Mike Williams Retires

A beginning to the 2025 season took a backseat to the ending of an unforgettable career Thursday. Chargers wide receiver Mike Williams is retiring from the NFL after eight seasons, at the age of 30.

The team had placed Williams on the physically unable to perform (PUP) list on July 14, citing an undisclosed injury sustained in mini-camp. Then, on the eve of training camp, William's agent Tory Dandy informed the team that he intended to retire.

With the No. 7 pick in the 2017 NFL Draft former GM Tom Telesco selected Williams out of Clemson; even though the team already had a strong group of receivers that included Keenan Allen, Tryell Williams, Dontrell Inman, and Travis Benjamin. (Don't ask who the Chiefs selected two picks later.)

After a sluggish and injury fraught rookie campaign in which he appeared in 10 games, (catching 11 passes on 23 targets, and not scoring a touchdown), Williams worked hard to earn the trust of Philip Rivers. Truth be told, Rivers didn't need much cajoling. One look at Williams huge frame (6'4, 218 lbs.) going up to snare passes in his giant mitts should have been enough.

Williams had been doing it throughout camp, but he needed to carry the confidence over into real games—and he needed Rivers to keep throwing him the ball.

As Charger players have said for years, "With Mike, 50/50 balls are not really 50/50."

With an innate ability to locate and high point the football, Williams became the best jump ball receiver since Calvin Johnson. In 2018, he had a breakout game against Kansas City in Arrowhead Stadium late in the season in a Thursday night prime-time game. When Keenen Allen was inactive due to injury, Williams caught 7 passes for 76 yards, 2 touchdowns, rushed 19 yards for a third touchdown, and caught a game-winning two point conversion.

Across eight seasons, he accumulated 330 receptions for 5,104 yards and 32 touchdowns, but his peaks were literally unrivaled.

Once Rivers started trusting Williams, there wasn't anything a defense could call to deter him from giving "Mike Dub" a chance.

Defenders draped all over him, he would manage to contort and float just an instant longer to save the Chargers countless times. He even played a few snaps on defense. His jump ball skills resulted in an interception of a Drew Lock Hail Mary pass to seal a victory over Denver in 2020; which means he had one more career interception than he had fumbles.

But what goes up, must come down.

In Week 3 of the 2023 season Williams was targeted 8 times, catching 7 passes for 121 yards and a touchdown against the Minnesota Vikings. Late in the third quarter, sandwiched by defenders, Williams’ left knee buckled.

A torn ACL ended his season just three games in.

It was the last time he would ever play for the Chargers. In an odd bit of kismet, Keenan Allen, one of his biggest advocates and best friend, threw Williams his final touchdown in a Chargers uniform.

Though Williams' absence was felt on the field a week later, his aura still held sway.

After a 51-yard catch to seal a victory over the Las Vegas Raiders Josh Palmer was captured by sideline microphones telling his teammates that he had been watching Mike Williams highlights all week.

"Just catch the ball! It don't matter!" Keenan Allen yelled. "It don't matter! Mike Will tactics!"

His teammates knew exactly what Mike Williams gave.

It becomes a big deal when you don't have that tool in your kit to depend on.

Words can’t do this justice. See for yourself .

"Mike Will tactics" never gained a Wikipedia entry, so I will do my best to explicate what they were.

Quarterbacks who played with Williams quickly discovered that he would sacrifice his entire body if it meant converting a third down.

Think about the spinning one-hander he patented along the sidelines. The moon ball prayer he caught in Denver in 2019. The multiple 4th-down conversions in the season finale against the Raiders in 2021. The one-handed touchdown in Kansas City in 2022 made in spite of the interference from the cornerback pinning his left hand.

Leaping over smaller defensive backs to pluck passes from off of their heads became so commonplace that fans took for granted the cost it took on his body.

He always catches those. No big deal.

Always quick with a smile and a contagious laugh, Williams was also soft spoken for a position known for their proclivity to talk. Not exactly shy, but certainly a throwback.

Though braggadocio is a vital trait that taps elite athletes into ambition, it can metastasize into a different genus if unchecked; these athletes behave more like divas.

Receivers walk a delicate line between proliferating their owns stats to gain both status and financial leverage, and second, helping the team's goals. This means blocking, running decoy routes, selling out when you know that someone else is getting the shine.

It was always difficult to understand the value of a receiver like Mike Williams because he was never one to seek attention, or demand the football. Do you remember a single game where the conversation leading up was centered on appeasing Williams public gripes about not being involved enough? Me neither.

“When everything mattered the most, he was going to show up. That’s what I’m going to remember most about him,” said Justin Herbert of Williams retirement announcement.  "It was an honor to play alongside him, to throw him the ball. Definitely heartbreaking, tough news to hear about, but we got his back no matter what.”

If Williams' superpower was the ability to snare footballs from the clouds, then gravity—an obtuse and impartial law—was his reckoning.

Williams missed games, yes. A neck fracture at Clemson. A wrenched knee. A high ankle sprain. The cracked vertebrae in the season finale in Denver.

How many times does a 6-4, 218 lbs. body get to be dropped from five feet up on the back of the head; the collarbone; the tailbone, before something gives?

Unfortunately for Williams that time came sooner than he imagined.