Los Angeles Chargers sign former Samford standout

The Los Angeles Chargers have signed defensive lineman Nick Williams, the NFL team announced on Friday.

The former Samford standout played for the New York Giants in 2022, but a torn biceps limited Williams to eight games last season.

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Williams joins a defensive front that also has players coming back from injuries. Only two defensive linemen played more than 28 percent of the snaps in 2022 for the Chargers – Sebastian Joseph-Day, who started 16 games, and Morgan Fox, who started 12. A knee injury limited Austin Johnson to eight games, and Otito Ogbonnia missed 10 games because of a quad injury.

All four players are returning for Los Angeles.

Drafted in the seventh round by the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2013, Williams played 268 defensive snaps, made 16 tackles and registered no sacks while appearing in 26 games for three teams from 2014 through 2016.

Released by the Miami Dolphins at the end of the preseason in 2017, Williams did not make it back into an NFL game until 2018, when he played in two contests for the Chicago Bears.

But the next season, Williams played in every game for the Bears, including making his first five NFL starts. On the field for 531 defensive snaps in 2019, Williams made 42 tackles, registered six sacks and won the Brian Piccolo Award, given annually to the Chicago player who exemplifies the courage, loyalty, teamwork, dedication and sense of humor of Piccolo, a Bears running back who lost his life to cancer in 1970.

That led to a two-year, $10 million contract with Detroit as a free agent, and Williams started 30 games and logged 1,161 defensive snaps with the Lions before leaving for the Giants last year.

Before entering the NFL as an All-Southern Conference defensive lineman for Samford in 2012, Williams played one season of football at Minor High School in Adamsville.

Terms of Williams’ contract with the Chargers were not announced.

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.