If you want to feel better about the fact that the Chicago Bears are the only NFL team without a 4,000-yard passer in its history, consider that 12 other teams hadn’t seen it happen for them until the new millennium turned around. And some of the league’s best current teams — the Houston Texans, Philadelphia Eagles, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Buffalo Bills, and Seattle Seahawks — didn’t see it for their franchises until the last few years.
The larger point, of course, is that Caleb Williams, who threw
for 3,942 yards in the 2025 regular season — and 4,560 if you include the postseason — is on the verge of getting the Bears off the schneid. Williams is also the man to finally break the Bears’ epic quarterback curse, which started after Sid Luckman and World War II.
How far can the 2026 Bears go with a quarterback of Williams’ caliber? This will be Williams’ second season with Ben Johnson as his head coach and offensive mastermind, and everybody’s pretty psyched about that.
“He’s had two offseasons and one training camp so far, and a full season to where he’s had a lot of the similar concepts repeat for him,” Johnson said of Williams a few days ago. “Now, we’re at the point where he’s not thinking about the play call, he’s not thinking about the cadence, the motion and all the rigmarole before the snap.
“Things are starting to slow down. So, what we need to see here in camp is that anticipation. Take it up a notch. I think with that, the coverage recognition gets taken up another notch. There are other ways we’re going to continue to challenge and push him, more of which are going to happen post-snap. Last year we talked about that pre-snap operation quite a bit. [We] feel a lot better about that this time of year than we did [last summer], so now we’re just moving onto the next stage.”
Williams agrees.
“Plays get more detailed,” the quarterback said of his current work with Johnson. “He’s adding more on my plate of figuring out the coverage before, and having an idea of where I can go with the ball faster and sooner. I haven’t thrown a lot of picks in my career, because I can see the coverage and feel the coverage. It’s a little more detailed from play to play, and specifics within the play, towards the coverage that we are attacking. Then, adding more plays in there so that we can kill, alert and check to these different man checks, Cover-2 checks, single-high or whatever the case may be.
“We are excited about that. I’m excited. The challenge that he’s giving me to be able to take the next step and progress is what I’m most excited about. It’s going to be hard. It’s going to be tough like it is every year. That’s what you embrace, that’s what you enjoy. Because when it shows up on game days and Sundays or whatever day we play on, it’s really rewarding.”
Last season, the 11-6 Bears got as far as the Divisional Round of the playoffs for the first time since 2010, and there’s no reason to assume that they can’t do it again — or go even further in the tournament. If that’s the case, of course, it can’t just be about Johnson and Williams. Everyone on the roster must be at their best, including the lesser-known names.
To that end, I’ve identified three Hidden Gems for the Bears’ new season — one underrated veteran, one underrated free agent, and one underrated draft pick.
Underrated veteran: RB Kyle Monangai
There are times when you watch a draft prospect’s tape, and you then see how the NFL values him, and you tend to wonder what the hell the NFL is thinking. When I saw that the Bears were able to lift Rutgers running back Kyle Monangai with the 235th overall pick in the seventh round of the 2025 draft, I must admit that I thought a lot of pro personnel people had lost their damned minds.
Because what I saw from the 5′ 8¼, 211-pound Monangai made it pretty clear in my mind: Forget about the height. Forget about the 4.6-second 40-yard dash at the combine. This guy is a football player, and I don’t care what anybody says in any other direction.
Monangai proved the point in a rookie season that had him gain 846 yards and score five rushing touchdowns on 190 carries, adding 23 catches on 34 targets for 222 yards. His first start came in Week 9 against the Cincinnati Bengals when D’Andre Swift was out with a groin injury. All Monangai did in that game was to blow up Cincy’s defense to the tune of 176 yards on 26 carries.
“When you come into the building like he does, and have his approach every single day, and it doesn’t matter whether it’s in the meetings or in walkthroughs or practices, you know what you’re going to get,” Johnson said of Monangai last November. “He is a very consistent player. He ran hard; he lowered his pads. I thought that he played some inspiring football for anybody that was watching it, whether you were on the field or on the sidelines. No one was surprised.”
Swift was more succinct, but equally complimentary. “He doesn’t carry himself like a rookie, and he [darn] sure doesn’t play like one.”
Monangai’s high-contact playing style does come with some danger — he’s been dealing with a soft tissue injury in training camp — but when he’s healthy, he will undoubtedly be proving the doubters wrong yet again.
Underrated free agent: LB Devin Bush
Just because you don’t succeed in the NFL right away doesn’t mean that you can’t do so over time. Some players have everything it takes to create legitimate careers, but the growth takes a while. Or, they’re in the wrong systems. Or, trends haven’t quite caught up to what they can do. Or, on and off-field issues get to them for a while.
