Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show - Did Caleb Williams play the best game of his career in Bears' win over Falcons? (Hour 1)

Episode Date: October 21, 2026

Leila Rahimi and Mark Grote opened their show by reflecting on Bears quarterback Caleb Williams' terrific performance in a win against the Falcons on Sunday. Was it the best game of his NFL career? After that, they detailed how Williams' relationship with Bears head coach Ben Johnson continues to grow. Later, they discussed how Williams is completing 72.5% of his passes, above the 70% threshold that's a goal of his and the Bears.

I will say this. Dick Turan was responsible for one of my favorite Bears regular seasons, and that was the year 2001, the year in which Mike Brown had back-to-back walk-off wins. Now, when they played the Eagles in the playoffs, Hugh Douglas destroyed everybody, including Jim Miller. E-A-G-A-L-E-S. Welcome.

Hugh Douglas. Yeah. That man struck fear in my heart as an NFL fan at times, having to see him twice a year. That guy game wreckers. Yeah, you had to deal with him as a Cowboys supporter at one point in time in your life. I didn't really think about that. We had to deal with him every once in a while. He's a scary man.

I believe he's doing radio right now on one of our sister, on WIP in Philadelphia, if I'm not mistaken. I think that they just decided to get the entire Eagles defense. from that era in some way or guys who overlapped. Seth Joyner also a part of it. Oh, bad man. I saw Seth Joyner one time, like for the first time in our office in 2014. And I was like, huh? Seth Joyner. That's what I would do if I saw Hugh Douglas. It's the same thing Jim Miller would do if he saw Hugh Douglas.

Seth was really nice, by the way. Of course. An incredibly classy man. And I agree. I agree. Also, I'm like, holy crap, this is amazing. Yeah. Another guy who I think either is doing radio or did do radio.

No, we worked with IGMedia, absolutely. Man, I hate you. We've had them on this show. Yeah, we have. Those guys, knowing ball in all ways, obviously on the field and then off the field too, and all still look like they could kick somebody's butt today. Do you think they're talking about a quarterback,

their quarterback in Philadelphia these days? Jail it hurts, you think they got opinions on that? Knowing what I know about Philadelphia, they're always talking about the Eagles and the quarterback in some way, shape, or form. Which we're going to do here. Also, do you really want to up? upset those guys?

If you really want to upset. Do you really want to upset any of those men? No, man. No, just send them up there and give a stern look to Roger Goodell and the rest of them. I have had a healthy fear of Hugh Douglas since that day in 2001 when he slaughtered the bears and ended all of our dreams on that day. I love the players that I have a respect and fear of. When you have that healthy balance of respect and fear in your NFL defensive nemeses,

I love that. Yeah. When you love them, but you're also like, Oh, no, now you're playing my team. Right. I fear you. And then you find out that they're a nice guy and that really ruins everything. That destroys your sports hate. The concept of the reasonable linebackers still doesn't quite sit well with me.

Because I'm like, wait, you just turn this on for the field. Really? Yeah, I mean, you contain the violence. And then you just do it on the field? Quite honestly. How? How do you do this? Yes, like all those guys.

Like, if you go back to the, like even the 80s bears, like the Wilbur Marshall, Otis, Wilson, Mike Singletary, headhunters, but then really super nice guys off the field. Maybe it's the opposite. Maybe because they have an outlet, then they just get it all out on the field, and then they have the rest of their day to just do whatever they want. God, I think we all need that in life, don't we? We all need it. We have an outlet. It's right here on these microphones, I'd like to think. Yes. We could let it out. I would agree. Let's let it out. We are broadcasting live from the Hyundai Studios, brought to you by your local Hyundai dealers, along with Layla Rahimi.

I am Mark Grody. We are absolutely Rahimi and Grody on 104.3 The score. Thank you so much for joining us and being with us. We are open for you in any way, shape, or form. 3-1-2-644-67. Hello, Twitchers. Hello, YouTube audience. Hello, everybody. Hello, laughing, Layla.

