Player

Caleb Williams

QB · CHI Bears

Sacks are the most expensive negative play in football and the leading source of quarterback fumbles, so a 44-sack swing is worth several wins on its own. The reason to treat this one seriously rather than as a line-play story is that sack rate is usually the quarterback's, not the tackles': across 534 back-to-back seasons in this data, roughly two in three passers land on the same side of league average two years running. Williams did the opposite, by more than almost anyone ever has.

FanIQ Research · August 31, 2026 · 7 facts, every one from the play-by-play

The year the sacks stopped

He was sacked 68 times as a rookie, then 24. Only David Carr has ever cut a sack rate harder in one offseason.

Rare

Biggest one-year drop in sack rate since 1999 (300 or more dropbacks in both seasons)

Quarterback	First year	Sacks	Rate	Next year	Sacks	Rate	Change
David Carr	2002	76	14.62%	2003	15	4.84%	-9.78
Caleb Williams	2024	68	10.79%	2025	24	4.05%	-6.74
Kurt Warner	2004	39	12.34%	2005	23	5.78%	-6.56
Dak Prescott	2018	56	9.62%	2019	23	3.72%	-5.91
Nick Foles	2013	28	8.12%	2014	9	2.81%	-5.30

Most sacks taken in a season since 1999 (regular season)

Quarterback	Season	Sacks	Attempts
David Carr	2002	76	444
David Carr	2005	68	423
Caleb Williams	2024	68	562
Sam Howell	2023	65	612
Jon Kitna	2006	63	596

His rookie season is one of the three worst pass-protection years any quarterback has endured since 1999: 68 sacks, tied with David Carr's 2005 and behind only Carr's 76 in 2002. Then it vanished. Williams went down 24 times in 2025 on more pass attempts, a fall from a 10.79 percent sack rate to 4.05 percent. In 25 years only Carr's 2002-to-2003 turnaround was steeper, and Carr had a full expansion roster rebuilt around him to explain it.

Why it matters. Sacks are the most expensive negative play in football and the leading source of quarterback fumbles, so a 44-sack swing is worth several wins on its own. The reason to treat this one seriously rather than as a line-play story is that sack rate is usually the quarterback's, not the tackles': across 534 back-to-back seasons in this data, roughly two in three passers land on the same side of league average two years running. Williams did the opposite, by more than almost anyone ever has.

MYTH TEST: short quarterbacks throw more picks. The 6-foot-1 one just led the NFL in throwing the fewest.

Lowest interception rate, 2025 (300 or more attempts, regular season)

Quarterback	Attempts	Interceptions	Rate	Yards	TD
Caleb Williams	568	7	1.23%	3,942	27
Cam Ward	540	7	1.30%	3,169	15
Jalen Hurts	454	6	1.32%	3,224	25
Matthew Stafford	597	8	1.34%	4,707	46
Jordan Love	439	6	1.37%	3,381	23
Jared Goff	578	8	1.38%	4,564	34

The old scouting worry is that a quarterback under 6-foot-2 cannot see over his line and will throw the ball into traffic. The record does not support it, and 2025 is a loud example: Williams, listed at 6-foot-1, threw 7 interceptions on 568 attempts, a 1.23 percent rate that was the lowest in football among quarterbacks with 300 or more throws. He did it while attempting more passes than all but four quarterbacks in the league. Height was not the variable. It rarely is.

Why it matters. The myth persists because it is intuitive and because it survives on anecdotes rather than rates. What actually drives interceptions is throw depth and decision speed, which is why the same quarterback can lead the league in deep touchdowns and in ball security in the same season. For Williams specifically, the low interception rate is the cleanest evidence that the leap from year one to year two was about decision-making rather than luck.

Eleven touchdowns on throws past 20 yards, more than anybody in football. He completed 39 percent of them.

Rare

Most touchdowns on throws of 20 or more air yards, 2025 (regular season)

Quarterback	Deep attempts	Completions	Deep TD	INT
Caleb Williams	82	32	11	2
Matthew Stafford	90	39	10	1
Bo Nix	72	25	9	4
Jalen Hurts	65	24	9	1
Baker Mayfield	69	21	8	3
Drake Maye	70	35	7	3

Williams threw 82 passes at least 20 yards downfield and turned 11 of them into touchdowns, the most in the NFL. He was not especially accurate on them: his 39.0 percent completion rate on deep throws trails Drake Maye's 50.0 and Stafford's 43.3. It did not matter. Only Matthew Stafford threw more of them, and only two of the 82 were intercepted, which is the combination that makes a low-percentage throw the most valuable one in football.

Why it matters. The deep ball is the only pass in the game where a sub-40 percent completion rate is still the right call, because the reward on the ones that land is large enough to swamp the cost of an incompletion. Williams's version of it is unusually safe: high volume, 11 scores, two picks. That profile is also what explains the rest of his statistical shape, including the lowest completion percentage in the league, and it is the piece Chicago's offense is clearly built to keep using.

How he actually scores

The fifth-best fantasy quarterback in football completed 58.1 percent of his passes, the lowest rate in the league.

