Ricky Williams: Troubled Superstar
Scot Kojola, MBA2/MAAS
Issue date: 9/23/02 Section: Sports
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Most professional athletes strive for the limelight that comes along with being a superstar. Ricky Williams is not one of them. However, after being drafted by the New Orleans Saints with the fifth pick in the 1999 NFL draft, he has been the focus of both success and controversy.
As the 1998 Heisman Trophy winner and holder of 20 NCAA rushing records, Ricky Williams was seen as the future of New Orleans Saints football. So much so, that Mike Ditka, head coach at the time, traded all of the Saints draft picks in order to get Ricky Williams. Over the next two years, injuries and an explosive relationship between Williams, his teammates, the media, and the fans strained this bond. With new head coach, Jim Haslet, and rookie tailback, Deuce McAllister, the New Orleans Saints decided to trade Ricky Williams to the Miami Dolphins during the off-season. Once again, Williams was thrust into an awkward position, for he was seen as the key to Miami's Super Bowl run this year. So far this year, Williams' performance has been spectacular. Nevertheless, events off the field have tarnished this rising star.
Illness, not Attitude
Words such as complicated, enigmatic, and unpredictable have been used to describe Williams. Most of his critics felt it was his attitude that was the cause of all his problems during the first two years of his professional football career. However, all this changed in January 2001. Williams had decided to seek professional help and was diagnosed with social anxiety disorder, also known as social phobia. According to Jerilyn Ross, clinical social worker and president of the Anxiety Disorders Association of America, social anxiety caused by a chemical imbalance is the third-most common psychiatric disorder after depression and alcoholism. "It is an intense, paralyzing fear of social or performance situations, where the person has a very morbid fear of any kind of negative reaction or criticism," Ross says. Williams, who has become a spokesman for Paxil, which is treating his illness, said this of his diagnosis, "I had this immediate warmth come over me, this feeling that I can get better. That there is a light at the end of the tunnel and I'm not just weird. I'm not just aloof. I'm not crazy. I'm not a flake."
Driving While Black
With Williams in treatment and therapy for his illness, the move to Miami and a new team indicated a possible quick return to stardom. Yet, the transition to South Florida has been anything, but a smooth one. Four times in the first few months he has been in South Florida, Williams had incidents with the Fort Lauderdale police; even though, he had been guilty of nothing more than having insufficient paperwork and driving expensive cars. For example, on June 5, Fort Lauderdale police stopped Williams for going 13 mph over the speed limit while driving home from a Dolphins banquet. He says he was immediately surrounded by several police cars, put through several drunk-driving tests, and asked how he could afford a BMW. Because the car had Louisiana plates, and because Ricky had taken his dress shoes off to drive, he walked barefoot a mile home while the car was towed. Just 13 days later, while driving a new Hummer, Ricky was stopped because the vehicle had expired paper tags (see picture). It turned out; he also had misplaced his driver's license. Fort Lauderdale police put Ricky in plastic handcuffs and sent a drug-sniffing dog through his vehicle. Only Chinese food was found.
