Caleb’s Close-Up, Part 4: Under Pressure

This is part four of a six-part series.

• In part one, we saw that Caleb Williams was generally an above-average passer during the 2025 season.
• Part two revealed that struggles with accuracy were his largest weakness, but that improved significantly late in the season.
• We saw in part three that Caleb was great at setting up scramble drill situations, but the Bears have to take better advantage of those opportunities.

Today, we’re going to look at how often Caleb was pressured in 2025, and who was most commonly to blame.

The table below shows how frequently every position was blamed for giving up pressure on the QB. Williams’ stats are shown, with context provided by giving his rank compared to 32 NFL QBs with 250+ pass attempts, plus the best, average, and worst marks for that sample. Any values in the top 25% are highlighted in green, while those in the bottom 25% are highlighted in red.

All data comes from Pro Football Focus (PFF) unless otherwise noted.

A few thoughts:

• Overall, Caleb was pressured at the 10th lowest rate, which is solid. We saw in part 1, however, that he was sacked at the 4th lowest rate, which is appreciably better and speaks to how well he avoided pressure.
  • Only 11% of his pressures turned into sacks, which was the 3rd best mark in the NFL.
  • This was a huge improvement from his 28% pressure to sack rate as a rookie (2nd worst in the NFL). This was easily Williams’ biggest growth from year 1 to year 2; he literally went from one of the NFL’s worst to one of the NFL’s best in one offseason.
• It’s worth noting the positive impact health had on Chicago’s OL in 2025, as 4 of the 5 spots (all but LT) saw one player play at least 93% of the snaps. That marked a huge difference from 2024, when only 2 offensive lineman played more than 65% of the snaps and 10 players saw 100 or more snaps.
  • In general, OL depth is more important than most realize, as only 4 NFL teams saw one OL combination play 65% of their offensive snaps or more in 2025.
  • It’s hard to evaluate Chicago’s OL depth based on 2025, because they didn’t play much, but the chances are good they will be needed in 2026.
• Now for the individual positions, let’s start with the good, as there were several bright spots on the offensive line:
  • LG Joe Thuney is really, really good. There’s a reason he was a 1st-team All Pro and named the NFL’s protector of the year.
  • RT Darnell Wright also had a breakthrough season and was one of the NFL’s best pass protectors.
  • RG Jonah Jackson had the best year of pass protection in his career after consistently being a sub-par pass protector for several prior seasons.
• Now for the areas that didn’t fare so well:
  • Williams was blamed for inviting pressures on himself at a slightly above-average rate, but this isn’t anything to worry about.
    • As we’ve previously noted in the series, Williams holds the ball a long time, and this will naturally invite pressure. It’s not a problem unless it turns into sacks, which it didn’t.
    • QBs who were responsible for pressure on themselves more frequently than Williams include Justin Herbert, Drake Maye, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Jordan Love, and Bo Nix, so this clearly isn’t a problem.
  • Center Drew Dalman grading out poorly was something of a surprise here, as he was generally considered to be quite good in 2025 (Pro Bowl berth and PFF’s 5th highest-graded C). This is where context is needed, as these numbers reflect nothing about what the assignment for each blocker was in a given play.
    • Bears on Taps’ Quinten Krzysko (who you should definitely follow on X) does great OL breakdowns for the Bears, and said Dalman was better in pass protection than he expected. He noted two factors that made Dalman’s job particularly difficult:
      • Dalman got less help from LG than most C because Thuney was consistently shading his help towards LT, which was easily the OL’s weakest position.
      • When RG Jonah Jackson gets beat, it tended to be on his inside shoulder, which is towards the center.
      • Add these together, and Dalman both had to cover more to the right than is typical and got less help from the left than is typical, giving him a more challenging assignment than most C.
  • The other trouble spot, which should be no surprise to anybody, is left tackle. The Bears rotated through three players here, and it’s worth noting the different results each saw in pass protection:
    • Braxton Jones: 9 snaps/pressure (136 pass blocking snaps)
    • Theo Benedet: 13 snaps/pressure (329 pass blocking snaps)
    • Ozzy Trapilo: 19 snaps/pressure (282 pass blocking snaps)
    • The aforementioned Quinten Krzysko told me that all three players received more help than is typical, so Jones and Benedet being so far worse than average (15 snaps/pressure) is particularly troubling. Krzysko mentioned Benedet in particular got more help in pass protection than any other OL when he was playing.
    • It really is a shame that Trapilo got hurt, because he was playing at a solid level. Based on Ryan Poles’ comments this offseason, the Bears aren’t counting on him for 2026. We can only hope he returns to pre-injury form in 2027.
• Looking outside the OL, TEs were blamed for pressures at an above-average rate, though it’s worth noting this could be something of a small sample size.
  • Bears TEs were blamed for 9 total pressures on the season, and while this was the 3rd highest mark in the NFL, it’s still a pretty small number.
  • It could simply mean that more was asked of Chicago’s TEs in pass protection than many other teams, as this was one way the Bears helped out their LT throughout the year.

