The Republic of Football by Chad S. Conine

Author:Chad S. Conine [Conine, Chad S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Published: 2016-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

22

WORTHAM

1996

The Bulldogs Grow into Champions

Long before Leonard Davis went to the Pro Bowl, before he was the second overall pick in the NFL draft, before he was all-American or all-Big 12, even before he was all-state, he was a young kid trying to earn his place with the older boys in the Sunday afternoon hoops game in tiny Wortham, Texas.

Not necessarily the bigger kids, mind you. Davis, who played offensive line in the NFL for a dozen seasons at six-six, 375 pounds, had his teachers looking up at him in elementary school. He stood five-nine in the fifth grade, so he’s seldom known bigger kids.

Clearly, Davis was born big. But his is not the story of a gentle giant who had to be coaxed into playing sports. Davis was born with a ball in his hands and, with twenty-one siblings, plenty of competition. “The thing about growing up [in Wortham] is I started playing sports at an early age, playing Little League and basketball Little Dribblers,” Davis said. “One of my older sisters, she played in high school, so she was one of my coaches. I had an uncle that played sports, and he was one of my coaches, and they taught me a lot about how to play basketball and play against people that are physically better than you, how to be a smarter player and use your size to your advantage.

“Then on Sundays growing up, after church everybody was playing basketball. We’d go up to the blacktop. You have people from all these different surrounding towns. The next thing you know, you’ve got forty or fifty people at the basketball court playing basketball. I learned a lot doing that.”

Like any of us who grew up playing sports, Davis set his sights on wanting to be in the game, to see whether he could match his skills with those of everybody around him. But while he pushed himself, people around him were taking notice.

The big kid knew how to use his size and seemed comfortable with his amazing athleticism. He looked like a can’t-miss. “Even in elementary and grade school, we knew that he would play pro football,” Wortham teammate Justin Chapman said. “Early on in his life, it was a done deal. It was known that there was something different with him, that he was going to be a better athlete than everybody else. Mainly because of his size, but even at a young age he showed a lot of physical ability for his size, and that’s really what kind of made the difference. Leonard was large and very skilled.”

It didn’t take long for the Wortham coaches to notice Davis. In fact, Davis was part of a class of young Bulldog standouts, and when he and his buddy Terrell Spence entered the sixth grade, the middle school coaches came calling. “We were like, ‘Yeah, we’ll do it,’” Davis said. “We talked to our parents and all of that. They sent a letter to the state, and it allowed us to play junior high football even though we were in sixth grade.

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