Jason Williams: Put in 12 Years, Got some Tats

Earlier this week former King, Grizzly, Heat, and Magic (and then Grizzly again) PG Jason Williams announced his retirement after struggling with back injuries. After being drafted 7th overall in the 1998 draft, Williams proved his value retiring as the Grizzlies all-time assist leader, winning a ring with the Heat, and posting near double-doubles in points and assists in his first two years with Memphis.

Considering that players like Michael Olowokandi, Raef LaFrentz and Robert Traylor were drafted before him, Williams appears to be a steal in the draft. (Dirk, Paul Pierce, and Rashard Lewis were all drafted later making his seventh pick seem more justified.)

However, DBSF's interest in Williams focuses on the evolution of his tattoos. Basically, Williams presents a case of how a young man evolves from standard senior year of high school fare consisting of a wicked flying dragon, a crawling tiger, and initials encased in a flaming basketball into full sleeves and words spelled out across fingers.

Kings: 2 tattoos--crawling tiger and curly-tailed dragon. Definitely looks like a Ralph Lauren polo would cover those up and he could work 50 hours a week at his Dad's accounting firm and nobody would be the wiser. The hair suggests he could also coach high school lacrosse on the weekends.



Grizzlies: Year 4 in the NBA must presents that existential crises facing all mid-twenty somethings--who am I? Jason William's response? "Jason". Put it across the right forearm. No more polo-t's at company picnics. Further, the hair's gone from the Sacramento days so he no longer looks like that guy from your cousin's frat at Clemson.



Heat: Williams now expands to left forearm and replaces the curly-tailed dragon with some wild-stuff that basically reminds DBSF of Caron Butler's tattoos covering Caron Butler's old tattoos.



Finally, the Magic: Full arm inner- and outer-decoration. He's got "White Boy" across the fingers, and the Mark McGrath birds on his hands. Fully committed; no longer eligible to work at Dad's accounting firm.