Todd McShay on Packers’ Savion Williams: ‘Tape Was Wild Ride’

NFL Draft expert Todd McShay is bullish on the potential of third-round pick Savion Williams, who could be a versatile “chess piece” for Matt LaFleur and Jordan Love.

Packers third-round draft pick Savion Williams catches a touchdown pass against Oklahoma while he was with TCU last season. / Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

GREEN BAY, Wis. – It wasn’t too long ago when a receiver like TCU’s Savion Williams, who the Green Bay Packers drafted in the third round last week, might have had a hard time finding a consistent role in the NFL.

Not anymore. Being a good route runner with soft hands is important – always has been, always will be – but the NFL has become about getting the ball to playmakers in space. Williams might be unpolished. His hands might be unreliable. But he is an absolute stud with the ball.

“If we’re asking him to go be the X wide receiver Week 1 and he has to run the full route tree and all those things, I’m like, ‘Nah,’” Todd McShay, formerly of ESPN and the creator of The McShay Report, said this week.

“But in today’s NFL, with that coach and with the other weapons at receiver and with that quarterback, now we’ve just got this chess piece and you have no idea on Sunday how we’re going to roll him out. And he can help in the return game. They will get their value for him. I’m convinced of that. There were a handful of places I wanted to see him land in the NFL, and this is absolutely one of them.”

“That coach” is Matt LaFleur. “That quarterback” is Jordan Love. Among those “other weapons” are first-round pick Matthew Golden and third-year player Jayden Reed, who McShay expects to be the team’s premier receivers.

With Williams, the good tape is great. According to Pro Football Focus, he forced 40 missed tackles on a combined 111 receptions (60) and rushes (51). At 222 pounds with 4.47 speed, he was a yards-after-contact machine. At 6-foot-3 7/8, his 80 7/8-inch wingspan was the largest among this year’s drafted receivers, which helped him make a number of circus catches.

But the bad is a tough watch. His 11.8 percent drop rate was one of the worst among the drafted receivers. His route-running ranges from sloppy to stumbling.

“His tape was a wild ride,” McShay said.

However, for coaches like LaFleur, the 49ers’ Kyle Shanahan and others of this generation, the nuance doesn’t matter as much as it might have under a Mike McCarthy of Bill Walsh. Just find an easy way to get Williams the ball and let him do his thing.

“He reminded me, and I know the comp is Cordarrelle Patterson and a lot of times it’s kind of lazy, but this one’s kind of accurate,” McShay said. “I don’t get the sense that he’s a deep studier of tape and tendencies. There will be routes where he’s tripping and falling on the ground getting in and out of breaks, but then you watch the tape.”

McShay has a “key plays” video of about 150 of Williams’ snaps. They showed the good and the bad, regardless of whether the ball came his way.

“The first three or four are him tripping getting in and out of a break, him not doing the right thing, maybe not understanding the concept,” McShay said. “And then, all of a sudden, it’s a ball thrown behind him in the end zone, he reaches back with those long, long arms that he’s got, and winds up making a touchdown catch and makes it look real easy.

“So, for me, this draft signaled, we’ve got this special talent at quarterback and we’ve got a chance to take it to the next level. We’ve got a coach in Matt LaFleur who knows what he’s doing. Let’s give him some chess pieces. Let’s give LaFleur some flexibility, allowing them to be multiple. Let’s get guys out there that actually scare defenses and have to account for them.”

That last sentence was critical. It matched what a scout said last week about Green Bay’s passing game following the selection of Golden. Which of the returning receivers was going to keep a defensive coordinator up at night?

Golden’s deep speed will stretch defenses, creating room underneath for Reed, Romeo Doubs and Dontayvion Wicks. Reed is excellent after the catch but has been slowed in both seasons by the accumulation of NFL hits. Doubs and Wicks aren’t elusive after the catch.

Williams can be that player who can turn a jet sweep or a bubble screen into a gain of 10 by using his athleticism and strength to run past or through defenders.

“I think as much as Williams will be used handing the ball off to him and utilizing him in the screen game, an occasional 9-route or something simplistic, I think when he comes in the game that he’ll be just as much of a decoy,” McShay said.

“So, kind of a Cordarrelle role, a little bit of Deebo Samuel – that’s the role I envision where we’re not asking him to be this refined route-runner [or running] Tom Brady’s option routes. Let’s just get him the football and let’s also use him as a decoy, because teams are going to be fearful when this massive human being that can run in the 4.4s comes out on the field and there’s this absolute worry of, ‘OK, what if they get him the ball at almost 6-foot-4, 222 with 4.48 speed.’”

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