Holly wants to be this year's Bodden
Steve King, Staff Writer
10.04.2006
It's funny how the rite of passage works.
Even on a football field.
Last year, then little-known Leigh Bodden took advantage of a season-ending injury to Gary Baxter to emerge as not just a starting cornerback, but also one of the best players on the team.
Now, with Bodden (ankle) and Baxter (pectoral) both hobbling, it may well be young Daven Holly's turn to show what he can do as maybe the Browns' top corner when they travel to meet the Carolina Panthers on Sunday.
In short, then, it's Holly's chance to try to be this year's version of Bodden.
"Definitely," Holly said Wednesday before practice. "The door is open for me. It's a great opportunity to get a couple of starts and see what I can do."
The similarities between Bodden and Holly are interesting.
Bodden came to the Browns in 2003 as an obscure rookie free agent from tiny Duquesne who had seemingly little hope of simply making the team, let alone ever seeing the field in a regular-season game.
Starting? That was even more of a pipe dream, according to the so-called experts. And starring? That wasn't even a thought, period.
Holly, who grew up near Pittsburgh in Clairton, Pa., played only sparingly with the Chicago Bears as a rookie last year and wasn't even with the Browns until being signed just 13 days before training camp began, on July 13. It wasn't a move that caused even as much as a blip on anyone's radar screen at that point. Though a seventh-round pick of the San Francisco 49ers in the 2005 NFL Draft and a player the Browns also considered selecting, he seemed to be nothing more than a "camp body" -- someone to fill up the roster so head coach Romeo Crennel's team would have enough players to run its various practice drills.
