WARE, England — When the Bears huddled to fix their offense, they came up with one solution: not huddling at all.
Going straight to the line of scrimmage keeps plays relatively simple and limits both the substitutions the defense can make and whether they disguise their blitzes and coverage. That helps Bears rookie quarterback Caleb Williams, who has looked more comfortable when he doesn’t huddle than when he does.
In Sunday’s win against a pathetic Panthers defense, Williams went 11-for-12 for 144 yards, two touchdowns and a passer rating of 101.3 in a no-huddle offense. When he huddled, Williams went 9-for-17 for 160 yards and a 85.4 passer rating.
“They did an excellent job executing the no-huddle situations that presented themselves,” offensive coordinator Shane Waldron said Thursday before practice at Hanbury Manor outside London.
Those situations should present themselves again. The decision to go no-huddle takes some of the control away from Waldron, who doesn’t have the luxury of substituting personnel. But the defensive limitations benefit his rookie quarterback.
“It’s easier for Caleb to dissect,” receiver DJ Moore said.
Many of the plays the Bears run in that situation are ons they’ve been running since training camp. They need to be successful with them. In general, pass game coordinator Thomas Brown said, offenses have to earn the right to play quickly ‚— going three-and-out without giving their defensive teammates a rest is too crippling otherwise.
In part because of the pace of their attack, the Bears have run 326 plays this season, the third-most in the NFL — behind the Texans and Ravens.
“I think [Williams] processes it better when we go faster,” Bears receiver Keenan Allen said. “The defense can’t do all the disguise and everything. When we go fast, they have to line up and show us what’s going on. …
“The defense has to show their hand. They can’t get into the disguise looks anymore because they don’t know when we’re going to snap the ball when they go fast.”
Williams has improved on processing what he sees before the snap. Center Coleman Shelton calling out a fire blitz — with colorful language — during a no-huddle play last week obscured the fact that Williams had already identified the rusher.
“He was about three yards away from the line or five yards away from the line,’” Williams said.
Playing fast keeps defenses “out of the exotic stuff,” said running back D’Andre Swift.
“And if they do want to bring it,” Swift said, “we have answers to those.”
It’s helped the run game, too. When they didn’t huddle Sunday, the Bears ran 13 times for an average of 5.2 yards. When they didn’t, they ran 26 times for 2.3 yards per carry.
The Bears ran no-huddle plays on six of the 20 plays of their two touchdown drives in Week 4 against the Rams — an impressive number, considering that they’re not allowed to skip a huddle on the first play of each drive. In Week 5, they went no-huddle on 13 of their 28 plays during touchdown drives.
“That gave us a little bit of juice. …” coach Matt Eberflus said. “I think the greatest benefit is you control the pace. You could get on the ball and snap it right away, you can get on the ball and look and see what the defense has given you in terms of the looks. You have time to change your call if you’d like to, so there’s a lot of benefit to it.
“I think it’s a cat-and-mouse game you’ve gotta play as a defensive guy. … It’s really good to get the tempo going and the guys operate. [Williams] is very comfortable doing that because that’s what he did a lot in college, and he’ll tell you that, too.”
It’s becoming the Bears’ identity, Allen said.
“When we control the tempo of the game,” he said, “I feel like we play better and we manage the game better.”