Toning It Down with Alan Williams

The calm Alan Williams who has been given great Bears defensive coordinator responsibilities by head coach Matt Eberflus no longer resembles the one who took over as Vikings defensive coordinator a decade ago.

Williams speaking calmly and thoughtfully hardly sounds like the ranting, screaming disaster he describes himself as during his first experience as defensive coordinator with the Vikings in 2012-13 under Leslie Frazier.

"An old Colt guy came and talked to our group one time, Dwight Freeney, and he would say, 'where you are and where you want to be, those two people can't co-exist in the same space,' " Williams said. "So I'd hope right now that I'm a little more mature, that I handle situations—adversity—a little bit better.

"I would think at this point I know football—eight years or whatever that was—a little bit better. I handle the staff better in terms of interpersonal skills. I would hope that. And then the players, I think that I was so intense about every situation. Every situation is not live or die. So right now I think I’m a little bit more relaxed … I'm a lot more relaxed, and so they get to know me. They get to know not just coach Williams, they get to know Alan Williams. So when the guys get to know you, I think that they play for you Not that the guys didn’t before. But now they get to see me as a person, not just as a coach."

It's easy to say someone is no longer Bobby Knight and Mike Ditka on steroids. Proving it is another thing, so Williams offered evidence.

"We had a bust on a pressure, installed last night, we went over it," Williams said. "Had a bust on a pressure. I would have hit the roof before, and now it's just, 'hey, this is what we need to do. We'll go over it again.' I would have jumped the coach and the player. I would have been super stern.

"Now, it's Day 4. And that was the first time that guy ran that in practice. And so there are going to be some mistakes, so I would say, 'Hey, No. 1 thing we do want execution. That's important. But the No. 1 thing is, 'Did you make the mistake a hundred miles per hour?' Not that the standard isn't the standard, but we're working to get there. We just want to improve 1% each day."

The Vikings defense Williams had went from 21st in yardage allowed, 31st in points allowed, 11th in rushing and 26th in passing before his arrival, to 19th in yards, 14th in points, 11th against the run and 24th against the pass during his first year. So he did a solid job. However, the collapse came in 2013 when they allowed more points than any defense, more yards than all but one defense and were 31st against the pass.

Williams traces much of his career in the NFL as a coach back to being a defensive backs coach for Tony Dungy on the Colts team that beat the Bears in Super Bowl LVI.

"I'm not sure what I didn't learn from him," Williams said.

One thing would have been Dungy's calm, collected demeanor.

the tough times in Minnesota, four years as a defensive backs coach for Detroit and then four more years in a return to Minnesota under Matt Eberflus as defensive backs coach taught him this part. It all adds up to a more calm and thoughtful Williams as he makes the decisions guiding this Bears Tampa-2 styled defense.

"I would hope just age, wisdom, experience—that the wisdom is making decisions based on past experiences; making decisions based on the collective, we have great coaches, using the coaches to help out and not having to do it all myself," Williams said. And then just reflecting back on some of the mistakes that I've made in my younger years and correcting those.

"We ask players all the time, 'Hey, mistakes that you made yesterday—don’t make the same mistakes tomorrow,' and then be self-aware; evaluate yourself on a daily basis to see what you’re doing in all phases, what you're doing—are those the right things? So if I'm gonna ask the players to do those type of things, I have to do that myself, so short answer—age and wisdom."

Williams is simply glad to be who he is now and what he's doing rather than elevate every single issue to the point of armageddon. His players have to be happy for this. He is, too.

"I don't know if I enjoy it more," Williams said. "I think that one of the things that coach Dungy always taught me was to (say), 'Hey, it's football.' And we are blessed to be—think about this: I'm the coordinator of the Chicago Bears. I'm the defensive coordinator. And so, there is no job better in the world—maybe Flus ( head coach)—but I get to coach defense for the Chicago Bears.

"So there's no job better than that. So to be excited about what you do and what I get to do, who I get to do it with—man, that's, I've always appreciated that I get to coach football for a living. There isn’t a job better than the one I have—none."

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