Caleb Williams finally signed his rookie contract with the Chicago Bears earlier this week even though he didn’t get everything he wanted.
Following the news that Caleb had signed his contract, it was reported that Williams had a unique request from Chicago Bears put a “no franchise tag” clause in his contract, which was denied by the Bears for obvious reasons.
But that wasn’t the only unique request. According to Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk, Williams (who’s representing himself) tried to get creative in paying taxes in the state of Illinois by having the Bears pay out his contract to an LLC.
LLCs in Illinois have zero income tax filing requirements, which would mea that his contract would be state tax exempt. The IRS does not consider an LLC to be a distinct, operate entity for tax purposes, so there is a lot of flexibility with how taxes can be paid by an LLC on a federal level.
Like the no-tag request, this was also denied and the 22-year-old signed a standard four-year, $39 million deal instead.
On Friday, Bears general manager Ryan Poles addressed the reports and didn’t acknowledge any of the fine details but noted that the negotiations with Williams were far form unusual. Via Josh Schrock of NBC Sports Chicago:
Poles also noted that the negotiations were a “positive” in regards to communication so there are no signs that Williams’ unique requests rubbed the organization the wrong way.
With the financial aspect behind him, Williams and the Bears can focus on the on-field stuff. The rookie quarterback enters a pressure-packed situation in Chicago with a fanbase starving for a star at the position.