What's funny over there? I just wanted to look up Hugh Douglas, and the first picture is him just striking fear in my heart. Look up Hugh Douglas hell yeah. Slash Jim Miller. And you will see the fear that I've lived with. the year 2001. The year 2001. Conan O'Brien.

Good references. Yeah, absolutely. So it's so funny. Caleb Williams yesterday was great. And he's always great. Caleb Williams has always been engaging. We had the one little glitch last week with my guy, our guy, Dan Wheater, which was really just kind of hilarious now when you think about it and look back on it.

But Caleb Williams was great yesterday. Coming off a game in which he was. 30 of 36 for 305 yards, a touchdown, and zero picks, two of the best drives that I've seen him have in his career to begin the game. And some of it is because it was the beginning of the game that made me happy. It was a 31 to 23 win. It was a game in which the Bears were up 31 to 7. A lot of us said, that might be the best game that Caleb Williams has ever played. I think Tom Brady said something like that.

We might have, I think Kurt Warner had some version of that. that having been his best game. Well, and math also says it's his most efficient game. Yeah, so math checked in in the Chicago Tribune. And you also can just look at the box score. Sean Hammond had the point about it being his most efficient game in the NFL, which I think is really what you're hearing kind of the veterans speak to. So the 30 for 36 translates to an 83.3% completion rate.

There it is. Thanks, Clark. The man is dominating completion percentage all of a sudden. was the highest completion percentage of his career. That's unbelievable. So all of that. And then Caleb Williams gets up to the podium yesterday and he's asked about how great he was in that game. And this is what it sounded like. In the context of the game that you've been out for three weeks, is one of your favorite games that you've played? No, I mean, I've had some pretty cool games in my career. But it was cool, you know, getting back.

I think it was just kind of another game for me. When I heard that, I immediately thought, are you flashing back to college, Caleb Williams? Are you going with personal stats? Or are you going with, say, I immediately thought if he was going pro, the playoff win against the Packers? Yeah.

Or game two of the regular season against the Packers. Those would be the ones I would vote for. But I was thinking it was like, hey, man, this isn't college. You're playing against better players up here. Give yourself some flowers. Yeah. I think that that's a fair place to go.

I also wonder if part of it is a word that you just used analytically efficiency. Like Caleb Williams, that probably is not a word that while he subscribes to it, of course, he'd like to be considered efficient. He wants to be considered spectacular. The spectacular plays, as you said, as he had at USC, as he had in the Packers game in the past, DJ Moore in overtime. I go to the, and maybe he doesn't consider the spectacular either. When I think about like low-key Caleb Williams' best games,

I go to the Cincinnati game last year where it is the coming out party. Sure. I thought for Caleb Williams and for Colson Loveland. That's where Colson Loveland has the, on the final drive, it's the first of a string of what, six, seven, fourth quarter comeback victories, a spectacular play to Colson Loveland. He goes over 300 yards. that game. So I think because, look,

one of the best parts about Caleb Williams is that he likes the idea of the drama, the being spectacular, being awesome, making the incredible big time play. While he'll take 30 for 36, 305 yards

and touchdown and zero picks, the efficiency of it all, he needs the big play to exist, to breathe, I think, in a lot of ways. If the media didn't have just nine minutes and change with Caleb Williams, the natural follow-up is, okay, well, which one stand out to you? Yeah.

And that could be college. That could be, for him, it could even be high school. And it could also be at the NFL level. I think Caleb Williams appropriately having gone to school at USC, additionally are you, but mostly USC is where I draw from, is episodic. You know, he's a guy who's not afraid to play a villain. He's not a man who's afraid to have the drama, as we've talked about. But in a good way where he can make the impossible look possible.

Watching Caleb Williams every game can be like a movie. It's a problem child, as he says. Even that is characterization. So I took a brief glance at some of the college games. And UCLA 2020 sticks out 470 yards. And that was a 4845. So maybe that's the college version of what you talk about with the idea of the Bengals game being kind of like that episodic.

