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That's the second time you've posted that, and it made me laugh out loud on both occasions. Jim Kelly is from East Brady, Pa., just down the Allegheny River a ways from me. For all I know, he'd never even BEEN to Houston before signing with the Gamblers.

I knew where Kelly grew up and where his parents lived. I knew he played played his college ball at the U. I also know that he was drafted by the Chicago Blitz in round 14 of the 83 USFL on Jan 4-5. The Bills didn't draft until April of that year.

 

Funny that Dan Marino was the first player taken in that USFL draft and the last QB taken in the first round of the NFL draft.

 

Kelly was drafted by Chicago and traded to the new expansion Houston Gamblers for the team's 1st, 3rd, 8th and 10th round picks in the 1984 USFL. I also know he was offered 3.5 million for 5 years and a one million dollar signing bonus with the Gamblers.

 

I realize it was 26 years ago and as an avid Bills fan even during the horrific pre Levy years I used to watch lots of college ball and the NFL draft to see what players could help Buffalo. I could be wrong, but I thought I remembered ESPN covering Jim Kelly when he heard the news he was drafted by the Bills, on his couch at his home /apt in Houston, it could have been at his parents home in Pa though.

 

Kelly put his hands over his face and got up and walked out of the cameras view. Later on I read that he had actually cried about getting drafted by the Bills. It seems to me that Pittsburgh can get just about as snowy and cold as Buffalo so the not wanting to play for the Bills because of the cold didn't really fly with me. Perhaps he was just upset he didn't get taken by the Steelers, his dream was to play for Pittsburgh, but it is also made me think of the Tom Cousineau incident.

 

A quote from Armed and Dangerous, Jim Kelly's book- "Buffalo would have 2 chances and I was praying they'd pass on me both times, everything I have ever heard about the team and city was negative"

 

 

If I'm wrong about the ESPN/house in Houston statement please forgive me, as my memory is not as good as it once was. Anyway you got a good laugh from it, so it can't be all bad. :unsure:

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Just bemuses me, is all, when someone argues facts with such certainty without bothering to ascertain that they're correct. Perhaps that's because whenever I'm wrong -- yes, even about a detail like that -- I get the pleasure of running a correction in the next edition of the newspaper.

 

P.S.: The answer is Akron, Oh., at his agent's house. You'll find that on the same page of Armed and Dangerous.

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Just bemuses me, is all, when someone argues facts with such certainty without bothering to ascertain that they're correct. Perhaps that's because whenever I'm wrong -- yes, even about a detail like that -- I get the pleasure of running a correction in the next edition of the newspaper.

 

P.S.: The answer is Akron, Oh., at his agent's house. You'll find that on the same page of Armed and Dangerous.

 

IIRC, I don't think ESPN nor anyone else have cameras in draftees homes in the pre-historic '83 draft. I don't even think they moved the draft to the spacious Marriott Ballroom in '83?

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IIRC, I don't think ESPN nor anyone else have cameras in draftees homes in the pre-historic '83 draft. I don't even think they moved the draft to the spacious Marriott Ballroom in '83?

Perhaps my memory is playing with me again,but I seem to recall ESPN having camera's some years later in Thurman Thomas's house as he waited in agony to be drafted in the second round, and not the first round.

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Perhaps my memory is playing with me again,but I seem to recall ESPN having camera's some years later in Thurman Thomas's house as he waited in agony to be drafted in the second round, and not the first round.

 

The draft became a bigger deal as ESPN gave it coverage through the years. I think that Thurman's feature was the first by ESPN to focus on draftees who were on the bubble. Don't remember what ESPN had as features for the '83 draft, but I don't think they had remotes set up in athletes' or agents' homes. By cable network time, the difference between '83 and '88 is glacial.

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Perhaps my memory is playing with me again,but I seem to recall ESPN having camera's some years later in Thurman Thomas's house as he waited in agony to be drafted in the second round, and not the first round.

They did, but he wasn't "waiting in agony." He actually fell asleep at one point.

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