D’haquille (Duke) Williams has found his happy place in the Eskimos locker room.
He’s also starting to make everyone around him enjoy what he’s capable of doing on the football field – catching long bombs in every game this season (46 yards in the first game, 88 yards and a touchdown in Game 2 and 64 yards and a TD against the BC Lions last week) – but it took the Eskimos fleet-footed receiver a long time to get to this point.
There is definitely some darkness in his past that slowed him down.
“I feel like I have one of the best stories to tell and, at the end of the day, I’m going to tell this story, and I’m going to tell it the right way,” said Williams, 25. “I’m not going to sugar-coat anything.
“I’m happy where I’m at right now because it made me a man,” he said. “If I didn’t go through that situation, I wouldn’t be the man I am today. I wouldn’t be as humble as I am. I wouldn’t be as vocal as I am. I’d still be in that shell, walking around with my hood on. But, now, I’m more thankful.”
Williams said his Eskimos teammates have helped him find himself.
“Being around the receiver group itself is amazing,” he said. “I can be myself.
“Being around the team, I can be myself. I joke. I do things that I don’t even do around people at home, but I do it here. If you do it at home, they might judge you for this, they might judge for that.
“But here, you can be yourself. I’m myself now. I’ve learned to be myself. I stopped caring about what people were thinking. I used to care what people think, but I don’t care anymore because everybody has their own opinions … but none of them are facts.
“I’m happy right now,” Williams continued. “I know everybody can see that. Everything I went through, a lot of people counted me out. Nobody saw me in the dark; nobody saw me work. They were just wondering where I was or what I was doing.
“Everything I did good, they don’t talk about, but everything I did bad was in the limelight. Up here (in Canada) they talk about (the good things), but not back in the (United) States. They’re not talking about how I’m accomplishing what I want to do or my attitude or how I haven’t been in trouble for a long time. But when I got kicked out (Auburn University), it was ‘Duke this’ or ‘Duke that.’
“It was painting a picture of me, but basically painting this picture that I’m a bad guy when I’m far from a bad guy,” he said. “They never walked a mile in my shoes. They couldn’t spend 10 days in my shoes. But if they spent 24 hours with me, they would know what type of person I am. I’m a fun, caring, loving person.”
Williams, a CFL player of the month for June who led all receivers with 308 yards on 14 catches, quickly added that he’s a competitor and loves to win, so it’s not smiley, smiley all the time.
“I get mad when I drop a ball. I get mad when I don’t get things right. I want to be perfect. … But nobody’s perfect,” he said.
“I thank the Eskimos for this opportunity because nobody believed in me but this team,” said Williams. “That’s why I give it my all each and every day. They know what type of person I am. I come into this locker room, and I smile each and every day, and I have fun. This is the most fun I’ve had playing football since I left JUCO (junior college).
“I’m just thankful for this opportunity. I thank God for putting me through the situation. He put in situations to see if I was able to get out of them. I worked so hard that everything I did in the past is over with now.”
Williams has been known as “Duke” since he attended Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College (MGCCC) because no could pronounce his given name of D’haquille “so I just rolled with that name.” His sister, Daviada, named him as a baby but didn’t want it to look like it was because of former NBA star Shaquille O’Neal, so she changed the ‘S’ to a ‘D.’
He realized at an early age that “football was something I wanted to do for the rest of my life” after he was invited to play with a neighbourhood team when he was nine years old.
“My brother told me to run across the field when one of these teams were practising,” Williams recalled. “He threw the ball as far as he could, and I ran and got it. They asked me if I wanted to play football. They knew I didn’t have any money, so they put me on the team anyway and just paid for everything.”
Initially a running back, he switched to receiver for his last two years of high school. His grades weren’t great in junior high, and there were more issues about the transfer of his credits when he switched from a Catholic school to a public school to play football in Grade 11.
Williams’ mother had moved the family from Los Angeles to New Orleans when he was seven years old, and they lived with one of his mom’s close friends and later with an aunt in the troubled St. John the Baptist Parish in LaPlace, La. He was “stuck in this environment of live or die. Can you survive in this environment?”
Football was his saving grace.
“I used football as an outlet to stay away with these drugs, to stay away from these killers, these gangsters,” he said. “If anybody knows me, they know it was hard to come from where I come from.”
It was also a hard place to get away from.
Williams was named the No. 1 junior college receiver prospect after two outstanding seasons at MGCCC, catching 26 touchdowns to go along with 2,028 receiving yards. He initially committed to Louisiana State University, which was a dream come true for a young man who grew up in the New Orleans metropolitan area. But LSU was too close to all that crime and violence back home – only a one-hour drive away – so Williams switched to Auburn University.
In a story about Williams on the Auburn Tigers’ website, MGCCC defensive coordinator Steve Davis said Williams left the junior college three times to attend funerals of family and friends, including his cousin, Kyrian Gray, who was shot and killed outside a house party in 2013.
“That put a lot of perspective on life; how not to take life for granted,” Williams says now. “He was only 16 years old. He always followed us everywhere. We took him in. We were all at the wrong place at the wrong time.
“I know he’s proud of me today, though. I still think of the situation and how I have bettered my life from that situation because I could easily have been one of those victims, too, as well.”
Williams has been losing friends and overcoming challenges all his life. He lost one of his best friends, who was only six or seven years old when hit by a car in Los Angeles.
