Chicago Bears fans didn’t know how to react as they watched their franchise quarterback Caleb Williams drag his right leg while being supported by two staffers during the loss to the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday.
After watching Williams’ reaction on the field, as well as his cart ride to the locker room where he was clearly emotional with a towel over his head and pumping his fist up to the crowd, it was right to expect the worst.
But Williams doesn’t have a season-ending injury like initially thought. Instead, he’s considered “week-to-week,” according to head coach Ben Johnson, with a right hamstring injury. An MRI on Monday was conducted to assess the severity of the strain, and though Johnson doesn’t expect him to practice this week, he hasn’t ruled him out completely for Week 3.
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Williams’ reaction to the injury has quickly become a punchline on social media, and OutKick’s Craig Carton went full tilt on the Bears’ quarterback for it during “The Craig Carton Show.”
“I don’t quite understand why people immediately thought, ‘Oh my God, it’s his Achilles.’ Oh, that’s right – it’s because he acted like it,” Carton said. “He went down like he tore his Achilles. He went down like he tore his ACL, and sadly when we see non-contact injuries, that’s typically the first thing we think.
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“The way Caleb reacted it was like doubling down on an 11 against a six. It was like, ‘Oh my God, Caleb Williams is acting and reacting like he tore his Achilles or he blew up his knee.’ He’s crying. He can’t get off the field on his own power. And then he’s got the proverbial Gatorade towel covering his face. ‘I don’t want my momma to see me like this. I don’t want people to see me like this.’ Then, as they were driving him off the field, this has become a thing – it’s usually for guys you’re worried have a significant neck injury or he might be paralyzed. Then, a brave man who raises his hand and gives a fist to the crowd, or maybe the thumbs up like, ‘I’m going to be OK, Billy!’”
Johnson said that he anticipates Williams to be sidelined for “some time,” but this wasn’t even a season-ending injury on his end. Of course, there’s no telling what type of pain Williams felt, or what was going through his mind.
However, Carton believes that Bears fans, a group filled with tradition, blue-collar identity and grit, wouldn’t be rooting for their starting quarterback if he weren’t on their team.
“He acted like his career ended, and that’s why as good a quarterback as he might be one day. And damn it, in Week 1, he looked fantastic putting a 59 burger up on the board. The reality is this: you’re going to root for him because you have no choice if you’re a Bears fan. You’re not going to root for him because you like him,” Carton explained. “You’re not going to root for him because he encapsulates what the starting quarterback of the Chicago Bears should encapsulate, like a Jim McMahon. A man’s man. When you think Chicago, you think Mike Ditka, you think Brian Urlacher. …You think men’s men, right?
“So, you’re going to like him because you have no choice. He’s your starting quarterback. And when you act like that when you’re not hurt that badly, it brings a lot of dudes back to, ‘Oh, I never trusted him when he painted his fingernails pink.’ That’s the problem. Caleb Williams, I think, is going to be a damn good quarterback for a long time. But he’s never really truly going to resonate with a Bears football fan, because he’s never going to be one of you. He’s never going to act like the man that you want him to act like.”
Carton added that it “doesn’t’ mean he’s a bad guy, doesn’t mean he’s not a great quarterback.” But he is certain Williams went way too far with his injury in Sunday’s loss, in front of a sold-out Soldier Field in rainy conditions.
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Bears fans, though, will be happy their season hopes are still alive with Williams not expected to be on the sideline for the remainder of the year.
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