Yeah, yeah. Or was it the game where you were the villain against the Packers? Or was it the game where you just got the, to the NFL, to the vets, it's always going to be the one where you just got the damn job done. Yeah. I think about, like Brian Anderson, when I worked with him on Sox broadcasts, he always said Paul Canerco is the job. And I feel like that that was one of those games where Caleb Williams was the job. He was the job and he'd rather be jumpman. Like he does a jumpman throw like to back up the being episodic and being dramatic.

Does he have to do it like that? No, there's a... But he can't. But he can, and he can make those throws to Roma Dunesay. He can make those throws in the past to DJ Moore. And they are spectacular, and they are dramatic. So, like, it really just blends in with all things Caleb Williams and even what built up to last week's press conference,

the good drama. Because sometimes that word when we say being dramatic, it connotes something bad, but we love drama in sports on the field. It's great. When I say drama here, I truly mean from an entertainment production standpoint. That's all, right. And when I say episodic, I mean, like, watching The Crown, where every episode looked like a movie. Mad Men, yes.

I got to watch Madman. I know. I did that on purpose because I knew you hadn't watched it. I do feel like, for me, his best game was the one against the Falcons because it was what the NFL vets, what they coach you to do. those aren't the ones where you necessarily get all of the highlight reels, even though he had an excellent day at the office. But they are the ones that earn you the money. Yeah, right.

They're the ones that get you to that percentage. I'll even go then. If you're going to go there and we're going to continue along the efficiency slide. I do love efficiency. September 21st, Dallas in 2024. Do you remember that game, 19 of 28, 298 yards, a 31 14 needed victory against the Dallas Cowboys? Ran well, two in that game.

That was the other part. dual threat. I'm glad you brought that up because that's another part of it. Caleb wasn't using his legs in this last game. So I think that's part of it too where he, his sensibilities are not going to allow him to say that that was his best game because there was not a lot of, at least in his mind, spectacular. There just wasn't. Well, and I just don't know him well enough to know. Was it was it a game like I mentioned UCLA? Was it was it Notre Dame in 2022? You know, that was his real worst game. Yeah. I mean, well, Yeah, the 23, I believe.

Oh, so he had a good game in 22 against Notre Dame? Yeah. Okay. 2020, so that was the one where he had three touchdowns that he ran for along 232 yards. That was a 38, 27. But that's kind of the idea. Again, we just mentioned two incredibly epic games, did we not? So that kind of illustrates what we're talking about.

Yeah, yeah. And if there's a, again, I don't know, textures are probably thrown it in there, too, if you have a favorite Caleb game, 312, 64, 64, 67, 67. And Kurt Warner on his weekly hit with Spiegel and Holmes shared his observation from Caleb Williams' first start from the injury against the Falcons. I thought it was one of the best games that I've seen in play, you know, and may not have been as flash. He didn't make, you know, maybe as much of those, you know, big, creative plays. But just playing the position, his poise is calm in the pocket. I thought he looked really, really good.

And he never quite sure when a guy comes off of an injury. You know, how long it's going to take them to get back. But he looked very, very comfortable to me. I thought he played a really good football game. That's kind of a – it was actually kind of a Kurt Warner-style game in a lot of ways, right? With the lack of – because Kurt Warner's game was not mobility. It was in the pocket and making big time third down throws down the middle of the field when he had to. Yeah, it was – it was run with an excellent run game.

But it was like pass, run, pass. Pass, run, pass, deep. Falk, Falk, Falk. Yeah. Just a little dash of Azekeem here and there. Right. So, yes. We're like run, run, run pass, run, pass.

Run, run past. Run, run past. Something along those lines. Like, there'd be a shot taken is the point. Yes. Oh, many shots. Greatest show on turf. It was under our old friend, Mike Martz.

