He just looked up, looked around and said, 'This is not going to be a problem for me.' " I can do this.' That was when he realized that he knew he was going to be successful. "But after about a week of camp, he said, 'Oh, this is easy. "I don't know if he ever told anybody this," Andrews says. So off to Baltimore he went, in the Mustang he'd driven since high school, an undersized, unknown rookie who'd carried the ball only 59 times his senior season for the Longhorns. "I said, 'Hey, if he had that attitude then, maybe he'll have it now,' " Holmes says. It seems Morris was supposed to be Holmes' host on a recruiting trip at Texas Tech, but blew it off because he was too busy having fun. He liked Baltimore, because Bam Morris was the starting running back.
That way, he could choose where he'd play. He says as it dragged on, he didn't really want to be drafted. Holmes tells a different version of how that day affected him. From that day on, the exec believes, Holmes used this personal affront to motivate himself. As Sunday rolled on and a litany of unfamiliar names passed him by, Holmes felt hurt, then an iron-willed determination. It wasn't a Day 1 bash, mind you, because he had torn up his knee in college and just happened to play in the same backfield as Ricky Williams. On draft weekend in 1997, Holmes' family had a party.
One NFL exec claims he can explain at least part of Priest. Herman Morris, left, a master sergeant in the Army Reserves, raised his stepson to be a private person.
#Priest holmes how to
Holmes, apparently, wanted to learn how to drive a stick shift.Īt the University of Texas, he stood out so much that he was snubbed by 32 teams. And he sat in the front of the bus, next to his coach, while the rest of the seniors lounged in the back. In high school, Holmes went by the name Anthony - his real name is Priest, but, according to his brother-in-law, Jeffrey Guess, he thought going by Anthony would make life easier. "The way you figure out who Priest is," Andrews says, "is to just understand that you will never figure him out." They barely talked during the whole trip. In 1997, in an '88 Mustang, Theo Andrews and his best friend, Priest Holmes, drove 1,600 miles together. Tell too many secrets and the mystery might be revealed. They were college roommates and half of an inner circle so tight and underground that the other two names cannot be divulged. Though it's hard to find the right person who can explain Holmes' wiring, there is a man in Texas who says he knows Holmes better than just about anybody. He knocked on the door of the apartment, said hello to the guy who answered, walked in, looked in the crib and asked, "Hey, where's the baby?" He was in the wrong apartment. One time he went to Houston after his sister had a baby. He'd change his cell phone number before anyone memorized it. When he was in the midst of a season, Holmes could go weeks without talking to family and friends.
Those who have followed his career even peripherally know Priest Holmes always seemed a little disconnected. He's asked what pulled him back.ĭespite a welcome from ex-coach Dick Vermeil, Holmes' comeback remains a mostly solitary experience. "It won't be anything like that."įour weeks later, Holmes arrives for the Kansas City Chiefs' training camp in River Falls, Wis. "It won't be something where I'll have a dream or, you know, a prophet comes to me," he says. When asked if there was anything that could convince him to come back, he shrugged. Just a month earlier, Holmes was signing autographs at a kids' camp in San Antonio, staring at old photos, telling old stories, giving off the vibe of a man who had definitely moved on. Hold on, he says.īut why? Why is he doing this? Who knows? There is no way to crawl inside the head of an enigma, a man of contradictions prone to making confounding choices. Todd France has to get back to him because he hasn't talked to Holmes, either. President/general manager Carl Peterson calls Holmes' agent, with visions of an early-season retirement ceremony in mind. Understandably, the Chiefs want some closure. So it is two weeks before camp, nearly two years since the helmet-to-helmet collision that sent Holmes to the sidelines, his career and life preserved in a kind of time capsule - complete with his empty uniform still hanging in the Chiefs' locker room and a Christmas tree still standing in his Missouri home, gathering dust since 2005. They do not put themselves through the torture of training camp just to prove what everybody already suspects - that it's all over. Priest Holmes' explanation for his NFL comeback was filled with more questions than answers.
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