For Tyrell Williams this camp is ‘super smooth’ compared to ‘big distraction’ of 2019 Raiders camp
On Tuesday night, the new season of HBO’s Hard Knocks began. This year it is in Los Angeles featuring the Rams and Chargers, who will open their new stadium this year.
The episode opens with Chargers staff putting up banners on fencing as they prep to get training camp started. Standard, mundane stuff, really. Stuff they could detail for any season of the show if they wanted to. But that wasn’t how last year’s Hard Knocks opened.
Last year, the prep work that we saw early in the first episode was for a hot air balloon ride. A ride to be taken by one Antonio Brown.
Last year it was the Raiders who were featured on Hard Knocks. And with that was the drama unfolding in real-time as to if or when Brown would show up at camp.
He had some mysterious foot skin issue that was supposedly keeping him off the field, but ultimately it appeared to be his helmet grievance that had him staying away.
Having the team’s number one receiver absent is bad enough, but having him absent for mysterious and strange reasons just made it worse. It meant the team had to practice as if they were not whole, and would be at some point, and afterward were asked questions about it which they didn’t want to answer.
No one was more acutely aware of all this than Tyrell Williams who was to be the number two starting receiver opposite Brown. Williams was new to the team and training camp is supposed to be his time to develop that bond and chemistry with his new team. Which, being that it was the first time he’d switched teams as a pro, it took him until now to realize just how absolutely bonkers things were.
“Last year, during it and going through it, it didn’t feel like a big distraction until now and how smooth and how easy it’s been,” Williams said Wednesday from training camp. “So, last year I think it definitely was a distraction. We tried not to let it be, but I think it did get to some of us and it was just kind of annoying for sure.”
Now entering his second season with the Raiders, he has plenty of other new challenges like changing cities and the COVID-19 pandemic. Which, oddly, for him, is pretty smooth sailing compared to Hurricane Antonio.
“I think moving into this year and having the guys that we have, it’s just been super smooth,” Williams continued. “So far, it’s been awesome being around those guys and competition and how they like to approach every single day. Like we all push each other and, like I said earlier, we all are pretty close and all pretty good friends and it just makes it easy.”
It helps that the Raiders have all their top receivers in camp, including, and especially Henry Ruggs III, who is projected to start along with Williams.
After AB forced the Raiders to release him, the Raiders never had anyone to fill his shoes. And a series of attempted starters rotated through and never stuck.
“It just feels a lot more loose,” Williams said of this year’s group. “I felt like last year, the room that we had we just couldn’t be ourselves, couldn’t really enjoy, couldn’t really settle in. But now I feel like guys are really good friends, like being around each other and like to see each other be successful. So, it’s easy to come to work and it’s easy to be around those guys and I think we can have a great year. I’m excited to be around them.”
Weird how those are all things you just expect a player to say. But there’s so much behind that you know it’s genuinely refreshing for him and all the receivers.
No ‘Big chicken plan’ no hot air balloon rides, no skipping out on camp over a tantrum about a stupid helmet, no cameras around to document every moment of it, and no constant questions about it. Just preparing for the season. What a concept.
