Another Bears Number Looms for Caleb Williams to Fix Against Patriots

It's easy to nitpick with numbers six games into a season, and no doubt fantasy football owners who have Colston Loveland or Luther Burden have done this, but the Bears' overall passing production has one big number sticking out in need of correction starting tonight against New England.

It's not their average air yards on attempts or completions or any of the other silly analytical numbers being thrown about to reflect how short Caleb Williams is actually throwing the ball. The reason his air yards are down is exactly the same reason they're down for Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes, and no one comments about his targeting.

Mahomes is actually below Williams in completed air yards per attempt. Williams is at 3.4 and Mahomes 3.3. Yet, Mahomes and the Chiefs are unbeaten and no one is mocking his target choices.

The number that needs fixing for the Bears is five, as in only five Bears touchdown passes in six games. The Bears are fifth in passing offense but only 27th in TD passes. Go figure.

The Bears have had only three TD passes since the season opener and this is their real problem because the other analytical target number simply reflects how teams defend the Bears and where Williams decides to go with the ball. It's why Mahomes is so low, too. Defenses are refusing to give up that deep strike and he's just giving them punishment underneath. The same is true for Williams.

Red zone TD passing was an issue

Part of the Bears' low TD pass total is reflected in their overall problem scoring TDs in the red zone, but more of their trouble simply came as a result of switching quarterbacks five times already in six games.

Continuity is off when this happens. Different QBs have their eyes in different places.

Last week's TD catch by Colston Loveland announcing Williams' return to the lineup as an off-platform passer was a difficult one to achieve because the second-year tight end took an unpenalized shot to the head and neck area but still held it. The red zone TD plays shouldn't be so hard to accomplish, and offensive coordinator Press Taylor said there were other opportunities missed.

"I thought we actually missed a throw to Colston there on one side and then we also get an off-schedule scramble play that results in a touchdown as well for us," Taylor said.

Before the Falcons game, the problem number that stood out for the Bears was 32nd, as in last in the NFL in red zone offense. They quickly remedied this with 4-for-5 TDs and moved all the way up to 22nd.

Williams' passing efficiency in the red zone is not as high as it needs to be, but it's still top half of the league among starters for completion percentage both inside the 20 and inside the 10. He's at 60% (9 of 15) inside the 20 and 57.1% inside the 10 (4 of 7).

It was the passing of the backup QBs that dragged down the Bears' offense in the red zone.

Case Keenum completed 42.9% inside the 10 (3 of 7) and 50% inside the 20 (5 of 10). Tyson Bagent was only 1-for-5 inside the 10 (20%) and 33.3% inside the 20 (4 of 12).

The fix is in already

Those were lost opportunities and the offense would no doubt look far more productive with a few more TDs on those chances.

Basically, all the Bears need is a lot more Caleb Williams and for the entire offense to start operating more like Johnson intended with the running game/passing game mix minus penalties. Getting back Kyle Monangai would help here, as well.

Put all of it together and secondaries will need to start coming up or gambling more and the deeper routes will open more.

Then the attack would look more like it did in the season opener, when they put up 59 points on the road against a team now leading its division. No doubt the fantasy football people who had Bears receivers would be happier.

And no one worries about how far the ball has been going downfield when a team is scoring 59 or is unbeaten, because where it's usually ending up is in the end zone.