Justin Fields and Caleb Williams will be forever linked. 

The Chicago Bears selected Fields in the first round in 2021. He would go on to spend the first three years of his NFL career in Chicago. This past March, that same franchise decided to trade Fields to the Pittsburgh Steelers in exchange for a conditional sixth-round draft pick in 2025. Just over a month later, the Bears used the first overall draft pick on Williams.

Fields experienced his fair share of ups and downs throughout his 40-game tenure with the Bears, but he has seemed to have found his footing with the Steelers. Super Bowl champion Russell Wilson was named the starter heading into the 2024 regular season, but he was scratched from Pittsburgh’s season opener against the Atlanta Falcons due to a hamstring injury.

Fields helped lift the Steelers to an 18-10 victory over the Falcons in Atlanta. Last week, Fields threw one touchdown and avoided turning the ball over in a game against the Denver Broncos to help Pittsburgh improve to 2-0 on the season.

STEELERS STICKING WITH JUSTIN FIELDS AT QB OVER INJURED RUSSELL WILSON FOR WEEK 3

Meanwhile, Williams’ final stat line after his NFL debut was largely forgettable. The Bears scored 24 points, which was enough to defeat the Tennessee Titans, but Williams finished the day with just 93 passing yards and no touchdowns. 

Williams delivered another pedestrian performance on Sunday night as the Bears suffered a 19-13 loss to 2023 NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year C.J. Stroud and the Houston Texans.

Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams heads off the field following an NFL football game against the Texans on Sunday, Sept. 15, 2024, in Houston. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Fields dealt with similar issues during his stint with the Bears. While Matt Nagy was the head coach during Fields’ rookie campaign, much of the Bears’ current regime, which is led by Matt Eberflus, was in place when the 25-year-old signal-caller was in Chicago.

Fields worked under a couple of different offensive coordinators during his run in the Windy City, but Eberflus’ approach to the offense appeared to largely remain the same. Eberflus elected to bring in Shane Waldron from the Seahawks to help guide Williams this season, but the results through the first pair of games have been underwhelming. 

Fields can certainly relate to what Williams is going through, and he told Fox News Digital that he believes the Heisman Trophy winner will ultimately recover from the slow start.

“I think he’s going to be fine,” Fields said when asked about how Williams will fare as the season progresses. “It’s his second game. He just got done playing. He’s talented, he has all the talent in the world. They drafted him No. 1 overall for a reason. 

“Of course, it’s just not him, but he’s going to get most of the blame just because of the position he’s in,” he continued. “But just as a whole … the guys over there I know … they want to be better, and I think they’re going to be better. So, I’m hoping that they start getting [the things] done on offense that they need to do.

“[Caleb] played two pretty good defenses coming out, so I think he’ll be fine.”

Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Justin Fields (2) runs against Broncos defensive end Zach Allen (99) during the first half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Sept. 15, 2024, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

Fields spoke to Fox News Digital on behalf of Reebok. This month, the NFL star teamed up with Reebok for the new Justin Fields collection. 

The collaboration introduces a training shoe called the Nano X4, a running shoe, the FloatZig 1, and a youth-sized shoe known as the Zig Dynamica 2.0. Every shoe in the collection features the mantra “Evening the Playing Fields” in the sock liner.

“It’s an honor to launch the Justin Fields Collection with Reebok and continue our shared mission of supporting the next generation of athletes,” Fields said. “The collection is designed to pay homage to my roots and the community around me.”

NFL quarterback Justin Fields’ Reebok footwear capsule titled “Reebok x Justin Fields” launched on Sept. 12. (Reebok)

Fields was named “Mr. Georgia football” during his standout high school football career. He went on to commit to the Bulldogs. But after experiencing limited playing time during his freshman season, he transferred to Ohio State. He went on to lead the Buckeyes to an appearance in the 2021 College Football Playoff National Championship game.

At just 25 years old, Fields has experienced quite a lot in his football career. He said his faith and his family help keep him grounded.

“God, to be honest, because I’ve seen how he’s worked in my life in those moments,” Fields told Fox News Digital when he reflected on changing schools and joining a new NFL team. “Just in life for anybody, we all come up with ideas in our heads of how we want certain things to play out, and that might not always be God’s will. He [does] things in a different way, and it turns out better than you could ever imagine.

“So, just trusting in him each and every day and also my family, really just the people who support me. Because I just know how God has put me on this platform to just inspire others … other people see what I’ve been through, so I just try and be a good role because at the end of the day we’re all going through something.”

Fields and the Steelers welcome the undefeated Los Angeles Chargers to Acrisure Stadium on Sept. 22 for Pittsburgh’s regular-season home opener.

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If you’ve watched the Sparks this season, their home finale went about exactly as you might have expected.

