A Hit for the Chargers : Lee Williams Took His Licks in High School, but Now He’s Striking Back

Since he has all those sacks, how about some pub, too?

“Why, thank you,” Lee Williams said, taking off some tape before taking on the tape recorder.

“OK, shoot,” he said. But, shoot, down the hallway came fellow San Diego Charger defensive linemen Tony Simmons and Fred Robinson. They were singing.

Simmons: “My girl wants to party all the time . . . “

Robinson: “Party all the time . . . “

Simmons: “Party all the ti-hime.”

Said Robinson (done singing): “What’s this? An interview? With you?”

Said Williams: “Yeah, with me. He’s getting a good story. Rags to riches.”

Robinson: “You’re rich?”

There once were rags. In Lauderhill, Fla., the sun doesn’t always shine. And neither does the son. Lee Williams grew up with in a low-income neighborhood. Dad (otherwise known as James Williams) took them fishing in the Everglades and bowling every weekend, but rarely take them all out to eat. Each of the six Williams children had to be in at a certain time. No crime allowed.

And no future?

“James Williams is a nice fellow, but he wasn’t very aggressive,” said Willie Allen, a Stranahan High School math teacher and assistant football coach who made Lee Williams what he is today, one of top young defensive ends in the NFL. “A lot of times, James was out of work. Lee’s mother and father are very pleasant to be around, but they didn’t push him as I would. I’d say ‘Lee! This is what you have to do!’ And he’d do it.”

Or Willie Allen would hit him.

Beeeeeep! Beeeeeep! “Attention, Carlton Rose and Lee Williams. Report to Willie Allen’s room. On the double.”

It was Allen. Rose and Williams had been naughty. It was time for the “the ol’ board.”

Actually, it’s a paddle, the kind you hit rear ends with. Whenever a football player at Stranahan messed up, he got a licking from Allen.

“Some guys might be late for class or whatever,” Allen said. “But we give them the option of 100 up-downs (a workout on the field) or a whack. We encourage the whack because if they do 100 up-downs, us coaches have to stay around school longer. Usually, they take the whack. I mean, it’s done in a friendly way. The football players understand it. I mean, they have the option. Nothing’s forced on them.”

Said Williams: “Maybe he’s getting soft in his old age, but back then, there was no option.”

Allen latched on to Williams because of his potential. Williams was 6-feet 5-inches in high school, but much too nice to suit Allen.

“He (Williams) always had a smile on his face, and he was very well liked,” football Coach Rick Perry said. “But we always thought that was a problem. Being too nice. He was so much bigger, he didn’t have to prove anything. He wasn’t very good as a junior.”

He wasn’t bad as a senior because Allen kept whacking him. A large man who Perry says “has arms bigger than my legs,” Allen intimidated Williams as well as other talented athletes. He’d use the paddle on his son Greg, too. Once, Greg was dating the most beautiful girl in the school, but Allen saw she had low grades and a low IQ and told his son to dump her.

“We told him to find someone on his level,” Allen said.

Allen had been a football player for Bethune-Cookman College in Daytona Beach. He’d been in the same army company as Billy Martin, that famous former Yankee manager. Billy and Willie are similar.

Allen ordered Williams to attend Bethune-Cookman. Williams did, but not without a struggle.

The following story has been verified by multiple sources: Just three days before the national signing date, Perry asked Williams if he’d decided between Cookman and Eastern Kentucky, the two main schools recruiting him. He said he’d decided on Eastern “because they have high-rise dorms with elevators.”

Perry asked Allen what he thought of the decision, but Allen said Williams had said he was going to Cookman. Perry, confused, asked Williams again, who said, “If I don’t go to Cookman, Coach Allen won’t put tires on my car.”

So Perry told Williams to sleep on it and make the decision the next day. And the next afternoon, Williams told Perry: “Let’s call Eastern and tell them I’m going to Bethune.” Perry congratulated him, and asked if Williams had Eastern’s phone number. “No,” Williams said, “But I’ve got Bethune’s number. Let’s call them and tell them I’m going to Eastern.”

Perry said “Uggggh.”

The next night was Stranahan’s final basketball game, and it was also a day before national signing day. Coaches from Bethune and Eastern showed up to watch Williams play, and Williams, as he’d run up and down the floor, would ask teammates, “Where should I go?”

With just seconds left, the recruiters left their seats to catch Williams first, but each ended up running onto the floor before the final buzzer, as Williams sprinted away from them.

Perry, meanwhile, had decided to let each recruiter spend five minutes alone with Williams. He left for a drink of water then, but when he returned, every one in the locker room was laughing.

Williams had told Bethune he was going to Eastern and told Eastern he was going to Bethune.

That night, Allen simply ordered Williams to attend Bethune. Coaches from Bethune and Eastern, who spent the night in Williams’ driveway, were invited in at 4:30 a.m. for breakfast, and Williams did live up to Allen’s order.

After his sophomore year, however, he left school, because his mother had a stroke. He hid from Allen, afraid Allen would send him back to school. Williams’ brother, James, leaked Lee’s whereabouts to Allen, and it was Allen who raised money from Bethune alumni so Williams could buy new clothes, afford food and return to school.

Allen, in the meantime, has started a program in which he puts local players’ names on a brochure and sends it to colleges.

“My idea,” he said. “We’ve gotten 172 scholarships total.”

In another hallway, John Sanders, the Charger general manager, saw Williams, who leads the team with eight sacks, fourth in the AFC.

“How come you’re not first in the league?” Sanders asked.

Williams: “I wanna be.”

In that case, he better watch more film. Charger defensive line coach Gunther Cunningham, who said: “I always tell Lee he’s a freak because he can play the run and pass,” is concerned that Williams must study opponents more.

Film sessions go like this:

Cunningham: “Lee! Lee!”

Williams: “I know! I know!”

But after a short career with the United States Football League’s Los Angeles Express, he’s with the Chargers and he is rich.

“My folks, they’ve got a big house now,” Williams said. “I let her (his mom) pick out the house. I’ve got my dad a truck, my brother a Z-28. Me? Oh yeah, I lead the style of life I like. I got a Jaguar, man.”

And his young cousin in Lauderhill, Fla., Tim Thompson, has Coach Allen chasing after him with a paddle.