Commentary: More mature Ricky Williams embracing football

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http://www.palmbeachpost.com/dolphins/content/sports/epaper/2008/06/27/0627bohls.html

Commentary: More mature Ricky Williams embracing football

By KIRK BOHLS
Cox News Service

Friday, June 27, 2008

AUSTIN, TEXAS — Ricky Williams finally wants to play football.

Oh, he has enough saved to make payments on his four-bedroom house in the Miami suburb of Davie that he shares with his fiancée, Kristin Barnes, and two of his three kids, including 6-year-old Prince, who's a dead ringer for his dad.

And Williams will hardly see NFL riches this season because he will make only the league minimum for veterans ($850,000) in the final season of his contract with the Dolphins.

But after a self-imposed exile from the game, three failed drug tests and the dubious distinction of having wrecked the Dolphins' 2004 season by quitting the team on the eve of training camp, Ricky Williams needs football to bring his family stability and financial security and help make over his reputation as a flaky dopehead.

But does football need him?

Probably not, although with more than 7,000 yards in six seasons and 47 career rushing touchdowns that tie him for 10th among active backs, he has shown he can be a dominant running back in the NFL. And Miami sure needs a reliable running back because Ronnie Brown is only eight months removed from surgery to repair torn knee ligaments. For that matter, any team coming off a dreadful 1-15 season needs all the healthy bodies it can get, especially a 220-pound one that's rock solid even if it does belong to the only vegetarian in the NFL who's drug-tested three times a week.

But can the Dolphins trust Ricky Williams? Can Roger Goodell? Can anyone?

Who knows.

"I understand that completely," said Williams, the 1998 Heisman Trophy winner, during a candid, 90-minute interview. "I definitely trust myself. It's been a long time (since he has smoked marijuana). Do I miss it? I can't miss it. If you say you miss it, you're going to do it.

"Looking back, I was so dumb. Something had to get out of my system. It's such a stressful job. I should have went up to the head coach and told him what was going on inside of me before it exploded in me. When it did explode, it was too late."

The fuse had been lit long before, starting with Williams' questionable choice of an agent, Master P, who negotiated a ridiculous incentive-laden contract with the Saints. Williams loves Mike Ditka, the coach who pulled off the blockbuster trade that brought him to New Orleans. He doesn't regret dressing up in a wedding gown for a magazine photo shoot or wearing his helmet with the dark visor during interviews because he felt reporters didn't really want to know the real Ricky anyway.

Understanding the real Ricky. Now that's a complicated venture.

Few NFL players wear dull-green moldavite earrings, probably made from a meteorite that landed in Czechoslovakia. Fewer still collect rocks and minerals, read books like Ted Andrews' spiritual "Animal Speak" and plan to pursue a post-football career as an osteopathic physician practicing holistic medicine once he completes the 60 hours he needs for an undergraduate degree from Texas. (Williams completed just five semesters at UT in four years, skipping three semesters to play pro baseball or prepare for the NFL draft.)

Williams has always been an enigma, smarter than many players and curious about everything. Had the Dolphins then-head coach Dave Wannstedt gotten closer to Williams, he said the coach might have been able to talk him out of a sabbatical that took him to Samoa, Fiji and Australia, where he lived in a military barracks for a week and then in a tent.

"I called him to say I didn't think I wanted to play anymore. I had to say it three times," Williams said. "He told me he had to sleep on it. We talked the next morning, and he said if he had a son, he would tell him to play. He didn't do a good job. If he had tried to connect with me, it might have made a difference."

Regret - and often, responsibility - isn't really a part of Williams' vocabulary, even though his leaving the Dolphins in the lurch pretty much ended Wannstedt's NFL coaching career and sent the franchise into a 20-44 tailspin from which it has yet to recover.

Williams predicts a much better season than 1-15 for the Dolphins this year and says the team will win "at least nine games." Then he adds, in his own playful manner, "I'm not the quarterback. I can say that."

He also says he and Brown plan to each run for more than 1,000 yards in 2008, a feat that has been accomplished just three times in the NFL, most recently in 1985 when Earnest Byner and Kevin Mack did it for Cleveland. He even ponders a long-shot bid for the Hall of Fame a bit wistfully.

"There's always a chance, I guess," he said, "but I don't think it's going to happen unless I go to two Super Bowls, be the MVP and run for at least 1,500 yards every year."

He'd probably settle for rehabbing a tarnished reputation, although the question remains: Did he waste a potentially brilliant career?

"My initial response is that pisses me off," said Williams, who hopes to play for four more years. "I think it's accurate. Things that are true piss you off the most. People think if you are a pro athlete, that's the only thing you can do. Life is not about maximizing my athletic ability as much as it is maximizing my evolution and growth as a human being."

And he's working on that. He appreciates the directness of Miami's new vice president, Bill Parcells. He says he is already implementing the two-time Super Bowl-winning coach's advice about practicing his cuts by himself and using his stiff-arm.

Parcells has called Williams "a street baller." Parcells noticed during offseason camps that the running back really competed on 18 of 25 plays and said he wants Williams to run with that edge on 18 of 18 plays rather than play 25. The limited workload might prolong Williams' career.

"Physically, I feel 28," he says. "Mentally, I feel I'm 45."

"But 45," he says with a wink, "is the new 30."

The Dolphins are just hoping he's a trustworthy 31.