Are the Eagles genuinely interested in Jameson Williams?
Jameson Williams thinks so.
Williams met earlier this month with the Eagles’ brass at the NovaCare Complex in one of the Eagles’ top-30 visits and said he came away from that meeting and a couple additional Zoom conversations truly believing the Eagles want to draft him.
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Williams spoke Wednesday in Las Vegas with John Clark of NBC Sports Philadelphia for a segment on Clark’s Takeoff podcast.
“I’ve been hearing that a lot,” the Alabama wide receiver said. “I’ve been keeping in contact with the Eagles. It was good.
“They told me they’d love to see me alongside DeVonta (Smith). I think that would be a great explosive offense, just something that no one’s seen before. We compliment each other very well so I think that would be good.”
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Smith, the Eagles’ 1st-round pick last year, set a franchise rookie receiving record with 916 yards.
Williams and Smith were never teammates – Williams transferred into Alabama last year after two seasons at Ohio State – but maybe they will become teammates. The Eagles also drafted Jalen Hurts in the second round in 2020 and Landon Dickerson in the second round in 2021. Hurts finished at Oklahoma, but he and Smith were teammates at Alabama.
If the Eagles drafted Williams, they could conceivably line up with four offensive starters who spent time in Tuscaloosa.
“It would be wild playing with some people that came from the same college as me in the NFL,” Williams said. “That would be dope.”
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Last time the Eagles used 1st-round picks on players from the same college in consecutive seasons was 1957 and 1958, when they picked Clarence Peaks and Walt Kowalczyk from Michigan State.
Smith had 117 catches for 1,856 yards and 23 touchdowns for the Crimson Tide in 2020, and Williams had 79-for-1,572 with 15 TDs this past season.
They’re the only Alabama receivers with 1,500 receiving yards in a season since Amari Cooper in 2014.
Even though they didn’t quite overlap at ‘bama, Williams studied Smith’s film when he arrived on campus because he was being asked to do a lot of the same things as Smith did.
“I watched him,” he said. “That’s really how I learned the offense, watching him make the plays through the fim. That’s really the same plan they had for me. When I watched him, it helped me a lot.”
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Although the Eagles would likely have to trade up to land Williams, Ohio State receiver Chris Olave could be there when the Eagles pick at 15 or even at 18.
Olave also spoke with Clark and also said he had good conversations with the Eagles.
“I got a lot of great vibes from the coaching staff, from the GM,” he said. “Just to be in Philly, it was a great trip overall. I liked it out there.”
Olave also spoke about the opportunity to play alongside Smith, the Heisman Trophy winner in 2020.
“I watched a lot of his game, especially his last year of college,” he said. “How he attacked the game, how he approached the game of football, that really stood out to me.
“Just his blocking and everything he does and the whole game, I could tell he loves the game so much. Just having that in the back of my head as I go into tomorrow, definitely has that mindset that I want to develop.”