Anomaly

Lowest completion percentage, 2025 (400 or more attempts, regular season)

Quarterback	Attempts	Completion pct	Yards per attempt	TD
Caleb Williams	568	58.1	6.94	27
Cam Ward	540	59.8	5.87	15
Trevor Lawrence	560	60.9	7.16	29
Patrick Mahomes	502	62.7	7.15	22
Baker Mayfield	543	63.2	6.80	26

Top-6 fantasy quarterback seasons since 1999 with a sub-60 completion rate (400 or more attempts)

Quarterback	Season	Finish	Completion pct	Rushing yards	PPR
Cam Newton	2015	1st	59.8	636	389.1
Cam Newton	2011	3rd	60.0	706	370.3
Blake Bortles	2015	4th	58.6	310	316.1
Caleb Williams	2025	5th	58.1	388	318.7
Josh Allen	2019	6th	58.8	510	288.6
Mike Vick	2002	3rd	54.9	777	280.7

Williams finished fifth among fantasy quarterbacks with 318.7 PPR points while completing a league-low 58.1 percent of his throws. That combination barely exists: since 1999 only 18 quarterback seasons have paired a top-six finish with a sub-60 completion rate on 400 or more attempts, and almost every one of them was a heavy runner. Cam Newton owns four of the 18 and averaged 709 rushing yards in them. Williams ran for 388. The closest match to his shape is Blake Bortles in 2015, and Bortles ran for even less.

Why it matters. Completion percentage measures where a quarterback throws as much as whether he is accurate, so a league-low number attached to a top-five fantasy finish is a statement about depth of target, not competence. Williams is producing volume points from deep shots and touchdowns rather than from an efficient underneath game. It is a real profile with a real risk attached: the same low-percentage throws that produced 11 deep touchdowns are the ones most exposed to a defense taking the top away.

In the six games he ran for 25 yards or more he averaged 22.7 fantasy points. In the other eleven, 16.6.

Split

Caleb Williams by rushing output, 2025 (regular season)

Split	Games	PPR per game	Passing TD	Rushing TD
Ran for 25 or more yards	6	22.72	9	2
Ran for under 25 yards	11	16.58	18	1

His four best fantasy weeks of 2025

Week	Opponent	Passing yards	Passing TD	Rushing yards	PPR
9	CIN	280	3	53	38.7
3	DAL	298	4	12	29.1
10	NYG	220	1	63	25.1
1	MIN	210	1	58	24.2

The legs are the difference between a good week and a great one. In the six games where Williams gained at least 25 rushing yards he averaged 22.72 fantasy points; in the other eleven, 16.58, a gap of six points a week. Three of his four highest-scoring games came with 50 or more yards on the ground, including a 38.7-point night against Cincinnati built on 280 passing yards, three touchdowns and 53 rushing yards.

Why it matters. Quarterback rushing is the cleanest source of fantasy leverage because it adds points without requiring the passing game to be efficient, and Williams's split is unusually stark for a passer who is not a designed runner. The caution is that 388 rushing yards is a modest total: this is scramble production, which depends on how often defenses cover everyone downfield rather than on a play call. That makes the weekly ceiling real but not schedulable.

The 2026 file

Chicago ran the second-most offensive plays in football. Only Dallas snapped it more often.

Anomaly

Most offensive plays run, 2025 (regular season)

Team	Plays	EPA per play	EPA rank
Dallas	1,104	0.098	5th
Chicago	1,096	0.079	8th
LA Chargers	1,080	-0.023	25th
Denver	1,079	0.050	10th
NY Giants	1,079	0.012	17th

NFC North offensive volume, 2025 (regular season)

Team	Plays	Rank	Pass plays	Rank
Chicago	1,096	2nd	600	16th
Detroit	1,051	14th	619	9th
Green Bay	993	26th	519	28th
Minnesota	943	30th	547	25th

Volume is the quiet half of Williams's fantasy case. Chicago ran 1,096 offensive plays in 2025, second in the NFL behind Dallas, and was eighth in value per play. That is 103 more snaps than Green Bay and 153 more than Minnesota. A quarterback in a top-two-volume offense gets a structural head start on the field every week, and it is the reason Williams could finish fifth in PPR points despite the league's lowest completion rate.

Why it matters. Offensive snap count is close to a fixed team trait, set by tempo philosophy and by how often a team stays on schedule, and it multiplies every skill player attached to it. For a quarterback specifically it is the difference between 30 and 35 attempts a week, which compounds across 17 games into real separation in the standings. Chicago's version is unusually durable because it is paired with an above-average efficiency number, meaning the snaps are not just the byproduct of trailing.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT: young quarterbacks who finish top six stay top twelve about seven times in ten. The call is another top-12 season.

Caleb Williams's 2025 (regular season)

Measure	Value
PPR points	318.7
Finish among QBs	5th
Passing TD to INT	27 to 7
Deep touchdowns (20 or more air yards)	11, most in the NFL
Age on September 1, 2026	24

QBs finishing top six in PPR at age 24 or younger with 14 or more games, 1999-2024: the next year

Outcome the following season	Count
Qualifying seasons with a next season	29
Finished top 12 again	21 of 29 (72%)
Finished top 6 again	12 of 29 (41%)
Average next-season finish	10th

The call: Williams finishes as a top-12 fantasy quarterback again in 2026. Since 1999, 29 quarterbacks aged 24 or younger have finished top six and then played another season, and 21 of them stayed inside the top twelve, with the group averaging a 10th-place finish. Chicago supplies the two things that base rate is really made of: the second-most offensive plays in football and a play caller who lets him throw it deep 82 times. At an average draft position of 88.1 he is priced like a backup, which is the part of this that does not add up.

Why it matters. The reason the base rate is this friendly is that a young quarterback's top-six season is usually built on a role and a scheme that both persist, unlike a running back's touchdown spike or a receiver's target share swing. The failure cases in the cohort are mostly injuries and coaching changes rather than a passer suddenly getting worse. The specific risk for Williams is the sack rate: history says it belongs to him, and he is one year removed from one of the three worst sack seasons any quarterback has posted in 25 years.

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