Coming up next. I can't think of March now without, on Twitch. It's an automated quote. Tell him I said Blake. Thomas, I'm like you. I just love Marks back in the day to me always sounded like when he was the Bears coach, and we got to hear from him once a week. He always sounded like a guy, and I'm not saying he was.

Like he had been on his second drink, like not where he was drunk at all, but he just started to be like, hey, oh yeah, it was such a great game out there. We just look so good at it. Less inhibited. Less inhibited. He was just enjoying a nice highball, like not drunk, maybe on his third or fourth sip. That was just the sound that Mike Martz would give us back in the day. Let's continue to talk about Caleb Williams and the Bears coming on up.

As we examine, we heard some interesting stuff from Caleb and from Ben Johnson. As we examine the growth of Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams' relationship, which I think we all kind of know, had a rocky start to it. Where are they now? There was some evidence that things have evolved. coming out of yesterday's press conference. That is next on Rahimi and Grody on 1043, the score. That's Bears head coach Ben Johnson right there. This is Rahimi and Grotie on 1043.

The score in this segment is being brought to you by Almost Free Teeth.com. Save on dental implants today. I'd say from literally getting to observe the relationship between Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams back in my time, way back in the days when I used to cover the Chicago Bears. and watching training camp last year. And we all know about it now about Ben Johnson,

getting in the face of Caleb Williams, pulling the offense off of the field, getting angry. And I wondered out loud many times, are Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams going to make it? Just because of the demands that Caleb Williams had on him, I believe, truly for the first time in his football life. Like, it's probably easy to assume that in high school he probably had it real nice. I think we know he had it real nice in college.

We know who was in charge at USC. It was Caleb Williams. Not that there wasn't coaching going on. But the demands of Ben Johnson feel like they were probably a lot different than the demands that, Layla, that Matt Eber Fluss and Shane Waldron put on him. Sorry to use those words, but I just use those words. I'll even go in. I could call him by whoever this coordinator was.

That would be me. I will say that at the time I think that was regarding a good defensive play and I thought it was funny. That would be me. I did think that was fun. But you know, I love some dad humor in my life. I don't know.

What's up yours? I'll go with Lincoln Riley even because Lincoln Riley could have spent more time at USC trying to develop Caleb Williams' footwork, for example. But that's not what happened. That was a show. And when you consider how well that offense worked and what we saw in his Heisman

trophy winning season, which were some of the games that I was alluding to earlier. You're talking about a guy who yeah, he's seen some things and he's definitely, I think he was really on the same page as Lincoln Riley. That's why he followed him across the country. And then moving forward to Ben Johnson,

you know that it was the coach he wanted. He told the St. Brown Brothers that on the podcast. Yeah. But at the same time, I think even those observers in Detroit of the teams that say Amin Ra was on, you didn't know if Jared Goff and Ben Johnson were going to be on the same page. We didn't know if that was a temporary fix that Matthew Stafford trade or if that was just

or if it was something where they were going to have to wait and see or if it ended up being, I never thought at the time that that was going to be the full commitment to Jared Goff. And then we saw in turn, Goff became that guy. So I think that's how Ben Johnson operates with his quarterback. So you have to prove something to him. Yeah. And I'm sorry my brain has gone here, but we had this conversation on Take the North yesterday. Do you get, because Shane Waldron just came up, do you guys remember or realize that the last time the Bears played the New England Patriots, which was in November of 2024, the Patriots beat the Bears?

The Patriots sucked. They came into Soldier Field at 3 and 7. The Bears were awful. Oh, I remember that game. Guess who got the axe after that game. Nate Davis. Shane Waldron. Both.

Oh, but Nate Davis. Was that 3, 2, 1? Jay Waldron. Yeah. Okay, hold on a second. That was the game where Nate Davis quit on the team. Oh, wow.

