Here's the drill: Fourteen 40-yard dashes in 100-degree heat on the first day of Houston Texans training camp. The players lined up in position groups, stretching from each sideline towards the middle of the field, sprinting from end zone to 40. Other than who finished first, who finished last, and what kind of shoes they wore, it was hard to distinguish one Texan in a white T-shirt and navy team shorts from the other.

Except for the guy with the silver do-rag draped down the back of his neck. That was safety Kevin Williams. He was easy to pick out. He was the one who always finished first.

	The Jets better not go deep against the Texans.

David Carr may have been the first pick in the draft, but Williams is the first Texan. He was one of the first players the team worked out. He was one of the first 10 it signed. He was the first one to start regularly training in Houston last January, before the expansion draft, before free agency, before he had more than a handful of teammates. That's because he's trying to make sure he's not one of the first players released. "Not that I haven't been through worse," says Williams.

He's not talking about being cut by both the Dolphins and Eagles in training camp last season, or watching all of the 2001 season from his home in Pine Bluff, Ark. He's not thinking about when the Jets cut him midway through 2000, after he started the first seven games and was second in the AFC in kickoff returns.

He's remembering the 12 games he missed in 1999, his second season in the league, when he felt a sore throat coming on after a game against Denver. He's remembering feeling like he was suffocating when the throat began closing up, and the first surgery to clear the airway, and the second to clear fluid, and the diagnosis of a rare bacterial infection that killed 80% of the people it attacked. He's remembering the discomfort that was so bad the doctors induced Williams into a two-week coma.

"After that I remember almost nothing," says Williams. "Except for some of the dreams I had, which always seemed to be the same. I knew I was helpless. I knew I was hurt. It felt like I was in a room with chains on my feet and my hands and a fire was burning underneath my back. One time I was playing with a ball and it was 10 feet in front of me and I fell trying to get it and couldn't get back up.

"I dreamt I was in a milk truck. And I knew I wasn't supposed to be driving the truck because I was sick. But I tried getting the truck out of my driveway and backed it into a ditch, where it flipped over. I was scared because I knew I shouldn't be driving and I couldn't stand myself up to get out. It was always something like that, where I was helpless."

Williams spent 27 days in the hospital. He dropped 40 pounds from his 190-pound playing weight. And when he woke up from his coma, he learned that because the Jets had put him on the reserve, non-football injury list his $250,000 salary had been slashed by a third.

"It almost seemed like they were mad I didn't die," says Williams. Which is why he spends so much time living at the Texans complex. He doesn't want to be forgotten if he's out of sight, or be someone who's ignored because he lags behind. Every sprint counts.

"He epitomizes this team," says GM Charley Casserly. "We don't have a trophy in our case or a win on our record. All we have is something to prove. Kevin is the same way, just a guy with something to prove."

That's why he's so easy to spot. He's the one in the silver do-rag. The one who finishes every drill first.

Chad Millman is a frequent contributor to ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at chad.x.millman@espnmag.com