The thing about the Hall of Fame is that it is fundamentally unconcerned about where you started from. What matters is where you finish. There are plenty of players in the Hall of Fame who weren’t even drafted, so it’s not just a compendium of the first-round picks of the past 100 years.
Cleveland Browns rookie cornerback Greedy Williams may have slid out of the first round, but that hasn’t stopped him from setting the highest possible goal for himself, as the second-round pick out of LSU has already told reporters that he plans to end up in Canton one day.
Williams has already been advised to tone it down once this offseason after he said that the Browns would win the Super Bowl after he was drafted, and to do more listening than talking, but personally, I see nothing wrong with a player starting off his career with such lofty ambitions. Many athletes play the game because they want to be among the greatest to ever do it, and that inevitably sets one on a path to the Hall of Fame.
“I’m just ready to get this season going and try to work towards being a Hall of Famer because that’s one of my long term goals is to be a Hall of Famer”, Williams said recently during a youth clinic held at the team’s facility, after minicamp had been completed. He described his offseason to date as being “great’.
Williams made it clear that his declaration of intention was no idle musing. It is, in fact, the goal that he has set for himself, and one that he has held for a long time, as he described to reporters the first time he set foot on the field during a game at the college level.
“I remember my first game, caught an interception and I said, when I get to the NFL level, I want to be a Hall of Famer”, the young cornerback described. “My job isn’t finished until I have a gold jacket. It’s just one of those things me and my stepdad just sit down and talk about”.
Williams was immediately installed in the starting lineup across from 2018 fourth-overall pick Denzel Ward, who made the Pro Bowl as a rookie a season ago. The Browns figure to have perhaps the youngest pair of starting cornerbacks in the NFL in 2019, both of whom should allow them to play a lot of man coverage.
As part of a rookie orientation program, all of the Browns’ rookie draft picks toured the Pro Football Hall of Fame, so he has seen the busts, and knows that he wants his to join them one day. He also knows that Joe Thomas also said early in his career is to reach the Hall of Fame.
He considers himself in good company. But he is still focused on the immediate. ““You’ve got to always think about stuff ahead and try to work towards that goal”, he said, but “I’ve got to get through this first season and hopefully things will stand out for me like I want it to go”.