That was the one where he had, quote, back spasms, end quote. Good call. I like the conversation we had yesterday I'd take the north. That didn't even come up. The Nate Davis part of it. That's why I've never said that the Nate Davis situation and Kyla Gordon are the same,

because I don't think they are at all. Nate Davis quit on the bears that day. That's hilarious. Do you know what else? Well, he did, and guess who got sacked? nine times that day. Caleb Williams. Caleb Williams got sacked nine times that day. The old Jay Cutler got sack one time. Good luck to y'all. Nine times against the Giants.

By a very bad Patriots team. Bad Patriots team. That was supposed to be a better, a better game for the Bears. And then, okay, let me do this. Let me go back into the way back from 2023. And I promise we'll have some good Caleb Williams audio here in a second, but I have taken us down this path and here we are. And there's nothing we could do about it. It's 24 Bears schedule. Wasn't that the one where after that was the Arizona game where DeMercado proceeded to run for like a hundred billion yards. Well, he had the-

No, that was the one before. The Arizona win or the Arizona loss for them it was a win was the one before. And then Washington was the week before that, the Hail Mary. The fail-Mary. The DeMaccato play was at the end of the half. Remember it was like the lights were off and then also-de-Marcato running into the end zone 50 yards, right? He ran for 400 bloody yards in that. Have I felt like, you want to look at, listen to these completion percentages and just listen to a,

listen to the yardage. I've got the yardage right in front of me here. Play-on player. The fail, Mary, where Caleb Williams tried to will his team to win, 131 yards. That's what Caleb had in the game. Yeah, DeAndre had 129. Ew, okay. Arizona, 217. Like, think about that compared to what we're seeing this past week. The New England game where they lost 19 to 3. How in the hell was it only 19 to 3? He only had 120 yards in that game. Yeah, 16 to 30, 120 yards. And he was sad. nine times. Justin Fields was once sack nine times. What's all these nine timers? The Bears offensive line was bad. That's right, Bute. That was such a brutal game.

It was. I remember like that the Bears were favor to win that game. It felt like, okay, they're going to be fine. Here comes very. Really, both of these teams. Think about it. Think about where we are now. And this is just symbolic of how fast things change in the NFL. That's not that long ago. That's November 10th. of 2024. Both of those organizations were a train wreck at the time. Okay.

Here's the two paragraphs that make me laugh. As if losing a Washington on a Hail Mary pass by Jaden Daniels two weeks ago and then falling flat at Arizona last week wasn't enough, things took another bad turn for the Bears. They were only four and five. They managed just 142 yards and were one of 14 on third downs,

facing a team that came in tied with six others for the worst record in the the NFL. How you doing everybody? It got so bad that fans started calling for coach Maddie Ber Fluse's dismissal in the closing minutes chanting fire flus. Thomas Brown ring a bell anybody? Thomas Brown. Wasn't his fault.

Where are we now? Well, remember Thomas Brown was kind of heroic and then all of a sudden he got exposed towards the end as well. Well, but I still, he said the offense he inherited. There's also this paragraph. May didn't exactly light it up. The number three overall draft was 15 of 25 for 184 yards with a touchdown and interception. May didn't exactly light it up is a great, a great sentence. That's amazing.

I don't think we're going to get the same game tomorrow. I don't think so. Right. I mean, like both of these quarterbacks have come so far. I mean, they are the two best quarterbacks of that draft class. They have, they've shown themselves the number one overall pick, the number three overall pick in the draft and the guy that the Bears lost two weeks previous in 2024, Jaden Daniels. We don't know exactly where he is on the scale. But three days. later they released Nate Davis. Was it three days later? Oh man, that was two days after my ping pong conversation with him? Or was that? I don't remember exactly the date that that famous conversation occurred with old Nate Davis.

