Filling a Tall Order for Bills : Wide Receiver Beebe Makes Up in Speed for What He Lacks in Size

He was John Jefferson back then, squaring off a pass pattern and making a spectacular one-handed catch in the corner of the end zone to win the Super Bowl in Pasadena.

Well, it wasn’t the corner of the end zone, it was the border of a back-yard garden. And maybe it was a suburb of Chicago, not Pasadena. And he was really 10-year-old Don Beebe, not John Jefferson.

Beebe will be trying to make his childhood dream come true for the Buffalo Bills on Sunday in the Rose Bowl.

“It’s weird, but believe me, it’s the truth,” Beebe said this week. “I was just spending some time with my best friend from back then, Mike Walker, who lives in Newport Beach now, and we were talking about those days when about 10 of us used to play in the back yard every day.

“I mean it’s not surprising that a kid would dream about making the big catch to win the Super Bowl, but we always pretended it was in Pasadena. I guess it was just because we liked the weather after watching all those sunny games in the Rose Bowl.”

The fact that Beebe’s Super Bowl moments have evolved into the real thing--with orange pylons marking the end zones, the heat of a Southern California sun on his face and his name on his jersey--is indeed the stuff of dreams.

He didn’t exactly take the fast track to the NFL. There were stops at Western Illinois and Aurora College before he graduated from that college football juggernaut, Chadron State. (It’s in Nebraska.)

Then there’s his size. Without helmet and pads, Beebe looks as much like a football player as some jockeys. The Bills’ media guide lists him at 5 feet 11, but that’s probably with thick-soled tennis shoes. And the 184 pounds? Well, maybe with his pockets full of lead shot.

There is no questioning his quickness, though. He ran what he considered to be slow 40-yard dashes during the pro scouting combines, after catching 78 passes for 1,361 yards and 18 touchdowns as a college senior. But the scouts were impressed, anyway. Twenty-one teams sent scouts to Chadron State to take a better look at Beebe, and he fired off some times in the high 4.2s.

After the workout, the Bills were convinced that Beebe could run a pattern and had sure hands to go with the flying feet, so they made him their first choice in 1989, picking him up during the third round of the NFL draft.

“Don is a very fast individual,” offensive coordinator Tom Bresnahan said. “(Opponents) tend to back off him pretty good, and we take advantage of it.”

Beebe’s first catch as a pro was a 63-yard pass play from Jim Kelly for a touchdown. A month later, Frank Reich lobbed one up, Beebe sped under it, and the result was the same--a 63-yard touchdown play. He also returned a kickoff 85 yards that season.

Beebe played in 14 games as a rookie, caught 14 passes for 317 yards and averaged more than 22 yards in 16 kickoff returns.

But the legs that carried him into the NFL have also betrayed him. He has sat out nine games and countless practices during his four years in the league because of hamstring injuries.

And while throwing a downfield block for Thurman Thomas in December of 1990, Beebe suffered a broken left leg, underwent surgery during which a rod was inserted into the fibula and sat out the rest of the season. And he was sidelined for the last five regular-season games of 1991 after suffering a broken collarbone.

After yet another hamstring injury during the second game of this season, Beebe decided to take a new approach to improving his chances of remaining sound. If something worked for somebody--anybody--he implemented it into his new regimen.

Now, his diet is strictly supervised by a nutritionist. He has regular appointments with a masseuse and a chiropractor. And he endures lengthy stretching exercises devised by Rusty Jones, the Bills’ strength and conditioning coach.

So far, it has worked.

“Actually, the latter half of this season is the best I’ve ever felt in my life,” Beebe said. “The week after I pulled the hamstring against the 49ers, I started seeing all these different people and started doing a lot of stretching I haven’t done in the past. I also quit weightlifting with my legs during the season.

“I think I’ve finally got the rhythm down because I haven’t had any problems with my hamstrings since. I feel more loose and relaxed. And to be honest, my stride length has lengthened a little, so I think I’m faster than I’ve ever been.”

And with the help of Charlie Joiner, who became the Bills’ receivers coach this season, he has learned to view his profession with a bit more perspective.

“Sure, he’s had some bad luck with injuries,” said Joiner, who played in 239 NFL games. “But I told him, ