Stream o'conscious: The Demond Williams situation

Here’s an excerpt from the column I wrote Tuesday for The News Tribune:

I submitted my column at 2 p.m. Pacific. Had I waited, oh, another eight hours, I would have changed one word in that first sentence:

“In the NFL, quarterback contracts actually mean something.”

If you haven’t heard, Washington quarterback Demond Williams announced on Instagram Tuesday night that he will be entering the transfer portal. His name will what reporters are calling a “Do Not Contact” tag, which means he already knows where he’s going. The expectation is that he will wind up at LSU.

To call this a surprise is an understatement. Washington coach Jedd Fisch could not have supported Williams more than he has from playing him in every game as a true freshman to designating him the starter last season to telling Bruce Feldman at one that Williams was the best quarter, at his age, he’d ever seen. Washington is poised to be very good in 2026 and Williams was positioned as the centerpiece.

The reaction is about what you’d expect: Husky fans are furious. The reaction nationally is largely sympathetic toward Washington. This is being characterized as the latest, most unambiguous sign that the current set-up in college football is unsustainable.

All of that is absolutely fair, and I’m not going to judge anyone’s reaction. I am going to tell you how I feel about it, though.

First, I’m bummed. I really liked watching Williams play. I thought he was a tremendously exciting player. It was also satisfying to watch him fulfill the high praise that Fisch had heaped on him.

However, I have a long-standing position that I will never get mad at a college athlete for where he or she chooses to play sports. It’s one of the reasons that I don’t get all that deep into recruiting. I don’t want to have negative feelings toward a young man because he decides to attend a different school, and I don’t intend to change that now. I’m not going to be cheering for Williams, but I don’t have a desire to see him suffer or struggle. I just don’t want to see him be more successful than the guy Washington winds up getting to replace him. Let me be clear: I want to the break-up.

I also recognize that college players being paid changes this dynamic. It makes it more like professional teams. Further, I’m someone who firmly loves the fact that Seattle has never really gotten over Alex Rodriguez signing with Texas so how, exactly, would this be different? In fact, it might be “worse” because Williams signed paperwork to stay at Washington.

But how much does the timing really matter here? If Williams had chosen to enter the transfer portal instead of re-signing with Washington would Husky fans be any less mad? I don’t think so. The fact Williams is going back on a signed commitment makes us feel a little more righteous. We have the moral high ground.

When we really get down to it, how different is this from when Kalen Deboer left for Alabama two years ago?

Both involved going from Washington to the SEC. In each case, both salary and national prestige probably played a role. For Deboer, it was about improving his chances to win a national championship because he could recruit a higher caliber of player. For Williams, it’s the chance to win a Heisman Trophy a la Jayden Daniels.

Deboer’s departure fell more in line with the way things usually work in college football. Of course coaches trade up.

Now before you think I’m defending Williams, remember, I’m someone who is openly petty about Deboer. I don’t want him to win. At all. I cackle with each loss. I was rooting for his Alabama team to beat Indiana, but even that was selfish. If Alabama beat Indiana, the Tide would have played Oregon. If the Tide beat Oregon, Dan Lanning would be 0-4 all-time in head-to-head meetings against Deboer. If that happened, I could tease Duck fans about Deboer being Lanning’s daddy.

However, when Alabama lost 38-3 in the Rose Bowl to Indiana, I found that to be thoroughly enjoyable, too, because there’s no way in hell Alabama fans think that their team should ever lose to Indiana in any way let alone getting dragged around Pasadena by their ear lobes.

So why don’t I feel the same way about Williams? Well, some of that is probably my residual (and outdated) sentiment that college players aren’t truly pros. Some of it is also because I think I don’t think we should expect the players to be more mature, more polished than the coaches are.

The coaches are the ones who set the tone for this dog-eat-dog world. Had Fisch been offered and taken another job over the past month and a half, I fully expected Williams to go with him.

And if — after Fisch took a job — Williams had decided to go to LSU instead, I would have laughed uproariously about that.

Does it suck that he’s leaving? Yeah. It does, and I’m not going to try to pretend that I’m OK with it. If Washington winds up suing him, fine, but that will be more about setting boundaries than getting him back to Washington. That’s a wrap on his Huskies career, and it’s a symptom of what is a larger problem in the sport.