Back spasms. As we bring it back to today, now, this very moment, Caleb Williams, just to, again, underscore things changing. How in life kids, things evolved. Here is Kayla Williams. discussing his relationship now after a year and a half. Oh, kids, a year and a half together. Here is Caleb Williams on Ben Johnson. You're a year plus now in with Ben. What if you come to appreciate his mind as he go through each week, setting up a game plan and kind of your role in that alongside him? Yeah, what I love about Ben, he adjusts to his players extremely well.

Other than that, I mean, he's super challenging on each position. He requires a lot of each guy. And then he's super consistent about how he is each and every single day. And so those are a couple of my favorite things about him. And then obviously we get out there and he's dialed in, seeing what the defense is doing for us throughout the game and calling the game how he sees it. And then my side of it's just me trying to be in his mind of when he calls to play, what he's trying to get at here. And I think a lot of that communication goes on throughout the week. How would you describe the continued growth of that relationship together?

Yeah, it's been fun. we've gotten better with some of the things that really bothers them. And so there's a little bit less, you know, hyper communication, let's say, in those situations. But it's been awesome. Being able to have him, been able to have him as a teacher, as a coach, and just keep growing our relationship between each other. Just the pre-snap stuff, getting lined up. making sure everybody's aligned, you know, getting in the huddle, getting in out of the huddle, penalties and things like that. Just a bunch of those small things that add up and

mean a lot throughout the weeks. I love that. Hyper communication. Is that yelling? Is that what that? Is that what we are considering that to have been or to be? Hyper communication. Yelling. That was a very corporate savvy, not sounding corporate phrase. We had some fun with that. Another thing about Caleb, right? Like, yesterday, earlier in the week, we talked about how he didn't want to say he was a fan, or he was fan-boying out over Keanu Reeves.

John Wick, to be exact. John Wick, yes. I don't think Caleb Williams wants to make it sound like he was intimidated by getting yelled at by Ben Johnson. So hypercommunication makes it sound like. It's all good. Yeah. We were just hyper-communicated. Did you guys talk offline?

Did you circle back? I'm pretty sure there was some drilling down. That I think happened. Hey, Caleb's a businessman now. He's got some corporate speak, I guess. Doesn't our boss always says? Then what Mitch Rosen says, guys, come on, you got to hypercommunicate. Hyper always need to hyper communicate.

Or overcommunicate, actually, is what it is. I do believe in that because a lot of times even in the communication business, you'd think we would be better at it than others. Hard no. There have been times where I was listening to a post-game show, and they're like, Laila Rahim is going to be in this place. And I was like, wait, I am. glad I heard it on a commercial.

We don't over communicate always at a communications company. Is that what you're saying? Yeah, so keep that in mind if some consultant or supervisors messing with you be like, well, they don't even communicate a communications companies. And it would be the truth. I can vouch. That is the truth. That is.

But it's nice to hear the evolving relationship with those two. We'll get to another Ben Johnson cut here in a second. But first. Well, no, I think we, yeah, we will. We decided to kind of kick this out to the entire hour because there's a lot of stuff. Yeah, I didn't realize what time it was. My bad. I do know where I'm going today.

Oh, good. Remy Martin VSOP is giving you a chance to attend the score's exclusive football after dark event featuring Jonah Jackson, who had a better practice report yesterday. I was happy to see it. Come out to A&S beverages 1461 South Blue Island Avenue in Chicago tonight, five to six 30. tonight I'll be hanging out there with your chance for your opportunity to register to win a pair of passes to football after dark with Jonah Jackson that is at Wildfire on November 17th. You know it's going to be a good chat.

It is all brought to you by Remy Martin, VSOP, My Call. Can't wait to hear about your night already. I know you always get a chance to talk to are the great score fans and have cool sports conversations. So that will be awesome for you tonight. I'm going to ask him to go Julia Child mode and tell me how he makes that tart 10. than he was talking about.

