Third-string QB Case Keenum ends 1,009-day drought, leads Bears past unbeaten Eagles 27-7

CHICAGO — Case Keenum had not started an NFL game since a Sunday afternoon in Houston more than 1,000 days earlier, a stretch that carried him through practice-squad stints and clipboard duty with four different franchises. On Monday night, pressed into duty as the Chicago Bears' third-string quarterback, the 38-year-old threw two touchdown passes, ran for a third and posted the best statistical line of his 14-year career as the Bears beat the Philadelphia Eagles 27-7 at Soldier Field.

The game had been billed as a measuring stick for Philadelphia, which entered the week unbeaten and widely regarded as one of the more complete rosters in the NFC. Instead, it turned into a showcase for a Chicago quarterback room that had been reduced, by Monday afternoon, to a single healthy arm.

The result, laid out in the Bears' official account of the game, moved Chicago to 2-1 and dropped Philadelphia to the same record after an unbeaten start. It was a lopsided outcome against a team many analysts had rated among the NFC's strongest rosters, and it turned entirely on a journeyman quarterback who had been signed as camp depth and was never supposed to play a meaningful snap this season.

The numbers

Keenum completed 24 of 34 passes for 247 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions, then added a 1-yard sneak for a third score, finishing with a career-best 110.8 passer rating in a start, according to the club's report on his first start in 1,009 days. His touchdown throws covered 8 yards to rookie receiver Luther Burden III in the first quarter and 41 yards to Kalif Raymond in the third, sandwiched around a pair of Cairo Santos field goals that pushed Chicago's lead to 20-7 by the end of the third quarter. Philadelphia's only points came on a 1-yard Hurts sneak just before halftime.

Chicago's defense supplied the other half of the story. The unit forced three turnovers — Austin Booker jarred loose a fumble that Xavier Woods recovered, rookie safety Dillon Thieneman intercepted a pass in the end zone, and linebacker T.J. Edwards picked off a fourth-down throw — while limiting Philadelphia to 62 total yards after halftime and a 22.2 percent conversion rate on third down. The Eagles finished with 238 total yards to Chicago's 375, a gap Pro Football Focus flagged as one of the widest of the young season. Jalen Hurts completed 16 of 25 passes for 153 yards with the interception and a 64.2 rating before giving way late to backup Andy Dalton, who threw the pick that Thieneman returned, according to Philadelphia's own recap of the loss. The box score is also posted through the league's official game center.

How Chicago got here

The Bears did not plan to start Keenum, and as late as midweek were unsure who would take the snaps. Caleb Williams, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2024 draft, strained his right hamstring scrambling in the fourth quarter of a 9-3 loss to Minnesota two days earlier and was ruled out for Monday. His primary backup, Tyson Bagent, entered the concussion protocol after replacing Williams against the Vikings, leaving Keenum — whose most recent NFL start had come for Houston on Dec. 24, 2023 — as the only healthy option. He was the only Bears quarterback to take a full practice that week.

Keenum's own path to that moment stretched back well beyond this season. Undrafted out of the University of Houston, where he left as the NCAA's career leader in total passing yards and touchdowns, he has since appeared for the Texans, Rams, Vikings, Broncos, Washington, Browns and Bills, returning to Chicago as a veteran depth signing. His previous career-best passer rating, 117.6, came in his 2019 debut for Washington against this same Eagles franchise, and his most recent NFL start of any kind, before Monday, came for Houston on Christmas Eve 2023 — a game that fell 1,009 days before this one.

The stakes extended beyond one game. Chicago hired Ben Johnson away from the Detroit Lions' offensive coordinator job in January 2025 largely on the strength of his work reviving Jared Goff's career, with an explicit mandate to do the same for Williams after a rookie season in which the Bears finished 5-12 and Williams absorbed a league-high 68 sacks. Three games into Johnson's tenure, his offense instead ran through a 38-year-old who had signed with the team as depth insurance.

Philadelphia arrived at Soldier Field 2-0 and regarded as a legitimate contender, with Hurts, running back Saquon Barkley and a defense that has carried the franchise to consecutive playoff berths.

Reaction

For the Eagles, the postgame tone was about correcting mistakes rather than reassessing talent. Barkley, held largely in check, said afterward: "Got to fix it. We know the problem. We got to get better at it." Dalton, whose interception effectively ended any comeback hope, said: "I can't turn the ball over in that situation." Coach Nick Sirianni, asked about Hurts being evaluated for a concussion after an illegal hit out of bounds and then returning to the game, said only that the "health of players is most important thing."

For Keenum, the night carried a different weight.

"When you're playing well any time in your career, it feels good. To do it on Monday Night Football after you thought you weren't ever going to play again multiple times, golly, this is special."

Teammates echoed him. Tight end Colston Loveland called him "a stone-cold killer, a vet" who "does everything the right way," and guard Jonah Jackson said Keenum is "just able to dot things up" with practiced ease. Keenum himself, asked what carried him through years of backup roles and releases, offered a family phrase rather than football jargon: "Keenums can do hard things." Johnson, whose team had an unusually short turnaround between Sunday's loss and Monday's kickoff, called the performance "extraordinary" and credited a defense that "were flying around" in the second half.

What happens next

Williams' hamstring strain is considered mild by the team's own description, but the Bears have not set a firm return timeline, and the decision over whether Johnson turns back to his former No. 1 pick once healthy or continues to lean on his 38-year-old backup will be one of the more closely watched subplots in the league over the coming weeks. Bagent, the other injured quarterback, remains in the concussion protocol with no clear timetable either, which means Keenum could be under center again even after Williams is cleared to practice.

Chicago hosts the New York Jets in Week 4, while Philadelphia travels to face the Los Angeles Rams. Both teams enter that weekend at 2-1, but the way they got there diverged sharply: the Eagles now face questions about turnovers and third-down execution against a defense that outplayed them from start to finish, while the Bears have, for the moment, a quarterback controversy manufactured entirely by injury rather than performance. Nothing about Monday's box score changes the long-term plan in Chicago, where Williams remains the franchise's investment at the position, but it does mean Johnson enters this week without an obvious reason to rush a change.