Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams made a noteworthy admission about how he and his teammates felt about former coach Matt Eberflus recently.
Williams was recently interviewed for a feature in Esquire, where he discussed how Eberflus lost the locker room last season. The quarterback pointed to one moment following the team’s 18-15 loss to the Washington Commanders on Oct. 27, a game the Bears lost on a last-second Hail Mary.
The Bears allowed the Commanders to complete two passes along the sideline for 24 yards prior to that Hail Mary, making the Hail Mary much easier to attempt. After the game, Eberflus downplayed the importance of those passes, which Williams says left the team “annoyed.”
“How [Eberflus] handled it at that time, for that game, was, I think, one of the things that throughout the locker room people talked about and were annoyed by,” Williams said, via Patrick Finley of the Chicago Sun-Times.
The Washington game had previously been reported on as a major point of contention within the Chicago locker room. By the time Eberflus botched the Bears’ final drive in their Thanksgiving Day loss in Detroit, the damage had already been done.
Eberflus was fired after the Thanksgiving debacle, with Ben Johnson replacing him. If Johnson learns one thing from how the Bears responded to Eberflus, it might be that game management and accountability are important if he wants to keep the players onside.
