Green Bay, Wisc. — It wasn’t the extension Detroit Lions fans expected this offseason, but they’ll gladly take it. Late Saturday night, ahead of the team’s season opener against the Green Bay Packers, the Lions reached a three-year agreement with Jameson Williams that could keep the speedy receiver in Honolulu blue through the 2029 season.
The move was particularly unexpected because Williams looked as if he might be the odd man out as Detroit navigates an increasingly complex salary cap situation, having handsomely paid Jared Goff, Penei Sewell, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Taylor Decker and David Montgomery last year, followed by Kerby Joseph in April. On top of those extensions, there's the upcoming need to lock up Aidan Hutchinson, Brian Branch, Sam LaPorta and Jahmyr Gibbs.
Most of those completed deals were top of the market for the player’s position, with Hutchinson potentially set to be the biggest contract for a non-quarterback in NFL history.
It’s why, at the league meetings this offseason, general manager Brad Holmes hinted that Williams could end up pricing himself out of Detroit’s range.
"We're still taking it as it goes," Holmes said. "Look, his fifth-year option, it's looking likely that we'll just pick that up, but in terms of extension, again, there's a lot of extensions that are hopefully coming. It's just one that you just don't know what's going to happen from a financial standpoint, because a wide receiver. It's expensive. It's very expensive.”
However, two things have happened since that spring conversation with the GM. The first and obvious, Williams forced the Lions to alter their priorities with a tremendous offseason that has him primed to take his production to another level after topping 1,000 yards for the first time in 2024.
“The big step he’s taken forward has been fun to watch,” quarterback Jared Goff said this week.
Secondly, that anticipated price tag that had cast clouds of doubt over his long-term future with the franchise ended up far more reasonable than initially envisioned.
It can be difficult to wrap your head around a $27.7 million salary being a bargain, but, relatively speaking, it absolutely is in this instance.
That’s because the three-year extension doesn’t kick in until 2027. So the Lions will benefit from already having Williams under contract this season and next, under the terms of his rookie deal. And while the average of the new money currently ranks 13th among receivers, by the time it kicks in, the cap will have likely continued to rapidly inflate, with several future pacts pushing Williams down the highest-paid list.
The average of Williams’ new money checks in just below some of the game’s highest-paid No. 2 receivers, Miami’s Jaylen Waddle and Cincinnati’s Tee Higgins, and just ahead of Philadelphia’s DeVonta Smith.
The deal rubber-stamps the faith the Lions have in Williams, who had a rocky start to his career, largely because of self-inflicted wounds.
Drafted in the first round of the 2022 draft, after the Lions traded up 20 spots to land him, Williams missed a good chunk of his rookie season recovering from the torn ACL he suffered in his final college game.
He caught just one of nine targets in six appearances down the stretch of that season, then was suspended for the first four games of the 2023 season — reduced from six — for naively violating the league’s gambling policy. Then, when he returned, he was underwhelming, catching just 24 passes for 354 in 12 games while struggling with drops.
It wasn’t until last season that he turned a corner and started delivering on Detroit’s massive investment, but not without another bone-headed suspension for violating the league’s performance-enhancing substance policy.
Still, the Lions remained patient.
“I know this; we dangled the rope down on the way up,” Lions coach Dan Campbell said. “We can’t wait for anybody, and over a year ago he started climbing his way up and he got to us. And maybe he lost his grip, but he’ll climb back up again. That rope’s still there, it’s tied to us, and he’ll be just fine. He's part of this team and I trust him.”
Williams returned from the two-game ban and turned it on down the stretch, hauling in 41 balls for 640 and four scores across the final nine games of the 2024 campaign.
As noted, Williams has taken his game to another level this offseason. Under the watchful eye of position coach Scottie Montgomery, Williams has steadily added lower-body strength, which has enhanced his ability to stop as fast as he accelerates, expanding his route tree.
“He's in that mode of where he is ascending and he's taking the right steps, but he has to do it every single day,” Montgomery said. “He's very receptive.”
The Lions went through the tribulations with Williams. But he climbed the rope back to them and then some. Now, they’re in a position to enjoy the fruits of those efforts for years to come.
