Note: Play reviews for this week will not be done, I’m traveling for the holidays and don’t have access to the tools I need to record and overlay information on those recordings. So this weeks recap will be abridged. Play review will be back next week!
Happy victory Thursday, Bears fans! Your Chicago Bears are on their second 4 game winning streak of the season, taking care of business at home with a 31-28 victory over the visiting Pittsburgh Steelers, pushing the Steelers road record against the Bears to just 1-13 all time.
And while it wasn’t pretty early (the first half saw 2 turnover worthy throws and 1 actual turnover that directly resulted in 7 Steelers points), Caleb Williams and the Chicago Bears did the most with their opportunities with the ball on offense. After a stretch of football that saw the Bears turnover the ball in back-to-back possessions, a stretch that I feel like would doom spiral past Bears teams, the offense responded by scoring on 4 of their next 5 possessions, 3 of which were touchdowns as the Bears offense went a perfect 3 for 3 in the redzone this week.
Caleb’s accuracy in the redzone was a big plus this week, with 2 touchdowns coming on tight windows or contested catches, and the 3rd coming off a free play he created with his own cadence (an Aaron Rodgers special!) The touchdown throws were some of my favorite things to see, as it’s showing improvement in an area where the Bears have been a bit lackluster in: redzone touchdown efficiency. They currently sit at 16th in the league scoring a touchdown on just 57.89% of redzone trips. But over the last 3 weeks that number is 77.78%, tied for 3rd in the league.
One of the more interesting things that the tape showed me was just how the Bears changed their offensive gameplan completely this week. In the matter of a week the offense went from a “explosive hunting, extend the play when needed” to “play within the pocket and exploit a good pass rush who maintains good discipline when scrambling with structured offense and quick throws.“
Caleb Williams threw outside of the pocket just 5 times total against the Steelers, because Ben Johnson knew it wouldn’t yield results against a defense that plays scrambling quarterbacks very well, and had been playing very well overall recently. So the offense adapted and in turn that won us the game, as the Bears and Caleb Williams threw quick hitting outs, ins, and slants.
And despite the more toned down approach to offense this week, the Bears still remain the 4th most explosive offense in the league, trailing only the Colts, Bills, and Patriots.
In fact, the stark contrast this offense has to 2024 is pretty astounding when you take a look at it.
2024 Rankings (Season):
Explosive Plays: 31st
Yards: 32nd
Points: 28th
2025 Offensive Rankings (Through week 12):
Explosive Plays: 4th
Yards: 6th
Points: 8th
It’s legitimately been a night a day difference from 2024. I expected improvement in these areas with the arrival of Ben Johnson, as many of us did, but I feel like I would be called crazy if I were to say these would be the jumps to expect before the season began.
Benchmarks
(Totals and averages are all before week 12: Season totals are underlined, Season averages in Italics)
C/A: 194/325 (59.7%) | 19.4/32.5 (59.7%) | 16/32 (50.0%)
Yards: 2329 | 232.9 | 239
Touchdowns:20 | 2.0 | 3
Turnovers:4| 0.4 | 1
QB at Fault Sacks: 7 | 0.7 | 1
aDOT: *9.*2 | 8.9
Passer Rating: 89.9 | 104.3
True Passer Rating: 129.5 | 126.8
Time to Throw: 3.11s | 2.41s
Time to Pressure: 2.67s | 2.36s
Pressure Rate: 32.30% | 19.51%
On-Target Rate: 63.7% | 71.0%
Poor Play Rate / Big Play Rate: 11.0 % PPR / 8.8% BPR | 11.6% PPR / 0.0% BRP
Game Scorecard
The full grading sheet for each play can be found here.
Game Notes
NFL Passer Rating / True Passer Rating / PFF Grade: 104.3 / 126.8 / 44.4
The average passer rating in the 2025 season sits at 92.1 through week 12. His 104.3 NFL Passer Rating would be considered a good game.
A 126.8 TPR would suggest a very good outing in terms of ball security, sack avoidance, and depth based aggressiveness, with 100 serving as the baseline for “Average.”
And on the PFF scale, a score between 40-50 is considered a Poor score. With a 44.4 Caleb Williams’ day was considered a poor outing.