Oh, yeah. It's an apple tarts, French pastry of some such. He's a talented man. And yes, it was really surprising, to be honest with you, just after all the reports to see that he was limited in practice yesterday. Again, projection. These are walk-through practices. Yeah, and of all the weeks where you probably really have to take reports about availability

with a grade of salt, this is the one. There's no doubt about it. This is a difficult, demanding, quite frankly, unfair week. But we have discussed such topics. We might get into some of that with Mike Florio, with the 10th international game being added as well, just to make travel and everything NFL even more arduous. Yeah, Floreo will be with us at 11.

The Jalen Hertz questions will be coming. I can't wait to hear what his up to the second opinions and thoughts and insights are on that. Chuck Swirsky at 1125. More bears Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams coming up next on Rahimi and Grotie on 1043, the score. What's going on? It's Rahimi and Grotie on 104.3, the score as we continue to look ahead to Bears and Patriots. Man, this is going to be a, this game's going to be a blast. I really didn't start thinking about it from the perspective of the national audience.

Like, what a perfect, like two teams that are relatively hot. The Bears coming off a win. Both teams are four and two. The Patriots have won three in a row. Oh, and then you have two of the best and youngest quarterbacks in the first. National Football League. This is going to be good for everybody, even though it's wholly unhealthy to do the Thursday turnaround. Yeah, that's the thing. It's kind of like the Rams and 40-nighters game in Australia. You're getting too good opponents with a lot of really compelling

angles, but it's just not going to be as good because of other factors. Yes, and both everybody talking about just doing what you have to do to get ready for the game and knowing your rules and depending on your fundamentals and just go out there and play for. football for crying out loud. I tolerate Thursday night football, but not really. Yes. We're all going to be there for it. I don't think it should have happened to begin with.

And I understand that it's a necessary thing the league wants to do. And frankly, they didn't ask me, so I don't really have an opinion about it that way. But yeah, it takes down the quality. It does. And it requires, if I may, hyper management from both organizations that play in these games. As we continue talking about the getting into Caleb Williams, and the relationship with Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson. We had teased the Ben Johnson part of this.

And Ben Johnson met with the media yesterday as well. He discussed how Caleb Williams can look ahead after one of his best performances of the season. And in your time with Caleb, what have you come to see of the way that he turns the page from one performance to the next game? I think this week in particular, you've got to turn the page extremely quickly. And we enjoyed the plane ride home. And when we came back in yesterday, we turned the page really quick and didn't even really touch a whole lot on that game. So we know how big it is to string good performances back to back to back in this league. That's what the good teams do.

And that's what we're looking to do here this week. That's what the great quarterbacks do as well. And as we try to build Caleb Williams's resume towards being a great and elite quarterback. It's important that. he plays well, obviously, on Thursday night as well. I think Turn the Page might be taking over the TTP for Take the North TTIN. Oh, really? I feel like this week has been especially Turn the Page phraseology.

Well, that's heavy competition because Turn the Page Industries is Matt Spiegel's, I believe, or Spiegel and Holmes' intellectual property going up against TTN. That is, that's a fierce heavyweight battle, I would like to think. Yeah. But with Emma, take in Turn the Page to Hallis Hall, where they definitely said turn the page hundreds of times this week. They have actually. I feel like we've got contenders.

I feel like, though, having Dan Wheater on my side of take the north and the tenacity and the claws that come out every once in a while and the occasional anger issues that Dan Weeder brings to the table. I think Dan Weirer reacts as any of us who functioned in the public space as a sports commentator. I, right. It comes naturally. Purturbed. Yeah, this is why I love Dan Weeder.

I think for Dan sake, we also have to add the juice. That's one of his favorite terms, the juice. Dan Weeter brings the juice. It was in the headline of one of his stories the other day, and Layla eweed me at that moment because we were talking about other suggestive things in the moment. I don't know what you're talking about. I think here's the thing about this, the Ben Johnson, Caleb Williams' partnership. Yeah.

