This Houdini’s Hard to Hold : Famous for Disappearing Acts, Raiders’ Scott Davis Might Stick Around This Time. Then Again . . .

Scott Davis is hard to miss. But then so are most guys who stand 6-feet-7, weigh 280 pounds, are articulate and can dominate a room by their mere presence.

So how does this guy manage to keep disappearing and reappearing?

He could be the next Fabio. Instead, he seems determined to be the next David Copperfield. Or Harry Houdini.

It started in college after an outstanding athletic career at Illinois’ Plainfield High, where Davis was one of the top prep football players in the country, starring on both offense and defense. He also played basketball, ran track and put the shot.

Then Davis went to the University of Illinois, where he put in one season and promptly disappeared.

Poof! Just like that.

Davis left school and took off for Phoenix, where he could get lost in the sands of the desert.

Was he planning on coming back? He didn’t know and he didn’t care.

“I was burned out,” Davis said. “I had come out of high school known for sports this and sports that. I was an All-American tight end, and everybody was hounding me.

“My first year in college was a very frustration-filled year. I wasn’t having fun with it. So I took what I guess you could say was a sabbatical. I wanted to get away from sports. I decided it was time to find out who Scott Davis was, time to do what was best for Scott Davis.”

And that was to disappear from the spotlight and get lost in the peace and quiet of Arizona. He worked in interior design and got a feel for the business world, his eventual destination when his playing days are over.

“It was the best decision I had ever made,” Davis said. “It was a good year for me, a really good year. If I had it to do again, I’d go back and do the same thing.

“I took it one day at a time, didn’t put any pressure on myself and just let things happen as they did.”

What happened was that Davis, invigorated by a year away from athletics, decided to put the pads back on and fulfill his destiny by becoming a star defensive lineman.

He was the Illini’s defensive lineman of the year as a sophomore, All-Big Ten as a junior and and honorable mention All-American as a senior.

From there, Davis took yet another big step, becoming a first-round draft choice in the NFL when the Raiders made him the 25th player selected overall in 1988.

In the ensuing four seasons, Davis became proficient against both the pass and the run and made 27 sacks, including a career-high 10 in 1990.

Then, it happened again.

Poof! He disappeared.

Gone without warning. No fanfare. No high-profile news conference such as the one Howie Long held to announce his retirement. No emotional farewell such as Bob Golic went through.

Davis simply disappeared from the sporting world.

It wasn’t that he was trying to hide his intentions when he took off the silver and black uniform after the 1991 season. Davis maintains that he didn’t know at the time he wouldn’t be back.

“In the off-season,” he said, “I started thinking it was time for me to get on with something else.”

Why would someone make that decision at 26, apparently still at the top of his game?

“That’s exactly it,” Davis said. “I was young, healthy and had had a couple of good years. What better time to go than when you’re finishing on a good note?

“The last thing I wanted to be was a guy that kind of fades out. I’d rather leave being known as a good player than as a guy who becomes third-string backup.

“People would say, you are doing what is best for you, that’s a little selfish, but I don’t think so. If you’re in any type of organization and you’re not happy, I think it’s not very conducive to the upward movement of the team to stay. I think it takes a smart man to know when he’s reached his time, reached his limit.”

While Davis felt confident that he had reached his limit, others were not so sure.

Around the Raider camp in the summer of 1992, the word was that this was just a salary ploy, that Davis was merely holding out for more money.

There was also a wilder theory that Davis had long harbored a secret desire to become a pro wrestler and would soon reappear wearing an evil mask with a sneer to match as a star of the World Wrestling Federation.

“I heard that,” he said with a laugh. “I don’t know where that got started.”

Instead, 1992 came and went and so did ‘93, but still no Davis.

He was busy with his new life, working in real estate and land development in Illinois and Wisconsin, and in the rental business in Phoenix.

“There was a certain comfort there,” Davis said, “going on to the next stage of your life. It felt good. It felt like it was a smart decision that I had made.”

Davis got so far away from the game that when people thought they recognized him and asked him if he had played football, he said, “No.”

Because, he explained, “That’s not where I was at.”

So what changed? What made him suddenly reappear in the national spotlight this summer at 29, back in his old spot on the defensive line after signing a four-year, $4.35-million contract?

“I don’t think there was any one ultimate factor,” he said. “I had achieved the other goals in my life, re-evaluated things and felt I still had some things to achieve in the NFL.”

Davis had stayed in shape while he was away, but maintaining muscle tone is not quite the same as maintaining the ability to fight through an offensive wall and locate the quarterback or to bring a running back to an abrupt and violent halt.

Davis has been playing on the second unit for the Raiders in the initial stage of his comeback and he struggled at times in Sunday’s exhibition opener against the Denver Broncos in Barcelona.

“It takes a little bit of time, and I get frustrated,” he conceded. “But it’s a pretty long preseason, so there’s time to get everything in place before the season starts. I’m more relaxed now. I don’t get so stressed out.

“I don’t spend a lot of time doubting myself. If I did, I certainly wouldn’t be here.”

Now that Davis is here, how long will he stay?

“My contract is for four years,” he said, “so, we’ll take it a year at a time.”

With Scott Davis, that’s the way it always is.