There are several areas where the Jacksonville Jaguars need help as they enter the 2022 offseason, but perhaps none are more glaring than fixing the problem at wide receiver. With D.J. Chark Jr. missing a sizable portion of the season and Laviska Shenault Jr. underwhelming, most of the targets went to veteran Marvin Jones Jr. and Laquon Treadwell, who began the year on the practice squad.
There are several potential options this team could go for, both in free agency and the draft. As far as the former goes, players like Davante Adams and Chris Godwin will command most of the attention.
However, Bleacher Report identified the Jaguars as a potential candidate for a bit of a dark horse option in Los Angeles Chargers wideout Mike Williams. The fifth-year player is coming off a breakout 2021 season in which he totaled 76 catches for 1,146 yards and nine touchdowns.
The Chargers will likely look to keep him around, but they will have to outbid several other teams, and the Jags could be among those given the importance of building around quarterback Trevor Lawrence.
Adding Williams—a fellow Clemson product like Lawrence—to the mix would do wonders to aid the development of Jacksonville’s 22-year-old signal-caller.
Courting Williams away from Los Angeles would give Jacksonville the potent scoring threat it sorely needs after the Jags ranked dead last with 14.9 points per game in 2021.
This season alone, Williams notched as many receiving touchdowns as all of Jacksonville’s wideouts combined.
While the Jags do have some promising young players in their receivers room in Laviska Shenault Jr. and DJ Chark Jr., the latter is hitting the open market this offseason after suffering a season-ending ankle injury and is far from a guarantee to return.
The Jaguars would have the money to make this move, and while it wouldn’t be cheap, it likely wouldn’t be as expensive as targeting a player like Adams, who is likely set to become the league’s highest-paid receiver this offseason.
With the aging Marvin Jones Jr. pacing the position with a pedestrian 73 catches for 832 yards and four touchdowns, it’s imperative that the Jags use a good portion of their projected $56.8 million in cap space to secure a bona fide weapon.
Williams may not be the top WR on the open market, but he’s likely the most attainable for this rebuilding franchise.
It may cost Jacksonville a premium to lure the Bolts star, but Williams’ scoring ability alone will lift Lawrence and this offense to the next level.
Williams is exactly the kind of big-play threat that this offense needs, and he would be a great compliment to Jones and Chark, assuming the Jags offer an extension to the latter.
Targeting him next month would be an aggressive move, but it could end up paying dividends for the Jaguars.