It's going to be reexamined any time there's a new challenge or wrinkle. or I think a new result, something we hadn't seen. Element of improvement, element of a game that you want to say it maybe unfolds or like somebody's unlocked. So Thursday, I think, might be another one because here's this test. You've got a Patriots team that we know is playing very good football right now. Drake May does not look like the same quarterback that he was in the first couple games of the season, especially that Seattle game that really, I think, has as much to do as Seattle as anything. and it's a Thursday game where they're coming here.

And I think that takes down their advantage a little bit, probably knocks it down by a couple points just because it's a turnaround where they're not playing at home on Thursday. And then the Bears are coming off of their best game of the year outside of, I think it's their complete best game of the year. Carolina, the defense still gave up too many points. I think if you asked them, they would say that. Well, they were bad in the first game.

So complete, like three phases, they had their best game of the year against Atlanta. So that's what makes it compelling. Yeah. You're getting the Drake May Caleb Williams part two. That's always going to be something we examined too in the same vein as the story surrounding Ben Johnson and Caleb Williams. Yeah, except for a bad roughing to punter penalty on special teams by Jada Walker for the Bears. It was as close to like the ideal offense, defense, and special teams all complementing one another.

Hopefully we get some version of that. I mean, it is rare when you get that. We can hope for it. That's for sure. One more cut from Caleb Williams in this case. We talked about the completion percentage. You brought it up. What was it, 83%?

That's where... 83. That's unbelievable. That's a third of the way to 84. It is. Holy cow. Wow. That is...

There you go math and again. That's why I love having you on the show. Yeah. If there's one thing I'm known for, it's my math skills. Is anybody in this business good at math? I'll find that person. Marshall, he's good at mental math. Oh, that's right.

Marshall is good. Shout out to Marshall Harris. I was texting with him yesterday. He's doing great, everybody. He's the best. Caleb Williams, with the media yesterday, discussed the same goal of hitting 70% completion. He's at 83 now.

Here's Caleb. Said that I could do it. And we're going to keep figuring out how to keep getting to that. Maybe it was the Drew Greene's talk of adding two or three more completions. But, I mean, part of it's just like I've said multiple times. And it's building confidence in myself, building confidence in the playbook, building confidence in my wide receivers and where they'll be, even if I can't see them. It's just putting a ball where they will be and then trusting them. And so that's what we've been doing. That's what I've been trying to do. I keep preaching to them, get open, get open, get open. I'll put the ball there, go catch it when the ball's in the air. It's yours. And so I'm going to keep preaching that, going to keep trying to give them runners balls to be able to keep them on the move and all of that. And so proud of myself. It's a long season, like you said.

We got to keep executing. We got to keep getting better. I got to keep getting better. And then from there, we'll see how it ends at the end of the year. Every year, Caleb Williams gets to shut more people up. You know what I mean? Like we've all been hyper about the completion percentage, completion person, hitting him over the head with it.

Hopefully by the end of the season, he could be like, see y'all. There you have it. Well, and I think that, as I've said before, that Drew Brie's conversation, and Ben Johnson has brought it up. Caleb Williams has brought it up multiple times now. That may be one of those phrases where Drew just voiced something in a way that really was good for Williams to visualize. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, that's the second time that he is referred to it. And maybe he, again, we know Caleb Williams reads the headlines and reads what people are talking about. And maybe he's just feeding into that. But maybe there is something to it as well. I just really want to know what else was said. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think it was just that.

that's the headline and it's great that we got that much. But I want to know what else was said about how to visualize that or like what the tips and tricks were. Anything as to how he phrased it. I would be curious to know. I'll also be curious too. And we've got a break here. But to see how he dissects what is a pretty good secondary for the New England Patriots

with Christian Gonzalez and Carlton Davis and the slot guy, Marcus Jones, as well. We'll get into some of those matchups maybe later today, certainly. tomorrow as well. But coming up next, we always love talking to Mike Florio of pro football talk. And I imagine he'll have a lot to say about the Jalen Hertz situation. And we'll have a lot to say about it as well. Florio is next on Rahimi and Grotia 104.3, the score.