“We did everything together,” Williams said. “That scarred me.”
Davis, the MGCCC coach, said they never knew if Williams would come back every time he left the team because of a death in the family because “there were always questions like if he was going to go challenge the guy who killed his cousin, things like that.”
“I didn’t want to be so close to home,” Williams said about that time, explaining that he felt more comfortable at Auburn.
Williams’ first game with the Tigers featured nine catches for a record-setting 154 yards and a touchdown – the best debut for any receiver in Auburn history. He finished the season with 45 catches for 730 yards and five touchdowns in 10 games but was suspended from the Outback Bowl for a violation of team rules. He was suspended the following August again and dismissed from the team after a bar fight two months later. He had made only 12 catches for 147 yards and one TD in the five games he played in his senior year.
While going to Auburn “was a good decision” because it helped him stay away from the problems back home, “I still got in trouble because my past followed me to Auburn,” he said. “I did stuff I wasn’t supposed to do, and the world doesn’t revolve around me. It’s a team thing, so I had to pay the consequences. It was all mistakes by me. I just made dumb decisions while I was there. It was nothing they did. It was all me.”
He now says his time at Auburn was “one of the best times of my life.”
After that, Williams tried to rehabilitate his image, apologizing to nearly everyone, taking responsibility for his mistakes and attending counselling sessions.
“I could have easily given up on life after getting kicked out of school,” he said. “I know a lot of people counted me out. They thought it was over with for me. But I’m built for it. When it comes to something I’ve been playing my whole life, I never let a man take it from me, so I’m going to grind each and every day to get back to where I need to be.”
He said he loves going home now.
“That’s where I was raised,” he said. “I go home every chance I get. I know I have little kids who look up to me when I do come home. Maybe my words can prevent them from doing something they aren’t supposed to be doing, doing these drugs or stealing from this person or killing this person.
“Maybe my words and my background can help them be like, ‘If he’s been there and he’s been through a lot, and he made it out of our situation, our environment, we can do it, too.’
“I’m here to prove to these young bucks who are coming up that anything’s possible. This is a different way out. I’ve been there. I’ve done it all. There’s nothing I haven’t done coming up.”
Williams was fortunate to receive an invite to the NFL combine after his aborted senior year of college but clocked the second-slowest time (4.72 seconds) among receivers.
“I came into Auburn at 205 (pounds); I was already fast,” he said. “I just gained more weight than I thought I would gain and that slowed me down. It gave me a slow 40 time when I know I’m faster.
“I’m faster on the field. It’s nothing to run a straight line, but if somebody is running after you, of course, your speed is going to pick up. If you’re going to judge my speed, then get in front of me and see if you can run with me.”
Williams didn’t get selected in the 2016 NFL draft, but the Los Angeles Rams later brought him to training camp.
“It was like I was there, but I wasn’t,” he said. “I played in the fourth quarter with two minutes left. There was nothing I could do with that time. The receivers right now, the ones that I went in with, none of them have got over 1,000 yards yet. I feel like if I was still there, I would have 1,000 easily.
“I’m thankful that the Rams gave me that opportunity. It made me better myself. It made me get better in my routes. It made me become a better person. It humbled me.”
Just like he did at Auburn, Williams had a splashy debut with the Eskimos last season, catching four passes for 110 yards, including a 44-yard pass play, in his first game.
“The first impression is always your best impression,” he said. “Everybody is watching, so you’ve got to let people know what type of player you are. That’s what I try to do every game.”
Williams ranked second on the Eskimos’ receiving staff last year with 715 yards on 46 catches despite playing only 13 games. He lost his position on the roster for the last three games of the regular season and the playoffs after former CFL all-star wide receiver Derel Walker returned from his NFL tryout and injured veterans Vital Hazelton and Adarius Bowman returned to action.
“This is a business,” he said. “I just had to man up and be happy I still had a job. I could have easily been out of a job.
“I’m thankful for the Eskimos, and I’m thankful for the program just giving me another chance, period. Now, I’m here to work, and I’m here not to let that happen again.”
Williams came into training camp last year at 238 pounds and ended the season at 230 pounds.
“I had to lose some weight,” he said. “I was too big. Now I’m losing that weight, and I’m here to just prove to these people I can play ball. I came in at 219 this year, and I’m still working to get down to 215. I’m way faster than last year.”
He’s been receptive to what the coaches have been telling him and applying it his game as he shifts from wide receiver to slotback this season.
“Duke’s a challenge for any defence to cover in this league,” said Eskimos quarterback Mike Reilly. “Time and time again he continues to step up and make big plays.
“He still has the ability that he had last year to hit the home run down the sideline, but he’s also shown a lot more to his repertoire, catching balls across the middle, doing things like that. He’s just going to continue to get better. You’ve got to remember he’s played in probably 15 games.”
Williams wants to be known as a complete receiver, that teams know they have to watch out for No. 81.
“They know I’m physical already,” he said. “They know I can run deep. But I know I can run real routes, too – digs, comebacks, slants, curls. I can run all that.
“I knew that before, but I just was mentally out of it. But now that I’ve focused on this game, I’ve been dominating each and every day, and I’m getting better, and I’m trying to better myself each and every day. What can I learn from the last practice that I can do different in this practice coming up? At the end of the day, I’m going to make my presence felt.”