Cody Williams had no choice but to reject the job interview of a lifetime.

In January 2008, the former Orchard Park High and Colgate defensive back was preparing for a

workout with the Buffalo Bills when his body abruptly shut down.

He couldn't run and couldn't eat. It hurt to eat. His weight fell from 190 pounds to

170. One simple squat in the weight room hurt his left buttock. And there was blood in his

stool.

Williams was petrified. He had no clue what was wrong. When the Bills called days before the

workout, he had to cancel.

"It felt like a knife was literally stuck in the left side of my butt," Williams said.

A colonoscopy revealed that he had ulcerative colitis, a disease that causes inflammation and

ulcers in the lining of the rectum. Playing football anywhere was impossible. A year and a

half later, he's finally back. Williams was picked up this summer by the Hamilton Tiger-Cats

of the Canadian Football League. The illness, his 5-foot-9 stature and that lingering

small-school stereotype have made for a turbulent path to a pro career.

"There were times when I thought about quitting football," Williams said. "Then, I'd go to

church, think about it and realize this was my dream."

The colitis is under control. Williams took the steroid prednisone to calm his stomach and

adjusted his diet. Oranges and spicy foods are off limits. Whenever he digests citric acid,

the inflammation returns, along with jarring pain. A notch below Crohn's disease, ulcerative

colitis strikes about 500,000 Americans.

Williams was practically bedridden for 4 1/2 months out of college, vaporizing his football

hopes. He was hired by HSBC Bank as an account executive for Household Finance and his body

slowly recovered. Every morning, he snuck in a workout at 6 a.m. — a savings account of

sorts. Teams might come knocking again. At least that's what he told himself. The inspiration

— and frustration — came in watching his best friend, Jon Corto, play for the

Bills.

As kids, they talked about playing together at Ralph Wilson Stadium. After all, Williams' dad,

Chris, played two seasons with the Bills and his uncle, Terry, had a tryout with the team.

"It was frustrating, I can't even lie," said Williams, who was a first-team all-Western New

York running back with Orchard Park. "Watching Jon be successful with the Bills and everything

and me just sitting at home."

Said Corto, "I'm sure he was happy for me but at the same time it had to be tough. I know he'd

love to be out there with me."

So Williams kept training just in case some team in some league would give him a chance.

Hope flickered in January, one year after he pulled out of his tryout with the Bills. Williams

was drafted by the Miami Flare of the upstart United National Gridiron League (UNGL). Too

nervous to watch the online draft himself, Williams found out he was picked from his

girlfriend's little brother, who scurried downstairs with the good news.

Football and the beach? Not a bad consolation. Williams' brother even lived in Tallahassee,

Fla. This was perfect. Williams quit his job at HSBC and drove the 24 hours to Florida for

training camp.

The morning after he got to Florida, Williams got a call from a Flare representative. Funding

for the UNGL crumbled. There would be no season. He had to drive back home, jobless and in

shock.

"That was just another setback," Williams sighed.

At that moment, Williams seriously considered giving up. There was a chance he could get his

job back at HSBC if he acted fast. Countless teams in the NFL and CFL were shunning him

anyway. Nobody wanted an undersized cornerback. Nobody was returning his agent's calls. Maybe

all this training was just ramming himself into a dead end. Williams asked his trainer, Willie

Burnett of Thurman Thomas Sports Training, if he should push on.

"Yes!" Burnett recalled telling him. "I wouldn't be wasting my time with you right now if I

didn't think you'd be a professional athlete."

So for the next four months he trained four times a week with Burnett. Williams' 40-yard dash

dipped from 4.65 to 4.4. Having played in the CFL himself, Burnett landed Williams workouts

with several teams at combine-like events throughout the U.S. After striking out with British

Columbia and Edmonton, Williams was signed by Hamilton on June 10.

Of course, he hadn't quite made it yet. At camp, Williams was one of eight defensive backs

battling for two roster spots behind the starters. His margin for error was microscopic. One

hiccup would send him back to soul-searching mode.

When his weight-training group had to do squats — in the blistering heat of two-a-days

— Williams sucked it up. Suppressed his colitis. One set couldn't hurt. No way was he

going to get blacklisted for squirming out of a lift.

And the "knife" stabbed him again.

"It was just a little lift and I got that sharp pain in my left side," Williams said.

The timing — for once — was perfect. Hamilton had two light days before a

preseason game at Winnipeg. Ample time to take prednisone and recover. At Winnipeg, he had a

sack. One week later against Toronto, he made the team for good on a play destined for the

blooper reel.

The call came in late in from the sideline. Half of the "D" was in man coverage. Half was in

zone. Wayward bodies were bound to smash into each other. Luckily, Williams was in man. His

receiver, who was 8 inches taller, took off.

"I turned around, saw the ball coming and thought, "Uh oh, time to make a play,'" Williams

said. "I just kind of boxed him out and came down with it."

So here he is. CFL teams carry only 42 active players. Williams is technically on the practice

squad, always one injury away from the lineup. At this point, such drama is expected.

He still fosters NFL hopes, still wants to play with Corto on Sundays. So many times, he could

have ditched football altogether. He pressed on.

"He stuck in there long enough to get a shot," Corto said. "A lot of people don't do that."

Burnett promises that 40-time will shrink to 4.3 by the winter. If so, he says Williams will

get that call from the Bills again. And this time, ulcers won't stand in the way.

"He will. Oh, he will," Burnett said. "Trust me, you will be seeing Cody in the NFL."