Despite the recent string of wins, and the preluding streak of losses; the firing of a head coach and the inability to score a touchdown, the Washington Redskins’ 2019 season has largely been ruled by a single storyline — the Trent Williams debacle that has played out in front of our eyes.
When it comes to Williams and his lengthy holdout that was ended over a month ago, we have facts, and we have opinions. For many, the reasoning behind all of it is in the eye of the beholder, and you can claim that he either had ill intentions when returning minutes before the NFL Trade Deadline to collect a check or that he actually ended his holdout with intentions to play football with his teammates.
In a new interview with The Washington Post, Williams says that when he returned to the team, he did so with every intention of returning to the field.
Yes, his coming back was a procedural move, to get credit for the 2019 season and keep the team from claiming it still controlled him for two more years on a contract that would otherwise expire after next season. But as long as he had returned to the team, he was going to play.
“At the end of the day I just wanted to do it for my teammates,” he says.
He passed his physical and was ready to take the field, that is until the seven-time Pro Bowler tried to put on his helmet for the first time in a long while and experienced severe discomfort stemming from a scar on his scalp that was left after a rare form of cancer was removed earlier that year — the debacle that started this whole thing in the first place. While the team was working with Williams to find a suitable helmet that didn’t irritate his surgically repaired scalp, Bruce Allen and the Redskins placed the 31-year-old on the Non-Football Injury list, ending his season and assuring that Williams would not receive payment for the year on his contract.
“It’s kind of a vindictive move, and it just showed their hand on how they wanted to operate,” Williams said. “I mean, I had until Tuesday and the new helmet Riddell was talking about was coming in on Monday, so for them to prematurely put me on the list without taking [time to see if the helmet would work] goes to show you that they didn’t really want me to play anyway.”
So the question now is about who you believe. Williams, who long said that he would never play for the Redskins again, is now proclaiming that he had every intention to suit up upon his return and take the field with his teammates. If we’re to believe his side of the story, he was never given that chance. Or you could believe Bruce Allen’s side of the story, where the 31-year-old was just returning to the team in order to cash a $5.9 million check and call it good, waiting to be traded in the offseason.
A muddled situation gets even more confusing, and the answers are left open for your interpretation.
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