Bear Digest

Grading the Bears' Decision Makers from Cardiac Comeback Season

Chicago Bears Final Report Card: Fixing letter grades to the 2025 efforts of Ben Johnson, Ryan Poles, their staffs, and team management/ownership.
Gene Chamberlain|
Ben Johnson allowed himself the occasional smile between intense moments in 2025.
Ben Johnson allowed himself the occasional smile between intense moments in 2025. | Kamil Krzaczynski-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

First in a series

LAKE FOREST, Ill. — Well into training camp, in the heat of summer, Bears coach Ben Johnson decided his team needed a full day of hitting like they might get in a regular-season game.

It became a free-for-all of vicious hits in scrimmage and physical torture from start to end in the heat.

When the season ended, GM Ryan Poles cited it as one of the most pivotal days of the 2025 season.

"I go back to training camp," Poles said. "He needed a physical day, in the  dog days of camp, and that was a really cool opportunity to see those guys buy into what he was saying, do something really hard. In the moment, does it feel good? No. But, they believed, from his message, that it would help us down the road, and they went all out with it. You saw that go through the entire season."

Johnson seemed to have his finger on the Bears'  pulse all year and it helped prevent anything longer than a two-game losing streak when over the three previous seasons they had gone off on 14-game and 10-game losing streaks.

It was just another example of Johnson's leadership in his first season as a head coach.

RANKING ALL OF THE COMEBACKS BY BEARS IN THEIR CARDIAC SEASON

A complete turnaround from last place and 5-12 to 12-7, a division title and a playoff win started at the top with decision makers.

Here is the final Bears report card for the decision makers in 2025.

Coaching: A

About the only flaws to find in Johnson's year were occasional unnecessary fourth-down gambles, a few play calls that seemed a bit greedy and how they always seemed to start slow in the final six weeks of the season. Coaching set up the comebacks by instilling confidence they could do it. The play designs often got receivers wide open, like on the 25-yard TD pass to DJ Moore in the wild-card playoff win. They dialed it up when they needed it, like on Colston Loveland's 58-yard TD catch. And their defense came up with more takeaways than anyone in the NFL, making up for a lack of sacks and an ineffective group of run stoppers.

When fate dictated defensive coordinator Dennis Allen would never have his intended defensive lineup on the field for a single down this year due to injuries, he did what Green Bay's defense couldn't do and adjust to the handicap. C.J. Gardner-Johnson, Nahshon Wright and—are you kidding me—D'Marco Jackson, became fill-ins who contributed greatly as starters due to injuries. In Wright's case, he became the starter and a huge play maker.

Allen and staff were behind this ability to get backups ready to fill in.

"There were a lot of challenges, guys were up and down, and anyone that came in there was ready to go to compete and help us win football games," Poles said. "He did an incredible job putting that group together."

When there are numerous injuries, especially on defense, it's going to impact special teams and did. Richard Hightower was forever juggling players in and out of return and coverage unit responsibilities. He even had to juggle kickers. The return set up for Devin Duvernay won the game against Minnesota. They won another game with the Raiders on a blocked kick.

Johnson's good, better, best slogan proved a fun rallying point but did something else. It fortified the belief they could always come back if necessary. His play calling once they were down in games was usually exemplary.

Johnson did all of this in his first year operating the offense, with a new coaching staff, with problems at the blindblocking position of left tackle due to injuries, and with a young quarterback who badly needed refinement. He still does. And he did it without any proven experience that he could lead a full team. These are all good reasons to argue for coach of the year, although his competition for this is likely to be too severe to take the actual award.

The offense went from last in the league to sixth, from 16th to 10th in passing and from 25th to third in rushing . This pretty much explains everything Johnson and staff did with handling their end of the attack.

The Bears haven't had total coaching like this since the 1980s. In fact, in many ways it was superior to the 1980s coaching because of Johnson's strategic offensive genius. 

Personnel: A-

A Bears draft class with four rookies playing major roles in a playoff season is the kind of thing from the Jim Finks-Bill Tobin-Mike Ditka eras, but not something from any time in recent memory. It wasn't perfect, though. Ruben Hyppolite and Zah Frazier contributed nothing in a season when they needed the defensive support. Free agent edge Dayo Odeyingbo did little before his season-ending injury, but even then Poles and staff found players who could supply needed depth.

What Poles did was forge a great working relationship immediately with Johnson and his staff so they knew exactly what the coaches wanted to implement their schemes, then kept the coaches involved in the process. It was clear communication they never really had for all sides of the football when it was Poles and is staff working with Matt Eberflus' staff.

Ownership: A-

Owner George McCaskey had been behind the Ryan Poles and Matt Eberflus hirings but he and president Kevin Warren at least had the foresight to realize mistakes made and then McCaskey was willing to part with the reported $13 million plus a year necessary to get the best possible candidate, instead of retread Mike McCarthy or some other bargain-basement wannabe.

The only flaw here has been the continuing failed attempt to get a shovel in the ground in Arlington Heights. Even that seems to be coming around now after they finally exerted  force and found necessary leverage in Indiana. Then, Gov. J.B. Pritzker went from the usual political mumbo jumbo to singing a different tune about providing infrastructure and the agreed-upon tax relief necessary to build the Arlington Heights Stadium.

Next: The defense

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.