At 35, Nature Jim Kelly Getting Better And Better

The creases around his eyes are a little deeper, and the stubble protruding from Jim Kelly’s chin has turned gray. He is much closer to the end of his career than the beginning.

The greatest quarterback in Baffalo Bills’ history has been humbled by four consecutive losses in the Super Bowl and a losing season last year. At age 35, he chooses his words wisely before they leave his mouth.

Jim Kelly has matured.

“He was the only quarterback in the league that used to have a press conference to clear up what he said at the last press conference. It’s true,” Bills special teams ace Steve Tasker said. “Now, he’s smooth as silk. It’s been a metamorphosis, but it’s also been an evolutionary thing where he’s gotten better and better. It’s been fun to watch.”

Kelly, now is his 10th NFL season, has worked his way back from a knee injury sustained in Week 14 of Bullafo’s 7-9 finish last year. He appears in much better shape, and his arm has returned with the same effectiveness.

More than any previous season, Kelly’s health will determine Buffalo’s success because the Bills have not found an experienced backup to replace veteran Frank Reich, who signed with the Carolina Panthers.

Kelly is only 319 yards shy of 30,000 for his career with the Bills, but he often is left out when analysts refer to the great active quarterbacks. Although he has four AFC championships in the coffers, he is still driven by the goal of one victory in a Super Bowl.

A recent poll of voters determined Kelly was among the longshots to be enshrined in Canton, but Kelly refuses to make a verbal case for himself. He wants his career evaluated when it is over.

“I’m not going to brag and say I deserve to be in the Hall of Fame. The numbers speak for themselves,” Kelly said. “I always said what I wanted to say, what was on my mind. I think before I speak now. It’s part of growing up. You learn from your mistakes.”

When he entered the league in 1986 after a two-year stint in the USFL, Kelly was considered a savior for a city that wished much more for a Super Bowl winner than for a snowless winter.

Fans held banners along the highway from the airport to Rich Stadium, welcoming the city’s biggest star since O.J. Simpson. What they perceived after the honeymoon was a young, self-absorbed quarterback who criticized teammates and snarled at the public. Kelly may have been misunderstood.

“Jim’s focused,” said Pat Kelly, his oldest brother and former linebacker for the Baltimore Colts and Detroit Lions. “When he steps on the field, he’s a professional with one thing on his mind - winning. When he steps off the field, it’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He switches into a different mode.”

Through his first six years in the league, he was Buffalo’s party boy, just as likely to be seen cruising the bars at no-huddle speed on Monday as he was to throw three touchdown passes on Sunday.

He had plenty of women hanging from his arm and a bank account that exceeded his needs. He threw enormous postgame victory parties at his 7,200-square-foot house minutes from Rich Stadium, where teammates and groupies boozed until the wee hours.

Before the Bills played Washington in their second Super Bowl, a few bartenders from Kelly’s house parties were hired to drive his new van from Buffalo to work a postgame celebration in Minneapolis. They wrecked the van in a snowstorm, and the Bills got buried by the Redskins, 37-24.

“He was 20-something years old and on top of the world,” center Kent Hull said. “Buffalo accepted him like he was the second coming or something. Why not take advantage of it? He was out every night, but I think he’s put all that past him.”

That was then. His teammates now talk about Kelly in before-and-after terms - before Jill Waggoner and after Erin Marie Kelly.

Kelly trashed his playboy lifestyle after meeting Waggoner, a friend of a guest at one of his parties about three years ago. Waggoner, 25, gave birth to Erin Marie in May, and the couple is planning to marry after the season.

“I’ve always wanted a family,” Kelly said. “I always wanted to find the right lady, and I definitely have. I have someone who really is dear to my heart. Now I have two queens in my life, plus my mother.”

The words almost sound like they should be coming from someone else’s mouth, but Kelly insists that this has been a dream come true. Kelly, who has raised nearly $1 million toward a camp for underprivileged children, said he has been waiting for the right girl to come along and to have children of his own.

Waggoner was a high school cheerleader and didn’t pay much attention to the Bills when Kelly came onto the local sports scene. Like everybody else, she had heard stories about Kelly’s promiscuity.

“I’m not a groupie. The only thing I heard about Jim were his parties and women,” Waggoner said. “To me, that was like ‘OK, I’m in the picture now.’ When we started going out, I said, ‘That’s not me.”’

Kelly began chasing her down after the second of Buffalo’s four Super Bowl losses. He sent her roses, and she didn’t flinch. Called her, no dice. Visited the club, sorry Charlie.

“The old lines you used when you’re younger didn’t work,” Kelly said. “I had to really work to reel her in. But once she knew me, realized what I was about, what kind of person I was, and vice-versa, everything went smooth.”

Rather than getting home from a weekend bender at 4 a.m., Kelly now finds himself waking up with Waggoner in the middle of the night while she feeds the baby.

His enthusiasm for football has not waned, but he looks at the game differently. No longer does a bad day on the field bother him at home.

“I wish I did this five or six years ago, so she could have enjoyed being around the great times I had. At the same time, there’s been times when I’ve been pretty low, but I tell you, it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” Kelly said.

“You can have a bad day, come home, and look at her, and she’s smiling at you, and it just wipes out everything else. I’m sure a lot of people say that … I know I can’t wait for the first day when she’s able to run to me and say, ‘Daddy, Daddy.”’