampetts to the Astor-like Bears. (Who wouldn’t say that wasn’t the right decision, given the mess the team was in last season?) He was criticized for the decision, and it was taken on the advice of his father Carl; It is worth noting right away that his son, who is already the top NIL winner in university sports, will be motivated by more than money. In fact, rumors last July that Carl had asked prospective managers if they were comfortable negotiating ownership stakes with NFL teams were all but confirmed by league owners voting to ban “non-family employees” from receiving equity in teams. “It would almost be better not to be drafted at all than to be drafted first,” Carl told GQ in February. “The system is completely backwards”
Since then, league insiders have viewed Carl as a bad influence — which is no surprise, considering the NFL draft is essentially a terrible TV show about Black fatherlessness. And to many armchair pundits, Zoomer’s son seems as out of place in the Bears as a 90-inch plasma screen in a Victorian living room (above the fireplace, Rembrandt’s once pride of place); Some are afraid of Williams. in fact, the USC lab project could turn out to be as big a bust as Todd Marinovich.
If Williams is viewed as deeply flawed, it’s because there’s little to criticize about his actual talent. He was touted repeatedly throughout his college career as the second coming of Patrick Mahomes, who was adept at staging plays in preparation and improvising when things fell apart. Like Mahomes, Williams can make every throw you can think of and very few that you can’t; or, as one scout told them, he could make the “Goddammit” shot. As the draft approached, pro talent evaluators began comparing him to Aaron Rodgers — another QB known for, ahem, doing things differently and with whom the Bears are incredibly familiar.
Maybe a decade ago, when Bears football was still built around bell-runners, heroic linebackers and other Midway Monsters, they would have been the last team to have the best draft of pass rushers in generations, let alone those of Black and Native American ancestry. . (Some Bears fans are old enough to remember how black stars like Vince Evans and Kordell Stewart were little different from the team’s broader support.)
But while football fans outside Chicago weren’t looking, the Bears did something many thought would never be possible: they evolved. They stopped letting family members run the franchise or take over the hot young GM candidate and handed the reins to Chiefs’ front office grinder Ryan Poles — who, incidentally, was also Black. (EgadsWhat would Papa Bear be? to think!) The Poles have been given unprecedented authority to strip the team of Fields and other popular players and rebuild it around new faces like Williams and Keenan Allen, a confident player who arrived via a trade with the Los Angeles Chargers last month. It’s as if the Poles knew what they were looking for in a championship team; It’s something Bears fans haven’t experienced since Mike Ditka and Buddy Ryan were sidelined after a nearly perfect 1985 season.
Most encouraging thing: Williams, despite reports to the contrary, just request Being in Chicago; he didn’t hesitate to laugh weird clothes fans think he might wear it on draft day. “Wait; You’ll see my draft casual suit and lady’s dress,” she wrote in response to an outfit guess with cover art evocative of the geisha from Young Thug’s 2016 mixtape.
The world may not be ready for a supremely self-possessed, perception-changing star QB. However, the league’s most narrow-minded team was able to come this far by adhering to tradition. Williams is at least guiding them to the closest point to the future.