Caleb Williams' accuracy leap passes a second test against the Patriots

By Vinaya · November 3, 2026

Caleb Williams missed three games with a hamstring injury this season, and the question when he returned was simple: would the accuracy he showed early in the year survive the layoff? Two games later, the answer is yes.

The comeback against Atlanta

Williams returned in Week 6 against the Falcons and completed 30 of 36 passes for 305 yards and a touchdown without an interception in a 31-23 Bears win on October 18. The league named him NFC Offensive Player of the Week for it, his second such award.

The first came in Week 3 of last season, after a 31-14 win over Dallas.

The second test: Drake Maye and the Patriots

A week later the test got harder. On Thursday night, October 22, the Bears beat New England 30-24 to improve to 5-2, and Williams again had the better of the quarterback duel.

He threw for 308 yards and two touchdowns while Drake Maye, the other quarterback from the 2024 draft's top three, completed 24 of 31 passes and scored three touchdowns. Maye's turnover proved to be the difference, and Chicago's late drives, with Williams throwing to Luther Burden, closed the game out.

New England fell to 4-3.

The meeting mattered because of how the two last met. In November 2024, the Patriots won 19-3 at Soldier Field, in a game that left Williams and the Bears offense looking out of sync. Two years on, the result went the other way.

What the numbers say

Accuracy was the question hanging over Williams coming into this season, and he addressed it himself in the summer, saying he wanted to prove his critics wrong by improving his completion percentage. The early returns backed him up.

The Bears' own site reported him leading the NFL at 72.5 percent after his first three starts of the year, and Bleacher Nation's look at his accuracy on October 27 had him second in the league at 71.0 percent, behind only Cincinnati's Joe Burrow.

Those figures will move with each game, and a few weeks of work is not a season. But the pattern is consistent. Williams is getting the ball to receivers on time and on target, and the offense has been able to stay on schedule as a result.

What to watch next

The real measure is whether he can keep it up as defenses adjust. Opponents now have film of Williams at his most accurate, and the next few games will show whether he can keep completing passes at this rate when defenses sit on the routes he has been hitting.

If he does, the conversation around the Bears' quarterback will no longer be about whether he can be consistent, but about how high his ceiling goes.