Bears

Bears QB Caleb Williams had a positive outlook following the loss to the Rams and told reporters he is excited for what lies ahead in the future for Chicago. He also hopes to work on both his footwork and accuracy this offseason.

“In these moments, you feel like you let your team down,” Williams told Courtney Cronin. “It’s a good lesson for us; first time being in this situation for me and for us as a team. I’m excited for what’s to come. We’re going to be here for a little bit. I’m excited about it. I’m excited about the growth. I’m excited about being able to go back and watch this. I’m excited to being able to get back, and next year being able to learn more than I did this year, keep growing, and us as a team and an organization to be able to keep growing.”

“We had a hell of a year,” Bears S Kevin Byard noted. “Nobody beginning of the season picked us to be where we were at. To be in the position to still almost win the game at the end, it just didn’t work out for us this year, but just super proud of the group. We have no reason to hang our heads. We don’t believe in moral victories, but at the same time, this is a special group and the culture has been set, and [we] expect to have success in the future.”

“When you have a season like this, when you have so much fun throughout the season, when you win so many games, you can’t let all that go to waste … after one season-ending loss,” CB Jaylon Johnson added. “We’ve had a hell of a ride, and each man individually has had a hell of a ride. We can really be thankful and have a lot of gratitude for what this season has done and how we’ve grown as men and grown as a team.”

“I know he’s feeling it because we didn’t win and had some turnovers mixed in there, and he’s feeling it,” HC Ben Johnson said of Williams. “But he’s one of those guys I’m talking about that will remember this feeling, and he’s going to be stronger for it.”

Packers

• The Athletic’s Matt Schneidman, citing a league source, writes that Packers president Ed Policy didn’t take the Packers’ playoff collapse into much account when deciding about HC Matt LaFleur‘s future. Instead, Policy leaned on the seven years he worked with LaFleur in totality, starting when he was part of the panel that hired him. 
• Per Schneidman, Policy believes LaFleur is proficient in team and player development, especially at quarterback. 
• Regarding all the furor about LaFleur and GM Brian Gutekunst‘s future from them not getting extensions last summer, including Schneidman reporting multiple times that this season could be a pivotal one for LaFleur, the source told Schneidman that Policy felt “very good” about both LaFleur and Gutekunst staying in Green Bay long term but wanted to remain open-minded until he had to make a decision
• Schneidman adds he was told it was possible Policy could have changed his mind, but it would’ve taken something “very significant” to do so, and evidently the slump to end the season didn’t qualify. According to Schneidman, Policy didn’t spend much time debating whether to offer LaFleur an extension after the season ended, and the delay was strictly about how negotiations progressed. 
• Schneidman notes Policy is not changing the reporting structure, with both LaFleur and Gutekunst reporting to him instead of having LaFleur report to Gutekunst. Policy also will not mandate any staff changes. 

Vikings

Vikings GM Kwesi Adofo-Mensah fielded questions about the state of the franchise and the perception that QB J.J. McCarthy may not be the team’s quarterback of the future.

“It’s easier to go and be a revisionist and results-based,” Adofo-Mensah said, via Kevin Seifert. “But to really think through what we had at the time, I still understand why we did what we did. The results maybe didn’t play out the way we wanted them to. Ultimately, I think that at the end of the day, we could have executed [player acquisitions] better in certain places. And I don’t want to say individually, in terms of a particular player, but just executing better, knowing what the room was play-style-wise, experience-wise, and really put together a better combination of people, collective in that group. That’s the thing I probably focused on the most.”

“And I think one of those goals is to make playoff runs and do different things like that,” Adofo-Mensah added. “I think he has the character and ability to be the person and do that for our organization. If I say that in 2026, that kind of binds us into a certain area. The way we’ve set this team up … to give ourselves multiple shots at [a Super Bowl] because you never know when there’s going to be a year where the field feels a little bit wide open and you can make that run. … It’s my job to really bring that deep, competitive room that we’ve talked about to the Vikings.”

• The Vikings will not retain OL coach Chris Kuper as his contract is expiring, and will be searching for a replacement. (Goessling)

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