Even sitting in front of a hotel television on Monday night, it wasn't too difficult to vicariously experience the sentiments which permeated through Mile High Stadium on Monday night as Terrell Davis ran onto the field for the final time.

Five years following his retirement, a move he has not yet finalized, there is apt to be a similar emotional catharsis as Davis' credentials are scrutinized by the Hall of Fame selection committee. And while emotion plays a part in the selection meeting -- in 1996, the late Jack Buck wept as he presented the merits of tackle Dan Dierdorf, and vowed to never set foot in the meeting room again unless the former offensive tackle was enshrined -- it won't be enough to get Davis memorialized in the Canton, Ohio football shrine.

The reason: Tenure still counts a lot more than tears.

For four wondrous seasons, Davis was a shooting star who flashed across the NFL firmament, posting rushing numbers surpassed only by the great Eric Dickerson and establishing himself as the game's premier runner. But just as Davis was so appropriately nicknamed "TD," and lived up to it by scoring 56 touchdowns in his first four campaigns, two other letters, "IR," will keep him out of the Hall of Fame.

Davis concluded his career, tragically, a too-frequent visitor to the injured reserve list. Ultimately betrayed by his balky knees in the NFL, just as he had been often stricken by hamstring woes at the University of Georgia, he went from being incredible to infirm.

In his last four seasons -- remember, he has elected to spend 2002 on the injured reserve list, not retired -- he played in 17 games and averaged 78 carries, 298 yards and one touchdown per year. That isn't to suggest that Davis' superb accomplishments of 1995-98, when he accumulated 81 percent of his total carries, nearly 85 percent of his rushing yards and 93 percent of his rushing touchdowns, should be ignored.

But such numbers, even in their gaudiness, do not guarantee a niche in the Hall of Fame. Instead they define a sports supernova, one who through no fault of his own, crashed and burned in a black hole. As good a player as he was, Davis may have been an even better person, but neither trait gains a man a lifetime pass to immortality.

Granted, he played a position that the NFL Players Association identified in a recent survey as having the shortest life expectancy in the league. But there is this reality: For the 17 running backs from the "modern era" inducted into the Hall of Fame, the average career length was 11.4 seasons. None of the 17 played a dozen seasons or more. Only three played less than a decade.

The early Davis proponents, and there are plenty of them, make a convenient comparison between he and Gale Sayers, who played just seven seasons. But the former Chicago Bears star was so much more than a running back. Jim Brown played only nine seasons, but no one would dare suggest that Davis had the same kind of impact on the sport. Those backs who were elected despite their short NFL tenures were certainly exceptions, but also exceptional, and to insist that Davis was the latter is to lift him to a new level of expediency.

Columnists have suggested that Hall of Fame electors extrapolate the Davis numbers over what his career could have been. Should the same method be applied, say, to Jamal Anderson? Does that mean that if Cleveland Browns first-round tailback William Green runs for 2,000 yards this year, but then blows out his knee in a freak playoff injuries and is forced to retire, that he merits Hall of Fame consideration? Should baseball have considered, for instance, Mark Fidrych after his one breakthrough season?

Absolutely not. And it is likewise absolute that Davis, who averaged over 1,600 yards and 14 touchdowns for four seasons, isn't Hall of Fame timber.

Apparently, there are current Hall of Fame selectors who concur. In a quick poll of 11 of the 38 selectors, seven said they would not favor Davis' entry into the Hall of Fame. In the next six years, people's minds can change and be changed as well, but the early signs are not encouraging for Davis.

A record-setting back like Roger Craig of the 49ers, not nearly as pure a runner as Davis but one of the greatest all-around offensive forces of the past 25 years, can conjure up sufficient support to get into the Hall of Fame. The chances are that, as years pass and emotion wanes a bit, Davis will find that the odds only get longer.

There are, as noted, always exceptions. Former Miami center Dwight Stephenson was a starter for just seven seasons. Lynn Swann, whose lack of tenure made his candidacy one of the most hotly debated for years, played just nine seasons. But those exceptions, Davis will discover are few. It will help him that he played in two Super Bowl games, overcame a migraine to score the winning touchdown in the '98 title game, but on a play where Green Bay coach Mike Holmgren ordered his defense to lay down.

Davis was good enough to wrest the mantle of leadership from the great John Elway, to turn the Broncos into his team, at least for a short while. But the operative term is "short" and, in the end, it is brevity that will lock close the doors of the Hall of Fame to the Denver tailback.

That he triumphed over adversity as a youngster, that Davis stole the center stage in the NFL forum for what was a glorious snippet of time, should be celebrated. No doubt about the fact the man deserves his due. But that due does not include Hall of Fame membership.

The fact is, we expect our Hall of Fame heroes to be as sturdy and enduring as the bronze from which their busts are cast, and Terrell Davis wasn't.

Len Pasquarelli is a senior writer for ESPN.com.