Mike Klingaman
Publication: The Baltimore Sun
Date: November 17, 2011
In midweek, the Ravens’ coach beckoned the third-string running back into his office and delivered the news: He would make his first NFL start that Sunday, against the Cincinnati Bengals.
Priest Holmes nodded, excused himself and hurried to the men’s room.
“I had to say a prayer,” Holmes said, recalling that day in 1998. “I thanked God for the opportunity. I knew I had a work ethic to compete with anyone in the league.”
That’s how one of football’s famed runners got his foot in the door – and the end zone. His debut, on national TV, was a dandy: Holmes, an undrafted free agent from Texas, rushed for 173 yards and two touchdowns in a 31-24 victory over the Bengals.
“I didn’t expect him to do so much,” Ravens’ coach Ted Marchibroda confessed afterward, adding, “I think we’ve found our halfback.”
Seven games later, Holmes exploded for a club-record 227 yards and a TD in a 20-13 win against Cincinnati. Again. It was the telling start of a stellar career for Holmes, who spent four uneven years in Baltimore before finding his niche in Kansas City.
Relegated to backup chores here with the arrival of Jamal Lewis in 2000, Holmes signed with the Chiefs following the Ravens’ Super Bowl victory and blossomed into one of the NFL’s premier runners. He led the league in rushing in 2001, and in TDs in both 2002 and 2003. Three times first-team All Pro, he was NFL Offensive Player of the Year in 2002.
All of that would be a pipe dream, had he chosen to stay put.
“I have no regrets (about leaving town),” said Holmes, 38, now retired and living in San Antonio. “But the Ravens helped launch my career, and I do wonder, sometimes, what if I had stayed in Baltimore, after we won the Super Bowl? What kind of success would have come of that?”
He’d known his future was iffy in 1999, when Brian Billick became coach.
Said Holmes, “Billick called me into his office and said, ‘Priest, you’re just not the guy I imagine coming down the tunnel. In this league, we have big, intimidating backs, like Corey Dillon and Jerome Bettis.’”
