Inside The Locker Room: As players gathered their equipment and said goodbye to Halas Hall for at least the time being, we heard from several guys, including pending free agents Jaquan Brisker and Kevin Byard III, plus core pieces Rome Odunze, Kyle Monangai and more.

Caleb Williams on the end of the season: “Being able to drive home and you’re like expecting to wake up the next day and come into the facility, watch the film and do all these different things. You get into such a routine.

“On the drive home, you’re thinking about it. On the drive home, you’re contemplating on the game, you’re contemplating on you don’t know who’s all going to be here, all these different things. Reflecting back on it, supremely grateful, supremely grateful of everyone here, the organization, last night, Chicago, the city and its support and love for us.”

Kevin Byard III on Ben Johnson: “Chicago, the Bears, they got the right guy leading this team. He did a phenomenal job this year. I think we all kinda knew when Ben came in as the head coach about his offensive play calling and how good the offense was gonna be. But I think just the accountability, the tone that was set from day one with the tough training camp that we had.”

Jaquan Brisker on the future: “These are great men off the field; great fathers, great sons, great husbands and great teammates too, and it hurts to not be a part of this no more with them or us together for this group to separate. It’s going to be tough, but I know it’s going to be greater for everybody and everything’s going to fall into place.”

Rome Odunze on his sophomore season: “I feel like this season I had way too many opportunities I left out there on the field, and that’s not been the player I’ve ever been in my career, so just capitalizing on those opportunities. I’ve got to go into the offseason and put in the work to do those things.”

We’ll hear from the head coach and general manager later this week.

Goin’ Back to Kansas City: Players weren’t the only ones packing their things and heading out. Running backs coach Eric Bieniemy was in the building early on Monday morning before news broke that the Kansas City Chiefs had requested to speak to their former offensive coordinator for their OC vacancy.

A short while later, The Athletic reported that Bieniemy would, in fact, return to Kansas City, where he’d coordinated Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs’ offense from 2018 through 2022.

Soooo…where does that leave Matt Nagy, who spent the last three seasons back as the Chiefs’ OC and previously held the job from 2016 through 2017 before he was hired as the Bears’ head coach?

Right now, it leaves him jobless. Nagy was thought to be a finalist for the Tennessee Titans’ head coaching vacancy, alongside Packers DC Jeff Hafley and ex-Browns HC Kevin Stefanski.

Stefanski, however, was hired by the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday, Hafley was hired by the Miami Dolphins yesterday and the Titans pivoted to former Jets HC Robert Saleh.

It’s not a great look for Nagy, who’s struggling to get looks in a cycle with 10 head coaching openings and isn’t under contract anywhere in 2026.

Bieniemy leaving the Bears after one season is admittedly a tough blow, too.

Kyle Monangai on Bieniemy: “He has meant a lot. Most of all, he kind of helped me to understand what it takes to be a great running back in this league and the amount of detail, the focus, the preparation and all those things. Just kind of learning from him as a running back coach, someone who has been a former OC and has coached great players, he definitely helped me out a lot from OTAs when we first met until now.”