Oct. 24, 2006
Editor's note: This article originally ran in the Baylor - Kansas edition of Baylor Gameday on Oct. 21, 2006.
by CARROLL FADAL
Like another famous American who was known by initials, when C.J. Wilson talks, people listen.
They certainly get plenty of chances.
Wilson, Baylor's All-America candidate at cornerback, has emerged as the player most likely to give an outrageous quote over the past couple of years. Off the field, you seldom see him without a microphone or voice recorder in his face. Reporters love him; opponents love to try and show him up.
Indeed, C.J. talks a big game. But he plays a bigger one.
"Sometimes you have got to let a kid be himself," said Wesley McGriff, Baylor cornerbacks coach. "Sometimes it is tough as a coach to hear him talk that smack before a game; but, honestly, C.J. Wilson works hard during the week and has a lot of confidence. It is not one of those deals where he is talking and not walking the walk in preparing for gametime. Even though he talks a lot of noise during the week, he is working hard during the week, so he is going to perform on game day. He is a very good football player."
McGriff's not the only one who thinks so. After a stellar 2005 season that brought him consensus All-Big 12 honors, Wilson has received numerous accolades this young season, the most recent of which was an invitation to play in the prestigious East-West Shrine all-star game next January.
"To say that is a great honor would be a tremendous understatement," Wilson said, for once in his life struggling for words. "Whoo. I do not know what to say. I expect the best; but, at the same time, it is amazing when it finally gets there."
It was the latest in a string of honors that have come Wilson's way. Before the season, he was named to the watch list for the Thorpe Award that goes to the nation's top defensive back. NFL draft guru Mel Kiper Jr. rated him the No. 4 senior cornerback in the country. The Sporting News called him the Big 12's fastest defensive back, and Lindy's named him the conference's best cover man.
He has done nothing to disprove them. For most of the season, he has ranked atop the Big 12 and in the top 10 nationally in interceptions, even though opponents seldom throw his way. Chided early in his career as a poor tackler, he has shed that reputation in a big way, as he ranks among the team leaders in tackles, many of them of the "oooh" and "aah" variety.
"I sat down and talked to him and (Anthony) Arline before their junior year, and I told them, 'the knock on you is going to be that you cannot tackle well. I want you both to make the commitment to be better tacklers; do not just be the corner that can cover and not tackle.' C.J. takes that kind of stuff to heart, now. You only have to tell him once, and he goes out and improves on it. He is the kind of person, if you have a conversation one time, he does not want to talk about it anymore, he wants to go out and fix it."
Anyone who has been around C.J. Wilson would find it difficult to believe there is anything he does not want to talk about. But spend any time with him and you will discover he is a bit of a paradox: confident, yet humble; brash, yet respectful; gifted, yet thankful.
"My mother has always taught me if you want to say what you want, you can say it, anytime you want; but, at the same time, it has to be in decency and in order," Wilson said. "That comes from the Bible. You also have to do it in a respectful way, so whenever I do something or say something, a lot of people think it's out of line. But I am doing it in a respectful way, because I can take it to another level, but I choose not to. I only believe in speaking the truth. Opinions do not count."
It is the absolute faith in his own abilities and those of his teammates that causes other players to look to him for leadership.
"He brings a lot of leadership to the table," McGriff said. "Not only does he lead verbally, he leads by example. He is always out there hustling hard, he is smart, he does almost everything right. A lot of times in the games, you can feel his teammates are looking to C.J. to make the big play. Not that anyone else cannot make the big play; but, he has demonstrated himself as the leader, so in the moment of adversity, the kids are looking at him, saying, 'hey, come on, make the big play for us.' There is no question they are looking to him for leadership."
Wilson is happy to oblige.
"I believe when the good Lord sent me here, with my type of personality and how Baylor is as a whole, people are afraid of change. That is why a lot of things I say, people get, 'well, he is out of context with this and that.' With the way the Lord is using me here, while I have played in every game, He wasn't using me like He is now. And now, it is getting a chance to infect the whole defense with my type of swagger. Our whole defense has a type of swagger, and it is getting into the whole team.
"I remember one of the guys one time said, 'you talk too much, you talk too much.' I said, 'If I ever stop living up to how I talk, then we have got a problem. I only talk after I have worked.'"
Standing at his cornerback position before any given play, Wilson is as likely to simulate a baseball game with fellow cornerback Arline as he is to break into a dance routine or exhort the crowd for support. But unlike, say, Terrell Owens or Chad Johnson, he does not plan his shtick beforehand.
"Hey, man, I never know what is going to happen," he says with a broad smile. "I promise I have never gone into any games deciding what I want to do or what I am going to do when I do it. When it happens, it is just freestyle. Earlier this year, I just felt like playing a little baseball. The crowd got a little quiet like before the seventh-inning stretch, so you have got to do what you have got to do sometimes to stay warm."
Like most of Baylor's better players, Wilson dreams of taking his act to the NFL after this season, and most observers think he is good enough to be drafted on the first day. Unlike a lot of his teammates, he is not sure exactly what he wants to do afterward, but he has got one idea that puts a twinkle in his eye, and it has little to do with the history degree he expects to receive next spring.
"I want to be an old man," he said. "You know, lay up on the couch, drink some sweet tea and lemonade, wait for the paper boy to ride by on his bike and throw water balloons at him. Live the life, you know. God said he wants us to live life and live it more abundantly, so that is what I am going to do. Do it my way."
There's no doubt that C.J. Wilson will follow Frank Sinatra's advice and do it his way. And it's a pretty good bet his way will include talking about it. Because when C.J. talks, people listen.