The Sparks got off to a hot start, building an advantage on the boards that led to a noticeable 12-2 margin in second-chance points as they took an eight-point lead into halftime. Then, an absolutely horrid third-quarter stretch snowballed as the Phoenix Mercury came roaring back to defeat the Sparks 85-81, handing them their eighth consecutive loss, tying a franchise record to close out their home schedule.

“It was that snowball effect again that we’ve talked about,” Sparks head coach Curt Miller said. “The offensive inefficiency, the offensive turnovers, a tough shooting night snowballed to where we lost some of our defensive focus and defensive intensity.”

After a back-and-forth first quarter, the Sparks opened the second quarter on a 10-2 run to take control of the game thanks in large part to strong performances off the bench from Li Yueru and Zia Cooke, whose nine points each tied Dearica Hamby for the team lead at the half. Rickea Jackson was starting to find her groove in the second half as well, getting to the line and shooting a perfect four for four on her free throws.

“I’m really appreciative of my coaching staff and all my teammates. They try to help me every game and every practice,” said Yueru, who had her first career double-double with career highs in both points (19) and rebounds (12). “I feel I really grew up.”

The Sparks were in full control of the game, with Brittney Griner the only Mercury player with more than five points (14) in the first half. But the mood shifted in the final seconds before halftime when Griner threw an elbow at Jackson, who took exception. They got in each other’s faces and exchanged shoves. After a lengthy official review, double technical fouls were handed out and Jackson and Griner were ejected from the game.

Almost as if on cue, things began to unravel for the Sparks once the second half was underway. The Mercury got off to a quick 10-2 run of their own to erase the Sparks lead, and finished the quarter on a 9-4 run to push it to double digits. In Griner’s absence, it was 20-year veteran Diana Taurasi (13 points, three rebounds, five assists), Sophie Cunningham (14 points, three rebounds, two assists), and Natasha Cloud (13 points, 12 assists) who stepped up to lead the Mercury.

“To Phoenix’s credit, they made it ugly,” Miller said. “They played a lot of zone, they scrambled around and pressed without BG. I thought we were on our heels immediately in the third quarter, got a little tentative against the zone. I didn’t think that first unit shared the ball particularly well.”

Miller in his postgame comments praised Taurasi as one of the greatest to ever play the game, referring to her as one of the torch-bearers of the WNBA.

“I don’t know if that truly is Diana’s last regular season road game, but she has meant so much to this league,” he said. “She continues to play at an extremely high level. … The GOAT gets tossed around a lot in sports these days, but truly one of the best to ever do it. And the longevity that she’s done it at is truly remarkable.”

Meanwhile, nothing went the Sparks’ way in the third quarter. They had eight turnovers, which matched their total in the first half. In total, they gave up 31 points off 20 turnovers, as both the ball and the game continued to slip away.

After the final buzzer sounded, sealing the defeat and an abysmal 5-15 home record this season, Azura Stevens took a minute to address the crowd at Crypto.com Arena.

“I can promise you that each and every one of us will be in the gym this offseason and we’re going to get better,” Stevens said. “Mark my words, next year is going to be different.”

On Jan. 11, Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers posted a video to more than 200,000 followers on Instagram. In it, he signed a trading card with his face and added a message below.

“I’m coming back,” he wrote, holding the card up to the camera.

The top comment on the post?

“Yall gonna lose manning (sic),” it read, adding a pair of laughing emojis aimed at the Longhorns’ predicted misfortunes.

Manning, as in Arch Manning: five-star recruit, and the son of Cooper, nephew of Eli and Peyton and grandson of Archie. Ewers’ surprising decision was about chasing Texas’ first national title since 2005, but the commenter wasn’t alone in directing attention to college football’s most famous backup in an era in which there is no penalty for transferring.

Even before Ewers elected to return, Manning faced questions at the Sugar Bowl about whether he wanted to leave after barely seeing the field in his first season.

“It’s tough because you want to be out there playing with your boys,” Manning told The Athletic in July. “But just realizing there’s nowhere else I want to be, and it was my dream to play at Texas. I’m going to stick it out and play there eventually,”

He made the same decision as Ewers: He was coming back. He was always coming back. Now, Manning is likely to make his first career start against Louisiana-Monroe on Saturday, as Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said Ewers is questionable to play after straining his oblique against UTSA.

“Arch is just another guy on our team, and the reason I’m able to do that is because that’s who Arch is every day,” Sarkisian said Monday. “He’s the selfless teammate. He cares about the guys on the team. He cares about Quinn. They’ve got a great relationship. He works his tail off. He wants to play good football for them because he knows how hard everybody’s working.

“So I literally don’t address it with him. I don’t address it with the team. He’s just part of the team.”

Arch Manning threw for 223 yards and had five total TDs versus UTSA. (Tim Warner / Getty Images)

There was a time when quarterbacks seeing the field before their second or third year was an anomaly. Now, it’s an expectation, at least for five-star prospects. When Manning’s name never appeared in the transfer portal, he bucked a decade of trends among college quarterbacks.

