In his short time as head coach of the Chicago Bears, Ben Johnson has made it clear that he's not here to make friends; he's here to win. His semi-feud with Green Bay Packers coach Matt LaFleur has made for some great entertainment, and you have to wonder if Jacksonville Jaguars coach Liam Coen is the latest on his list.
Coen made headlines this week for taking a subtle shot at quarterback Caleb Williams for the attention he's received, compared to the Jaguars, who have flown under the radar, during an appearance on 1010 XL-AM in Jacksonville.
“You don’t have to make up the fire,” Coen said. “You don’t have to make it up. It’s given to us every day. It’s a gift from the heavens. I just go pull out of my phone, look up the NFL Network web site
and just pop it up here and I’m curious if I see any photos, or anything, about the Jacksonville Jaguars. I think I’ll just scroll right on through.
“I think I’ll see 40 pictures of Caleb Williams and I won’t see a single thing about any of players on here. So it’s beautiful … I’m going to tell these guys how much you all think they suck, and we’ll keep going.”
Williams had the perfect reaction, choosing to share the post on his socials and use it as even more motivation in his collection of criticisms. And his head coach echoed the sentiment when asked about it during his press conference on Friday morning, making it clear that Chicago hasn't gone without criticism this offseason.
"Well, we’re the No. 1 regression candidate so … I think we’ve got plenty of motivation ourselves," Johnson said. "We talked about Caleb in the past. He’s used to handling a lot of attention, so I’m not worried about that."
Johnson has had the perfect approach to his second season as head coach, looking at the 2026 season as a clean slate despite last season's impressive success. Now, Johnson and Williams have a chance to stick it to Coen as the Bears host the Jaguars on Dec. 6 at Soldier Field.
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This article originally appeared on Bears Wire: Ben Johnson responds to Liam Coen's comments on Bears' Caleb Williams
