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Growing pains: Ex-Glades star improving with Steelers
By
Hal Habib
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
The first-round draft pick is listed as a backup for his NFL debut Thursday night, but according to his mother, he expects to start. Toss in the fact he plays for the Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers and that the game is against his hometown Miami Dolphins, and plenty of intrigue surrounds Santonio Holmes' place on the football field.
That's a relief.
Since Holmes, a receiver from Glades Central High and Ohio State, was selected with the 25th overall pick, he had been in the spotlight for the wrong reasons - legal reasons. An arrest and charge in May of disorderly conduct on South Beach was followed by an arrest and charges of domestic violence and assault - all within 51 days of the draft. Add a supposed phone-tag flap between Holmes and quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and it was enough to have the Pittsburgh media wondering what the Steelers had gotten themselves into.
Here's what the Steelers have gotten themselves into: "He has gotten better and better," says coach Bill Cowher, who has had a sit-down with Holmes. "I'm encouraged by where he's at. Being around his demeanor on game day, I really like it. He's going to be fine."
With the South Beach charges dropped and the trial in the second case postponed while a former girlfriend considers a settlement out of court, Holmes can concentrate on football. At the least, he figures to play a key role on the kickoff return team against the Dolphins, in addition to spelling listed starters Hines Ward, who has become a mentor, and Cedrick Wilson. A backup role for Holmes would be fine with Patricia Brown, his mother, who says she'd rather
not see him start his first pro game.
"Kind of scared," Brown says of her demeanor, not his. "I want him to ease his way in, like wait till the first half or maybe the first quarter is over with."
He tells her, "Ma, I've got to do what I've got to do," and she replies, "Oh, well," understanding that she's playing the role of the overprotective mom. "He's calmer than I am, and I don't even have to play," she says, laughing.
Brown is in Pittsburgh, having arrived last week with the proper attire for Santonio's cheering section of half a dozen friends and family from South Florida. She has his No. 10 Steelers jersey, which she'll wear to the game, but she also has a bunch of T-shirts the family made, with a picture of him wearing that jersey.
"We're going to wear both," she says, lest anyone in her section at Heinz Field wonder whose mom is seated among them.
Holmes - who by NFL rules was forced to miss mini-camp time because his class at Ohio State hadn't yet graduated - finished the exhibition season with seven receptions for 54 yards, a 7.7 average and no touchdowns. Seven Steelers had more receiving yards, including fellow rookie Willie Reid of FSU, yet Holmes' 21.0 average on kickoff returns and his ability to perform while injured impressed Cowher.
Willie Bueno, who coached Holmes at Glades Central, expected as much.
"He was always a kid who never got in any trouble, a kid who's got great work ethic," Bueno says. "It showed when he went to Ohio State and was able to play early. Once he gets acclimated to the pro game, he'll do fine."
Cowher is taking up Bueno's tune. "He had a groin issue. A little birdie might have been saying to shut it down, but he kept working through it. I respect that."
That doesn't surprise Ken Herock, a former personnel director for the Raiders, Falcons and Packers who runs Pro Prep, a service that counsels draft prospects before their interviews with general managers at the NFL combine. Herock worked with Holmes in January.
"If anybody would have asked me going into the draft, 'Ken, what do you think of this guy?' he would have gotten all high accolades from me," Herock says. "And if I was drafting, I would draft him. Now, I've worked with some kids and I wouldn't draft them."
Herock says Holmes is articulate and smart but had "that little niche in his background" that was a concern. Specifically?
"He grew up in a very poor economical area," Herock says. "Here he is, he's going to be confronted with a lot of money and he had three children by two different women. You knew there was going to be a problem eventually one of these days. I wasn't expecting it to be Santonio's fault."
Herock says he cautioned Holmes.
"Now that he's experienced these things, he's smart enough to know, 'This ain't going to happen to me anymore,''" Herock says.
Holmes agrees. "I put it all behind me."
His mother says it'll stay that way.
"He's only human," Brown says. "That's life, which some can avoid and some can't avoid. He's a very great person, a person that you have to know yourself - not just what you hear, what you read or what you see on TV."
Holmes hopes a strong start will help convince the Steelers that they made the right choice.
"I'm a young guy stepping into a great deal of things that are ahead of me," Holmes says. "I don't feel like I have anything to prove to anybody. I just have to get out there and show the organization that I want to play football and that's the only thing I'm here for."
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</IMG> LaShae Boone, shown with daughter Saniya, says that the child’s father, Santonio Holmes, beat her.
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