Transfer portal decisions are unique to every player, but as Manning enters what is expected to be his first start, we’re seeing the reasons why leaving would introduce more questions than answers and present more problems than solutions.

Though Manning has thrown only 23 passes in four appearances since arriving in 2023, things have largely gone according to plan at Texas — even if winning the starting job was delayed by a year because of Ewers’ return. Manning is still one good season away from crystallizing his status as a first-round draft pick, and he has plenty of time to do it, with three years of eligibility remaining after this season. His path to the field became clearer when last year’s backup, Maalik Murphy, transferred to Duke, and another year working behind Ewers was only going to make the results better once it was time for his turn in the spotlight.

His growing pains have mostly been able to come in closed practices. They haven’t had to come in nationally televised games like young quarterbacks who are asked to be saviors like freshmen Dylan Raiola at Nebraska and DJ Lagway at Florida. But when he has been given the opportunity, he’s excelled. On Saturday, thrust into extended duty against an overmatched UTSA team, he threw a touchdown pass on his first attempt, scooted past a safety for a 67-yard touchdown run and finished with three more touchdown passes in a 56-7 blowout win.

GO DEEPER

With Quinn Ewers injured, Arch Manning tallies five TDs vs. UTSA

Now, if he starts Saturday, he’ll do it for a Texas team ranked No. 1 in the AP poll for the first time since 2008, when Colt McCoy was under center for the Longhorns. McCoy, by the way, didn’t play his first season at Texas either.

Since high school, everything the Mannings have done with Arch points to a big-picture approach, aiming for a lengthy NFL career, not the quickest path to the playing field or the best way to earn money from his fame in college. Manning’s recruitment was straight out of 1995: If you don’t have DMs, reporters and coaches can’t slide into them, and it’s easier for coaches and parents to control coaches’ access to you, too.

He’s a non-factor on social media. He barely spoke to reporters about his college decision, a family strategy borne out of a desire to allow him to live a more normal high school life. His family background affords him the ability to shrug off the obligations of chasing NIL money, as does his status as a likely NFL Draft pick after he does get on the field.

GO DEEPER

Arch Manning’s unique approach to recruiting

Now, his decision to stay patient in college is old-school, too. NIL money is the invisible hand guiding players into and out of the transfer portal, but the success that his family has enjoyed means money was never going to influence his decision. As of last December, his only NIL deal was an exclusive trading card partnership with Panini America, despite erroneous reports that he was earning millions as Texas’ third-string quarterback. After initially declining to be included, he elected to opt into his name, image and likeness being used in EA Sports’ College Football 25.

Manning has done little to nothing to “grow his brand” and yet the brand he was born with has made him one of the five biggest names in college football.

Ewers returned to Texas with national title aspirations in Texas’ first season in the SEC after reaching the College Football Playoff a season ago and narrowly losing to Washington in the semifinals. His faith in Sarkisian and the team returning to Austin has thus far been rewarded, and Manning saw the same thing.

If the program had been on shakier ground entering the SEC, it stands to reason Manning might have entertained entering the portal. But Texas is as strong as it’s been since the heyday of Mack Brown in the 2000s. Why would Manning leave and adjust to new coaches, a new play caller, a new offense and a new head coach for what would almost certainly be a worse team?

And there’s the uncomfortable reality that Ewers, who could be the first quarterback taken in the 2025 NFL Draft, has been one of the more injury-prone QBs in college football, even as he’s developed into one of the best. When he strained his oblique Saturday, he did it as the betting favorite for the Heisman Trophy. In 2022, he missed a shade under four games after injuring his shoulder in a close loss to Alabama. In 2023, he missed two Big 12 games with a sprained AC joint in his shoulder. Texas turned to Murphy to keep its Big 12 and national title hopes on track and survived an upset bid from Kansas State while Ewers healed.

Now, Ewers is injured again, and Manning looked like America’s best backup quarterback in relief against UTSA.

Regardless of Ewers’ readiness to play, handing Manning the keys for a game against ULM in which Texas is favored by 45 points is the prudent decision. The next two opponents, Louisiana-Monroe and Mississippi State, are unlikely to test the Longhorns, and Ewers seems likely to return by the time the national championship pressures increase when Texas’ date with Oklahoma in the Red River Showdown arrives on Oct. 12 before Georgia comes to town on Oct. 19.

When Ewers stayed for one more unexpected year in Austin, it was easy to expect Manning to act like every other quarterback and develop a drifting eye to find a new program. But Manning leaving Texas never made sense. His college football experience is not like every other quarterback’s.

Why wouldn’t his decision-making be different?

(Top illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; photos: Eric Gay / Associated Press; Tim Warner / Getty Images)