{"id":707891,"date":"2026-06-16T17:57:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T17:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/707891\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T17:57:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T17:57:09","slug":"new-bear-kalif-raymond-is-helping-caleb-williams-grow-as-a-leader","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/707891\/","title":{"rendered":"New Bear Kalif Raymond is helping Caleb Williams grow as a leader"},"content":{"rendered":"

When wide receiver Kalif Raymond signed with the Bears this offseason, he said his decision ultimately came down to wanting to play for Ben Johnson<\/a>, who previously coached Raymond in Detroit. Johnson knows what Raymond can do in his offense, but Johnson also knows what Raymond can do as a team leader.<\/p>\n

The leadership element has been evident to quarterback Caleb Williams, who said Raymond talked to him during a frustrating practice about how the rest of the team is looking to him to stay positive and set the right example of how to shake off frustrations.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeaf has only been here for a couple couple months or so,\u201d Williams said of Raymond. \u201cLeaf came up to me, there was a day I wasn\u2019t having the best practice, so I got I got really frustrated. Leaf came up to me and said, \u2018Everybody\u2019s looking at you.\u2019 And that really resonated for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williams said he tries to adopt a stoic mindset of controlling the things he can and not getting rattled by the things he can\u2019t control, and he credited Raymond for keeping him on that mindset.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to be as stoic as possible, good, bad, or indifferent,\u201d Williams said. \u201cNot be too high or too low for the guys, and so when he said that to me, it stuck with me, and it bothered me and so just every day having that type of mindset: Be as stoic as possible, be as strong as possible for the guys because they\u2019re they\u2019re looking at me. And it takes a lot to do that because it\u2019s such a passionate \u2014 the energy in the sport is is so strong, but it\u2019s important to me, it\u2019s important to the guys, and it\u2019s important to Coach.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Raymond makes Williams a better franchise quarterback, then he\u2019s earning that new contract beyond what he contributes on the field.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When wide receiver Kalif Raymond signed with the Bears this offseason, he said his decision ultimately came down…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":707892,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[349,99],"class_list":["post-707891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=707891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707891\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/707892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}