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Williams not worried about his reputation for 'jaw-jabbing'

Cary Williams knows he has a history of dust-ups with DeSean Jackson, but stresses that his emotions won't get the best of him.

Eagles cornerback Cary Williams. (Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)
Eagles cornerback Cary Williams. (Yong Kim/Staff Photographer)Read more

ANYONE WHO has witnessed a hockey fight and asked about it afterward knows what an exercise in futility such an effort is. It's embarrassing, the antagonists will tell you afterward, whether they are recurring combatants or occasional ones.

Not the fight itself. They might even be proud of that work.

But the words that come out of their mouths before, during and after it?

That's the cringeworthy part.

"It is," Cary Williams said the other day after practice. "It really is. You try jaw-jabbing at 'em. It's just a part of the game. Two guys. Emotions. But the stuff you say . . . "

. . . Is not something you want to remember afterward.

Oh, sure, the fight itself also does not resemble in any way, shape or form what the combatants involved think it does at the time. They often swing wildly and widely and, as they do so, they imagine the crisp punching of Bernard Hopkins.

And then they watch the replay and, well . . . it is not Bernard Hopkins out there.

Take, for example, Game 2 of the Eagles' 2012 season, when Williams, then a part of the Baltimore Ravens, came to Lincoln Financial Field for the first time as an opposing player and drew, at least occasionally, the task of covering DeSean Jackson.

Anyone who has seen Williams' work in the past is well aware that jaw-jabbing is an integral part of his coverage skills. At least in his mind it is. There was that, um, little skirmish with teammate Riley Cooper in early September last year, after the revelation that Eagles wideout had shouted racist rants at concert security guards in June.

Often forgotten in referencing that was that a heated exchange between Williams and Jackson followed that skirmish.

"You're dealing with different personalities and a lot of different players with different backgrounds and things like that," Jackson said then. "But at the end of the day, we're all here to do a job, first and foremost, and come to work and give it your best effort and go out there and be as productive as you can."

And then he said this: "He's just one of those guys where he's just a nagging person sometimes."

It's that kind of nagging that led to Jackson and Williams exchanging on-field blows after a second-quarter running play in that 2012 game, each incurring 15-yard penalties and, eventually, $10,000 fines from the league. It is also precipitated a big game by Jackson, who was targeted eight times and caught seven of them, one a 49-yard sideline bomb in which he charged past defensive backs.

Prone to surrendering the deep ball, Williams recalls that he kept Jackson in front of him when he covered him that day. He's also pretty sure he wasn't the only "nagging" person that day, or in the practice sessions between the two last year.

"You've got to understand that we're two guys who seemingly wear our emotions on our sleeves," Williams said.

No matter how often you see it, it's an impressive metamorphosis, what many NFL players do on Sunday. Inside of a locker room after a routine practice, Williams, 29, is soft-spoken and reflective, someone who uses his brain to answer rather than leaning on those tried and true clichés. But he's also the guy on that 2012 replay, and the guy who shoved an official in that season's Super Bowl, and the guy who was dismissed from a joint practice with the Patriots in 2013 after a scuffle.

I asked him this week whether age had allowed him to get a better hold of his inner Hulk.

"Nah," he said. "It's still there. It just hasn't been brought out yet this year. And I'm trying to hone that stuff in. Trying to be real smart and not penalize my team for my behavior."

That might be easier if Jackson and his sprained shoulder sit this one out, as some expect. As it proved in Sunday's blowout of Jacksonville, Washington has a formidable offense without him, and Williams continually brought up Pierre Garcon, the Redskins' leading receiver of a year ago, when the talk got to DeSean heavy.

But there's no getting around their shared past or shared approach to the game.

"Sometimes our emotions can get the best of us," Williams said. "And that time, in the heat of the battle, we allowed our emotions to get the best of us. That's what happened in that situation."

So, what did you say?

"To be honest with you, I can't remember specifics," he said with a knowing smile. "It was all jaw-jabbing. That's all it ever is. We try to keep it clean, but, well, you know . . . "

On Twitter: @samdonnellon

Columns: ph.ly/Donnellon