This is a score I strongly disagree with. For context, J.J. McCarthy’s PFF grade this week was 47.3. This was a game that McCarthy was responsibly for -1.58 ANY/A. (ANY/A by the way is the football stat most correlated with wins, a metric Caleb is 11th in the league in, just behind Josh Allen.)
While Caleb did have 3 turnover worthy plays he still piloted the offense to 5 scoring drives, 31 points, and a 6.46 ANY/A. The argument that J.J. McCarthy had a better game than Williams in the context of quarterbacking efficiency per PFF grading standards is a little laughable.
Interestingly this wasn’t the first time something like this happened this year, in the week 6 win against the Commanders, Caleb Williams had a 46.1 PFF grade. In the same week, Justin Fields had a 51.2 overall grade, despite accounting for negative net yards passing. This is why I preach film + statistics = more full picture.
On-Target Throws: Season Average: 63.7% | Week 12 vs. Vikings: 71.0%
Reminder: Completion % ≠ On-Target %. On-target throws are only counted on aimed passes, so throw aways, spikes, and deflections at the line aren’t counted. And drops are counted as on-target.
This was a bit of a paradoxal start accuracy-wise for Caleb. While his 71.0% OnTar% is near 8% higher than season average, his misses were glaring, 2 of which were turnover worthy, and a handful of others on open targets that could have gone for good gains.
Short-Level Passing (Behind LOS – 9 yards): 17/21 | 81.0% On-Target
Deep-Level Passing (10–20+ yards): 5/10 | 50.0% On-Target
11.6% Poor Play Rate (turnover-worthy + poorly graded plays) against a 0.0% Big Play Rate (great + elite graded plays)
All the poor grades, of course, came on the back of turnover worthy plays. The 3 turnovers worthy plays accounted for -5.00 points in scoring. And while Caleb recorded no Great or Elite throws for the first time in a game this year, he executed a different game plan this week, which did not require these types of throws to move the offense.
Time To Throw: This week Caleb’s time to throw dropped from 3.15 seconds to 2.41 seconds this week. A pretty dramatic drop off.
This is a testament to the change in offensive philosophy the Bears used against the Steelers in week 12. The Steelers have a great defensive front, and a defensive front that excels in limiting scrambling and maintaining gap discipline.
Caleb left the pocket on just 5 dropbacks this week, was the focus was working within structure and delivering accurate balls into the short and medium-short levels of the field.
This was a lethal game to those pushing the “Caleb Williams can’t play within structure” narrative.
Pressure: A season low 19.51% pressure rate allowed by the Bears this week, with the Steelers getting pressure on just 8 of 41 dropbacks. The season low time to throw combined with how the Bears attacked the Steelers this week all played a part in this. An overall fantastic effort against a team that is 5th in the NFL in total sacks.
Drops/Miscues: Just 1 drop this week, attributed to Rome Odunze, a 15-yard out that what delivered excellently by Caleb, Rome had initially hauled it in, but poor ball protection allowed the defender to swat the ball from Rome’s hands.
There were also a couple routes that I feel like didn’t work out fully from the receivers side.
The first was an open underneath drag route to Burden, when it looked like Caleb had expects Burden to throttle down on the route, but he continue drifting which lead to Caleb throwing behind him.
The second was a middle dig in the 4th intended for Rome, who slows down out of his break, where it seems like Caleb is throwing to a spot where Rome would be if he never slows up on his route.
His final scores of 1st Half (-3.65) / 2nd Half (1.50) / Game (-2.15) gives him a slightly “Below Average” game grade for week 11.
Again the turnover worthy plays really bit him hard this week, accounting for -5.00 points in grading, removing just 1 of those plays bumps his game up at an “Average” game. This game unfortunately breaks a streak of 5 consecutive games where he finished with an “Average” score or higher, and charts just his 3 game scored belowe “Average” all season.
A quick turnaround this week as the Bears will travel to Philadelphia to take on the Eagles for some Black Friday football, a chance to show the football world that maybe the Bears do below in the conversation of the NFC elite.
Gary Baugher Jr. is a rookie contributor to WCG, bringing football insight backed by over 16 years of experience in organized football and more than 30 years as a passionate fan of the game. You can follow him on Twitter at@iamcogs.