Demetrius Williams Profile at Pro Football Reference

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These link to the industry's best IRs. These are the sites that Stegman goes to, in order, if/when he's obsessing about data on the status of an injury.

• Rotoworld IR (most up to date – the Cadillac of NFL injury reports)
• CBS Sports IR  (a close 2^nd)
• ESPN IR 
• Yahoo IR
• Fanball IR
• Foxsports IR
• The Huddle.com IR
• NFL.com IR  
• NFLInjury.com IR  (decent independent blog for injury data)

Bad Things Happen in Threes

Last October, after seven games, Demetrius Williams was put on IR due to an Achilles injury and the year before that he only played nine games (again, due to injury).  Can he complete the trifecta this season?    

Success in the NFL is two parts skill and one part opportunity.  We're sure Williams has at least one part skill and were not quite sure about the 2^nd part just yet, but the one part opportunity is staring him down.  Derrick Mason opted for retirement following the death of his close friend Steve McNair (RIP).  The Ravens hit the market for another WR and signed former 2004 receiving dynamo and Titan Drew Bennett.  48 hours and a swollen knee later, he retired, too.  So we have two retirements and two years of injury out of Williams, and you know what they say about bad things and the number three...

Tangled Web

With a nickname like Spider-man, the Ravens can't go wrong, right?

Williams has tremendous raw potential.  His hands earned the arachnophobic nickname during his days as a Duck at the University of Oregon.  He has the size and frame (6'2" and we hear he bulked up to about 215 pounds this past off-season) to be a dominant possession WR.  He was drafted in the 4^th round in 2006 and has played sparingly behind Mason and Mark Clayton in an offensive scheme that has not been heavy on passing yards, mostly due to not having a prolific passer the last two years.  In his only full season in the league (as a rookie and with a stud QB - McNair),  he caught 22 balls for 396 yards (18 yards per reception) and two TDs - all career highs and very encouraging numbers.

2009 Fantasy Outlook

Williams is now relevant fantasy talk.  Bring up his name around the water cooler and after an uncomfortable silence and a couple of eye rolls, you'll quickly realize that you are way too involved in this hobby.  

The Ravens had playoff success breaking in their new QB gently and pounding the football, and given the loss of their former Pro-Bowl possession WR, they figure to continue that trend.  Their No. 2 overall defense gives them that flexibility.  No matter that 2^nd year QB Joe Flacco should be ready to air it out a little more, it's hard to envision this team departing from a formula that got them to the post-season in '08, so don't expect the Ravens to deviate from the passing game that ranked 30^th in passing attempts and 28^th in passing yards.

He looks and feels 100% healthy now during training camp (he still had a little gait and limp during OTAs and Minicamp a few months ago, but he's gotten rid of that).  He's got potential as the Ravens #2 target.  Mark Clayton is not a possession guy, and while he should end up being Flacco's #1 target, Williams could emerge with the most receptions and TDs in the red zone given his size.  Williams is a late addition to our sleeper bucket.  We would venture a late round flier on this one to see if his college nickname can translate to the NFL.