Mario Williams: Grown Men Don’t Blast Their Teammates Anonymously

BUFFALO—Buffalo Bills defensive end Mario Williams told Breitbart Sports and the media surrounding his locker that grown men don’t blast their teammates anonymously through the press.

A few days before Buffalo’s final regular season game, the Associated Press’s John Wawrow reported that the Buffalo Bills plan on releasing defensive end Mario Williams after the season.

“High-priced defensive end Mario Williams will be cut by the Bills this offseason, a person with direct knowledge of discussions told The Associated Press on Thursday,” Wawrow wrote on December 31. “The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because the team does not publicly discuss its player personnel plans.”

Three clear reasons exist for his potential release: one, he suffered through a bad 2015; two, he stands to make $16 million next season; and three, he blasted coach Rex Ryan’s defensive scheme myriad times.

The day after the AP report, an unnamed Bills player ripped Williams to the Buffalo News.

“It’s been clear to me that Mario doesn’t care about anybody but himself,” the teammate said. “He followed that up by not giving any effort during the season and complaining about the scheme instead of manning up and saying he played like crap and doesn’t care.”

Asked if Williams had quit on the team, the unnamed player responded: “Totally checked out.”

After the Bills’ win over the Jets on Sunday, Williams spoke to the media for the first time since those two reports. Breitbart Sports was there.

He didn’t have much to say about his future with the team, but was pretty exorcised over the unnamed teammate taking shots.

“If we are all grown men, I don’t see how anything is anonymous around here,” Williams said. “Especially if it’s from the other side of the ball. That is even worse. It was anonymous. We are all grown men, so I don’t know about that. I know if I said something I’d tell you.”

As for assertion that he quit in games, Williams maintained: “No, I don’t think I have.”

But one thing he won’t quit is bashing the team’s defensive playbook.

“As a defense, things went backwards as far as overall for everybody,” Williams said on Sunday. “You guys look at that, so you can answer that yourself. I think the biggest things is us understanding [the playbook] and being a little simpler would make things better.”

Even if the Bills simplify the defense, it’s doubtful Williams sticks around to enjoy it.