Jim Kelly: Houston Gamblers
As the USFL’s future was in doubt in the summer of 1986, Jim Kelly’s professional football career was at a crossroads: He was the property of the New Jersey Generals after the merger with the Houston Gamblers, but the league's existence hinged on the $1.7 million anti-trust suit against the NFL; the Bills owned his NFL rights.
However, Kelly wasn’t eager to shuffle-off to Buffalo.
In a 1986 with Sports Illustrated’s Rick Telander, Kelly said, “I’d love to play for the Raiders. I’d love to live in California.” While the Raiders toiled with several different NFL retreads at quarterback over the next decade, Kelly would help bring a franchise (Bills) back from obscurity.
Kelly was disillusioned about playing for the Bills in 1983, so the USFL was an enticing option for the young University of Miami quarterback. The USFL, who broke all the traditional NFL rules in its three years of existence, made Kelly an offer he couldn’t resist.
Former NFL coaching legend George Allen, who coached the Chicago Blitz in ’83 and the Arizona Wranglers in ’84, was also a “recruiter” for players coming out of college. “George Allen and the USFL said I had the choice of any team I wanted to play for,” says Kelly, whochose the Astrodome in Houston and played for the Gamblers. “ I didn’t have to worry about wind, rain or climate.”
Kelly lit-up USFL opponents for 83 touchdowns and passed for more than 9,800 yards during his two years as quarterback of the Gamblers. “I was blessed to be coached with a guy like Jack Pardee, who I admired when he played, when I was a kid growing up,” says Kelly. “He brought along offensive coordinator Mouse Davis and June Jones; we ran the Run-and-Shoot offense that was all passing -- everything I loved to do.”
Kelly, who grew up in Pennsylvania, loved the toughness of the Oakland Raiders and the Pittsburgh Steelers teams he watched in the 1970s. Despite being drafted by the Bills in 1983 out of the University of Miami, Kelly bolted to the USFL where he brought his confident attitude and rifle-arm to the Houston Gamblers.
After two successful seasons of orchestrating the Run- and-Shoot offense under head coach Jack Pardee, Kelly was looking to ditch the Bills for a second time after the USFL lost its anti-trust case against the the NFL in 1986.
The future seemed bleak as a quarterback with the Buffalo Bills in the tough AFC East, where the Dolphins, Jets and Patriots all made the playoffs in the ’85 season; the Patriots went to the Super Bowl after beating Miami in the AFC Championship.
“We tried to work out a deal with the Raiders or Steelers,” says Kelly from his Buffalo office where he runs children’s charities in honor of his son Hunter in February 2006. “I would have loved to play for either team.”
http://usfl-therebelleague.com/paypal>