Chiefs have plans for new defensive tackle and KC native Xavier Williams

Xavier Williams is a very superstitious man.

So while the 26-year-old nose tackle had a sense there was a good chance he'd soon be playing for his hometown team, the Kansas City Chiefs, long before the news was announced Wednesday, he played this one close to the vest with his loved ones until the T's were crossed and the I's were dotted.

“I don’t want to jinx anything," said Williams, a graduate of Grandview High School. "I even talked to my agent about it and I was like, ‘You know I think the last thing I want to do is get my mom pumped up that I’ll be coming home and then something crazy happens like I end up in New York or something like that.’ ”

Her reaction to the news, however, proved to be worth the wait.

“She freaked out — everybody was freaking out,” Williams said with a laugh. “My phone’s been blowing up since yesterday. Everybody with congratulations. Old schoolmates, all my family members, just everyone.”

And why not? It's not every day a hometown kid gets to sign with the Chiefs during free agency.

“I was a huge Chiefs fan — my mom and everybody still has all of their gear from way back in the day,” Williams said. “Huge Derrick Thomas fan, of course. Tony Gonzalez, Priest Holmes and Dante Hall, you know the ‘X-Factor.’ He was an exciting guy to watch.”

Williams' return to Kansas City, however, is much more than a feel-good story. Despite his modest production to this point — his 20 tackles and a half-sack in 2017 with the Arizona Cardinals represented the best single-season marks of his three-year career — the Chiefs will be counting on Williams to help plug an oft-leaky run defense, one that ranked a miserable 25th in the NFL in 2017 and was also facing a potential future without their best interior run defender, nose tackle Bennie Logan, who remains a free agent.

“Since I’ve gotten into the league, I’ve been a nose guard and if you’re a nose guard that’s your main job, stop the run,” said the 6-foot-2 Williams, who said he played last season at 295 pounds but expects to bulk up to 305 or 310 pounds in Kansas City. “Objective No. 1 if you’re going to be on the D-line always has to be to stop the run, so I take pride in that, making sure there’s nobody that can run on me. I’m trying to dominate centers, guards, whatever, trying to help out the linebackers.”

In Williams, who could easily earn the starting job at nose tackle in the Chiefs’ 3-4 front, the Chiefs see a young player (26) who can grow with the rest of a defensive core that general manager Brett Veach wants to get younger, faster and more aggressive.

“They mentioned (that),” said Williams, who was undrafted out of Northern Iowa in 2015. “If you look at the entire team, it’s a young team, bright future. That’s definitely a selling point. I’m excited about it. I hope I can be with it for years to come. Got a young quarterback, young receivers, everybody.”

Williams also likes the scheme fit. The Chiefs, like the rest of the NFL, spend most of their time in nickel and dime subpackages, and while Williams has a well-earned reputation as a run-first player, he said the last three years he spent playing in an upfield, aggressive defense in Arizona leads him to believe he can contribute on passing downs in Kansas City.

“From what I understand it’s an attack defense,” Williams said. “I talked to (defensive line) coach Britt Reid and coach Sutton (defensive coordinator Bob Sutton) and we were going through the philosophy and schemes of the defense and I think it really matched and was similar to what I was doing in Phoenix. This defense is something I think I can produce in.”

Williams is working hard to improve his pass-rush skills. This offseason, he went down to Texas to work with a pass-rush coach, and he’s also been working on improving his flexibility.

“Things that would help me tone in on smaller nuances of pass rush and balance,” Williams said. “I really have been attacking that hard this offseason.”

He’ll keep on attacking it, too, right up until the Chiefs’ offseason workout program starts in mid-April.

But in the meantime, he’ll also be taking on another task — figuring out where he wants to live now that he’s in his hometown. It’s a task he can’t wait to get started with.

“This city has changed so much since I really lived down here from college to when I was out in Phoenix,” Williams said with a laugh. “I really have to get back and check the city out and try to figure out where everybody’s staying these days.”

This story was originally published March 22, 2018 at 7:22 PM with the headline "Chiefs have plans for new defensive tackle and KC native Xavier Williams."