Is Caleb Williams playing today? Bears Week 6 injury as QB eyes return

Ben Johnson's offensive genius can paper over plenty of cracks, but even he is capable of only so much. Sure, guiding Case Keenum and then Tyson Bagent to wins in the Chicago Bears' first two games without starting quarterback Caleb Williams was impressive, but last Sunday's shellacking at Lambeau Field drove the point home loudly: If the Bears want to keep up with the Joneses in the typically rugged NFC North, they need their QB1 back as soon as possible.

Thankfully, we have good news on that front for Chicago. Williams' status was up in the air all week as he returned to practice following his scary hamstring injury against the Minnesota Vikings late in Week 2. But despite a questionable tag, all signs point to him being under center on Sunday against the Atlanta Falcons.

Is Caleb Williams playing today? Bears QB officially a go for Week 6 vs. Falcons

Williams was trending in the right direction toward the end of the week, logging full practices on both Thursday and Friday per Chicago's injury report. And on Sunday morning, we got confirmation from NFL Network's Ian Rapoport that the former No. 1 overall pick will return to the lineup against Atlanta.

It's hard to overstate the impact this has on a Bears offense that had seen diminishing returns without him over the last couple of weeks. He's far, far more willing to push the ball down the field than we've seen from Bagent, and his athleticism in and out of the pocket — assuming it's not compromised as he returns from a hamstring injury — is second to none.

Granted, hamstring issues have a nasty habit of recurring if you don't give them proper time to heal, so we're not out of the woods just yet. And after the last two weeks, what the depth chart looks like behind Williams seems to be very much up in the air.

Bears QB depth chart behind Caleb Williams remains murky

Hopefully Bears fans will never have to find out who the next man up is should Williams be forced from the game again. But Johnson, for his part, has been playing it coy, refusing to commit to either Bagent or Keenum as his QB2 for Sunday's game against the Falcons.

Bagent is the younger, sprier option, but he also looked manifestly unfit to start in last week's loss at Green Bay. Keenum is obviously physically limited at this point in his career, but he proved in that stirring win over the Philadelphia Eagles that his timing, anticipation and accuracy can still get the job done when called upon. As Chicago's running game begins to leak water a bit, would Johnson go with the more known quantity rather than risk Bagent again?

Fantasy football outlook for Caleb Williams, Bears WRs

The biggest winners from all of this, beyond the mental health of the greater Chicagoland area, are Williams' pass-catchers, who've been largely left out to dry without him. Rome Odunze and Luther Burden III, in particular, have seen their production taper off as the Bears struggled to push the ball downfield with any regularity. With Williams back and playing indoors against a suspect Falcons secondary, both can be confidently fired up as WR2s once again. Colston Loveland was the biggest beneficiary of the shift to more underneath stuff in the passing game; how his volume is affected by Williams' return will be fascinating to watch on Sunday.

As for Williams himself, let's be real: If you have him on your roster, you're starting him. There are lingering questions about rust and about his ability to trust his hamstring and extend plays with his legs. But the last time we saw him play a fully healthy game that wasn't in the middle of a rainstorm, he cracked 50 points against the Carolina Panthers. The conditions are excellent here from a fantasy perspective, with no adverse weather in Atlanta against a very gettable Falcons secondary. Even if he's not running around in quite the way we're used to, he still should be productive enough to land as a back-end QB1 this week.

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