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Another chance for Davis

STEVE DeSHAZO: Davis thankful for another chance--is it his last?

Date published: 4/29/2004

By STEVE DeSHAZO

FOUR DOWNS are all you usually get in football. If you can't make sufficient progress in four shots, you have to give up the ball.

Since leaving Brooke Point High School as a can't-miss prospect in 1999, Daniel Davis has made three college stops. At each, he has been tripped up more often off the field than on it.

Now, the NFL's Indianapolis Colts have given Davis another shot at football's highest level--even though he's done little in college to deserve it.

It's fourth down.

Davis' long and winding road "has made me appreciate everything a lot more," he said this week. "It showed me I had an opportunity most people don't get, and I [threw] it away by not doing everything I was supposed to. If I had, I could have been in the NFL by now."

Instead, Davis is a 24-year-old free agent who'll attend the Colts' minicamp today, hoping to impress coach Tony Dungy and earn an invitation to training camp later this summer.

It speaks volumes about Davis' awesome athletic ability that any team would even consider a running back who's carried just 37 times in the past three years--let alone one who's run into recurring legal and academic trouble.

"He's always shown an ability to be a tremendous football player," said Michael Smith, Kansas State's running-backs coach. "But he's run into off-field issues. He's had to show he can handle his business, and by doing that, he's gotten a second chance again."

Or fourth.

Amid great fanfare, Davis signed with North Carolina in February 1999. He lasted one season in Chapel Hill, kicked off a mediocre team by a coach (Carl Torbush) who later got fired. Poor grades and charges of credit card fraud and underage possession of alcohol overshadowed Davis' performance. He even spent weekends in jail because he didn't show up for hearings after being stopped for driving on a suspended license.

He landed at Garden State (Kan.) Community College and led the Broncbusters to the 2000 junior-college national championship game. But he failed to complete his degree and had to sit out the 2001 season before transferring to Kansas State.

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Date published: 4/29/2004