After a challenging rookie season, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2024 draft blossomed in 2025, his first season under Bears head coach Ben Johnson’s offensive lineman. The results were stunning: 3,942 passing yards, a 27-7 TD-INT ratio, an 11-6 record, an NFC North title, a Wild Card weekend win over the rival Green Bay Packers and a highlight reel with enough excitement to fill a major motion picture.
A sudden turnaround turned the Bears from an often frustrating club into the most promising club in the Windy City, with the source of optimism at No. 18.
It is up to Williams to ensure that the 2025 success was no fluke.
Williams carried confidence into Thursday night’s preview event for both Madden 27 and College Football 27 — the first of which EA Sports called the “Opening Drive” — but despite his years in the spotlight at Oklahoma and USC, it’s clear the star game is still relatively new for the quarterback.
It’s either that, or Williams understands that the work is more important than the acting.
Take his response to a question about the dreaded “Madden curse,” the belief that a Madden cover athlete is doomed for the upcoming season, for example. Williams quickly turned away from the hype and back toward the field.
“No more of this Madden curse,” he said. “We’re going to go out and do everything we need to do, stay healthy, do everything we need to do to study film and be prepared every week and go out and do business.”
The trade should be a little easier, at least during the current stretch of offseason activity. At this time a year ago, Williams was immersed in Johnson’s new scheme, absorbing as much of it as possible while preparing for his second NFL season, which suddenly carried heightened expectations.
“I was learning so much and I felt like I was just drowning with all the information and stuff,” Williams explained.
Now, after a year together, Williams believes the Bears are poised to grow.
“Where we are now is different than where we were last year,” Williams said. “A lot of last year was trying to figure it out. A lot of last year was trying to trust teammates and coaches and all that. I think at this point we trust our coaches, they trust us. We’ve got a lot of guys back, at least on the offensive side of the ball that we know the offense well enough to be able to go out and practice and get that information that we play and have on that good information that we play. those different systems that we have, it just increases awareness of the system and when we’re out there we have a better understanding of where we need to go and what we need to do.”