Of course, the Bears made moves at both C and LT this offseason, so let’s look at the new options there to see what can reasonably be expected:

• At LT, the Bears re-signed Braxton Jones and added Jedrick Wills in free agency. Both players are coming off serious 2024 injuries that impacted their 2025 availability, so it’s worth taking a look at their past histories.
  • As mentioned above, Jones posted an atrocious 9 snaps/pressure in 2025, but his leg never looked right after a late 2024 injury. Prior to the injury, he was at 18 snaps/pressure in 2024, which would be a solidly above-average, and had 13 snaps/pressure in 2023, which would be a sub-par but not catastrophic performance.
  • Wills missed the entire 2025 season due to a knee injury suffered late in 2024. Prior to that injury, he was enjoying the best season of his career, with an average 15 snaps/pressure mark. He was at 11 snaps/pressure in 2023.
  • The Bears’ hope is that one of these players can return to their pre-injury 2024 form in 2026 and give them adequate LT play. It’s not realistic to expect anything more than that, but even getting average play for the low cost the Bears are paying (which is far from a guarantee) would be a big win.
  • If neither can recover, Benedet is a possible fallback option. He was a terrible pass blocker in 2025, with no injury excuse to blame, but it was his first NFL action, so maybe he improves a bit with another offseason.
• At C, the Bears traded for Garrett Bradbury, who posted a sub-par 32 snaps/pressure mark as New England’s starter in 2025.
  • This was actually the best mark Bradbury has posted recently, as his 2024 (18 snaps/pressure) and 2023 (26 snaps/pressure) seasons in Minnesota were markedly worse. There’s a reason Bradbury was available for only a future 5th round pick.
  • It should be fully expected that Bradbury struggles in pass coverage, but this likely ripples out to the rest of the offensive line as well. As noted above, Dalman had to frequently help protect the RG’s inside shoulder while receiving little help from the left since the LG was helping LT. If Bradbury can’t handle that, the Bears will have to adjust their protection schemes, and Jonah Jackson and/or the LT could be more exposed. Head coach Ben Johnson recently hinted at the Bears potentially changing what they do on the OL due to the new C.
  • In addition to being a sub-par starter, Bradbury will also be 31 by training camp and is on an expiring contract, so I fully expect Chicago to draft a center at some point in the draft later this month, possibly higher than many fans expect.

Lessons Learned

In case you got lost in all the words, here are the main takeaways from today:

• A combination of good health and a few standout performers made Chicago’s pass protection good (but not great) in 2025, but Caleb Williams’ sack avoidance was equally responsible for Chicago’s extremely low sack rate.
• Left tackle is a huge question mark for 2026, with the Bears needing one of Braxton Jones or Jedrick Wills to return to pre-injury 2024 form to have any chance at getting adequate play at the position.
• New C Garrett Bradbury is a significant downgrade in pass protection from recently retired Drew Dalman, which could have ripple effects on the entire OL that make life harder for weak links Jonah Jackson and whoever starts at LT.