Jameson Williams won’t back down from bold claim about 40-yard dash time

Detroit Lions wide receiver Jameson Williams is undeniably one of the fastest players in the NFL. On his 82-yard touchdown catch in Week 16 against the Chicago Bears, Next Gen Stats had him as the fifth-fastest ball carrier in the league for the week (20.9 MPH).

Williams made his long-awaited appearance on teammate Amon-Ra St. Brown’s podcast this week, claiming he would’ve ran the 40-yard dash in 4.1 seconds if he could’ve ran at the NFL Combine when he was entering the draft in 2022. A torn ACL in the national title game playing for Alabama kept that from happening.

On Thursday, St. Brown told reporters he doubted Williams could run a 4.1.

“I do love Jamo, but I don’t think he’s touching 4.1,” St. Brown said. “That’s crazy.” 

Quarterback Jared Goff had similar doubts.

“Yeah, I guess if he says so, I don’t know. We’ll have to go measure it sometime,” Goff said. “He’s hard to track down if we want to measure his 40, but he says 4.1, we have to hold him accountable.”

Jameson Williams is not backing down from claim about his 40 time

On Friday, Williams got his opportunity to answer those who doubt he can run a 4.1-second 40-yard dash.

“I think I can for sure. I probably could run faster,” Williams said. “I seen bro (St. Brown) say he don’t believe in 4.1 — I believe in it. People who know me know I can do that, though.”

Williams noted how he never ran a 40 during his pre-draft process, but yet his immediate speed rating in “Madden” as a rookie stands as a sign of respect for how fast he is.

“I never ran a 40. That’s what I’m saying, like, I never even had to do that and ‘Madden’ respects me enough to (give me) a 98 speed out of the gate,” Williams said. “That’s a 4.1. No 40 and a 98 speed? If I was a 99, it would be like a 3.9 or a 4.0.”

Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Xavier Worthy set the NFL Combine record this year with a 4.21-second 40-yard dash time. So Williams believes he can best that time by a shade over a tenth of a second.

As for proving his claim, Goff’s idea of having Williams run a combine-style 40-yard dash at an appropriate time sounds pretty good. The Lions’ social media team would surely capture the event too.