5 things to know about Ben Johnson, the Chicago Bears reported next head coach

The Chicago Bears reportedly have their next head coach.

Ben Johnson, whose offenses took the NFL by storm behind the revival of Jared Goff’s career and a show-stopping utilization of skill players, has agreed to be the Bears’ next head coach, according to multiple reports.

Here are five things to know about the reported next head coach of the Chicago Bears.

Johnson had the best offense in the NFL the last three seasons

The Lions may have lost in the NFC Divisional round, but Detroit scored 31 points against the Washington Commanders.

That follows suit with his resume.

In three seasons with Ben Johnson as the Lions’ offensive coordinator, Detroit ranked the top-five in scoring each of those three years. The Lions finished fifth in 2022 and 2023 and first in 2024 at 33.2 PPG. The Lions last led the NFL in scoring in the 1954 season. The Lions’ 28.2 offensive PPG from 2022-24 were the most in the NFL.

It isn’t just points, either. In the three seasons with Johnson calling plays, the Lions had 230 plays that went for 20 yards or more. Only San Francisco had more such plays.

Johnson breaks a trend of offensive coach hires

When it comes to the best offensive coaches in the game, Johnson isn’t like the others.

Sean McVay and Kyle Shanahan have their coaching trees which produced the likes of Zac Taylor, Mike McDaniel, Kevin O’Connell and Matt LaFluer as head coaches.

Johnson isn’t a part of that coaching tree.

Johnson started off as an offensive assistant for the Miami Dolphins in February 2012 under Joe Philbin. He worked his way up to be the team’s tight ends coach in 2015 and was retained when Philbin was fired.

He became Detriot’s offensive coordinator in 2022 after the Lions fired Anthony Lynn in the 2021 season.

Johnson’s resume has two unheralded but impressive parts

Johnson was on two separate Miami Dolphins staffs and two separate Detroit Lions staffs.

Joe Philbin was fired in Miami and Adam Gase took his place. Matt Patricia was fired in Detroit, and Dan Campbell was hired to replace him. What those two staffs had in common was how they retained Johnson.

When a head coach is fired, more likely than not the rest of the assistants and coordinators follow suit. In this case, Campbell and Gase saw fit to keep Johnson on their staffs.

In Detroit, this resulted in Johnson’s eventual elevation as the team’s offensive coordinator. That parlayed him into a head coaching role with the Bears. 

Johnson was one the most sought-after coaching candidates

The Bears weren’t the only ones after Johnson, especially for the aforementioned reasons.

His offenses were winning games. That caught the eye of four teams: the Bears, Las Vegas Raiders, New England Patriots and Jacksonville Jaguars. Johnson took interviews with all four teams.  

Johnson was reportedly picky with the interviews he did take. He interviewed with the Patriots, who has a budding rookie quarterback in Drake Maye, but New England eventually hired Mike Vrabel.

That left the Jaguars, Bears and Raiders as the teams who interviewed with Johnson. 

The X-factor: Quarterback Caleb Williams

The one thing the Bears have that neither the Raiders nor Jaguars have is Caleb Williams.

More specifically, Caleb Williams on his rookie contract.

This gives the Bears flexibility when piecing together their roster, as they have money that isn’t going to be allocated to Williams. Eventually, that might be the case. It isn’t now.

The Raiders don’t have their long-term solution at quarterback. Jacksonville does have their quarterback, however Trevor Lawrence is in the middle of a five-year, $275 million contract.

With cap space and their future at quarterback, Johnson chose to coach the Bears.