Detroit Lions’ Jameson Williams has a rare, special quality that could make him a success

If it comes to pass that one day, perhaps in the near future or perhaps awhile a longer, Jameson Williams becomes the kind of elite receiver the Detroit Lions envisioned when they moved up in the NFL draft to select him 12th overall last year, there will be one significant reason it happens.

It’s a special quality that most players don’t possess. It’s a special quality that most athletes either don’t want or don’t understand how to handle.

But Williams has it. He has the rare quality of wanting the spotlight and knowing how to handle it.

Williams has been under intense scrutiny this year, now that he has recovered from a torn ACL and is expected to make good on all that promise he showed in one spectacular, 1,572-yard, 15-touchdown season at Alabama in 2021.

From his social-media faux pas to his head coach saying he’ll probably never have elite hands, to concerning activity on late-night Instagram posts, to the biggest mistake of them all — getting slapped with a six-game suspension for violating the NFL’s rules on gambling — Williams has been under in the kind searing spotlight that only an ant under a magnifying glass on a sunny day could understand.

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On Monday, Williams spoke with reporters only a few days after an uneven performance in the preseason opener against the New York Giants. I’ve attended almost every one of Williams’ news conferences, and in every one he has maintained his composure and his professionalism, he hasn’t been defensive or angry, no matter how hard the questions have been or how difficult the situation.

On Monday, I found out why. He’s comfortable in the spotlight. He wants it in its entirety, even when others might wince when its glare becomes too intense.

“Yeah, I feel eyes on me,” he said. “But you know it come with everything, like being drafted high. I wouldn’t say I want the eyes off of me because I want ’em on me. Eventually they’ll be on me.

“So I wouldn’t say it’s no pressure or anything. I don’t feel no pressure.”

Let’s stop to appreciate the full extent of that statement. Williams understands that all the attention — plus his lucrative four-year, $17.5 million contract — comes precisely because he was a high draft pick. But he’s OK with the good and the bad publicity.

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Most players have a hard time with the duality of attention. They only want to bask in the spotlight while everything’s good. But when things take a bad turn, they can’t dodge into the dark fast enough. Ndamukong Suh was a great player and probably an even better self-promoter. But when the spotlight exposed his problems off the field, he would turn sullen and angry.

It seems Williams needs the spotlight to thrive, maybe in the way Golden Tate did, which helped spur him on to becoming a Pro Bowler. Love from the fans, praise from his teammates and coaches, exalting headlines — I’m sure Williams can imagine it all coming back to him, recapturing all that Alabama adoration.

Of course, Williams needs to pair his love of attention with the right kind of preparation on and off the field. And give the Lions credit for listening to my whining. I asked Dan Campbell in June if team had plans to provide Williams with a mentor, and he arrived Monday in the form of Teddy Bridgewater. (I can’t resist thinking of Bridgewater playing Crash Davis to Williams’ Nuke LaLoosh.)

The other thing working in Williams’ favor is the benefit of doubt he’s going to get from the decision-makers, and specifically from Brad Holmes. Because the thing Williams doesn’t fully understand at age 22 is that his success is not entirely about him. It’s about Campbell, but mostly about his general manager, who took the biggest swing of his tenure by trading up to draft a promising but injured player.

If Williams succeeds, he would be the litmus test that confirms Holmes’ talent for spotting talent where others might not see it and having the boldness and conviction to pursue it, despite the cost and risk. It would also give Holmes full license to make a similar move in the future.

But if Williams is a bust, then there will have to be an equivocation about the swing and miss. He might have to tread more cautiously in the first round. Williams’ failure wouldn’t do any serious damage to Holmes’ impressive draft record so far, but it would never be forgotten.

It’s good that Williams probably hasn’t worked out all this organizational calculus. If he stopped to consider that the reputation of his bosses and the hope of the franchise and its fans are at stake, he might be paralyzed by the pressure.

But that sounds like the furthest thing from his mind.

“Nah, no pressure, no pressure,” he said, quickly cutting of a question before it was barely be asked. “I was born for this.”

Maybe. Or maybe not. The only thing we know for sure about Williams is whether or not he lives up to his birthright, he won’t lack for attention during his attempt.

Contact Carlos Monarrez: cmonarrez@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @cmonarrez.