Take the example of linebacker Devin Bush. The Pittsburgh Steelers selected the 5’11, 234-pound Bush with the 10th overall pick in the 2019 draft out of Michigan, and it never quite worked out. Bush had his moments in Pittsburgh’s defense, but not nearly enough for such a high pick — especially a high pick that the team had to trade first- and second-round picks in 2019, and a third-round pick in 2020, just to take in the first place. The Steelers refused to exercise Bush’s fifth-year option, so he was out after the 2022 season.
Bush signed with the Seattle Seahawks for a nondescript 2023 season, and then, the turnaround started to happen when Bush signed a one-year, $1.5 million contract with the Cleveland Browns in 2024 and had his best season to date under Jim Schwartz. That led to a one-year, $3.25 million contract with the Browns in 2025, whereupon Bush had his best season to date under Schwartz once again.
Last year, Bush totaled 50 solo tackles, 24 stops, seven tackles for loss, a forced fumble, three interceptions, and five pass breakups. He had three more picks than he allowed, and with his two pick-sixes and 164 return yards, Bush was as dangerous an interceptor as you could get in the NFL.
“I’m going into Year 8,” Bush said after the Bears signed him. “Came into this league at 20 years old, so you can kind of say I grew up in this league. I mean, there’s nothing I haven’t seen. Practiced against Big Ben [Roethlisberger] for three years. Played against Aaron Rodgers twice a year for two years. Played against Philip Rivers. I’ve seen a lot of things, been through a lot of different situations.”
And that’s how it kicked in late for Bush, though it certainly has kicked in. Which is why Chicago gave him a three-year, $30 million contract with $21 million guaranteed. The Bears have been talking all offseason about how they want their defense to be faster in 2026, and Bush absolutely fits that initiative.
“His ability to take the air out,” GM Ryan Poles said in March of Bush’s primary attribute. “I mean, when he triggers, he goes. I remember watching him at Michigan. The play style, he plays fast. That helps with range and coverage.
“Again, if you think [of] DA’s [defensive coordinator Dennis Allen’s] system, it’s a perfect fit.”
Underrated draft pick: CB Malik Muhammad
Another new Bear who seems to be a perfect fit in Allen’s system is Texas cornerback Malik Muhammad, who the team selected with the 124th overall pick in the fourth round of the draft. Allen has always preferred big, aggressive cornerbacks in his man/match schemes, and he already has two in Jaylon Johnson and Tyrique Stevenson. The 6’0, 188-pound Muhammad brings more weight to the idea.
“Yeah, for sure,” Bears national scout John Syty said post-draft when he was asked whether Muhammad is a natural fit for what Allen wants his cornerbacks to do. “The speed, and you factor in a little bit of length with that. From a coverage standpoint, obviously that translates to athleticism. So for him, the ability to play man, and stick at top of routes is one of his strengths. And then, continuing with instincts and zone coverage is also a strength of his player. He’s definitely a combo guy that can do a couple different things for us on defense.”
Last season for the Texas Longhorns, Muhammad allowed 21 catches on 35 targets for 168 yards, 87 yards after the catch, one touchdown, two interceptions, two pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 57.8. The versatility is key with Muhammad — last season, he lined up as an outside cornerback on 48% of his snaps, as an overhang defender 41% of the time, in the slot on 9% of his snaps, and the rest of the time as either a box or single-high defender.
Right now, Allen and his coaches may be looking to put Muhammad in as the primary slot defender, and see what happens from there.
“There’s a lot of stuff that goes on at that position,” Allen recently said of the slot. “You know, when you play outside at corner, I don’t want this to seem wrong, but things don’t happen quite as fast. Obviously, the speed of the receivers on the outside edge, you know, that’s coming at you fast. But in terms of when you play inside in the nickel, you’ve got things that are happening on the outside of you, you have things that are happening on the inside of you, you’ve got more responsibility in the run game.
“So there’s just a lot more that goes along with playing that position. Look, the kid’s smart. We’ll give him a look at it and see where he’s at and let the competition throughout the course of training camp kind of play out. And I think, you know, evaluation is something that takes time.”
Muhammad does have the skills to pay those bills — last season when lined up as a slot or overhang defender, he allowed 10 catches on 18 targets for 55 yards, no touchdowns, one interception, one pass breakup, and an opponent passer rating of 38.0. The NFL obviously has its own adjustment period as Allen intimated, but you can expect Muhammad to get a ton of preseason looks.
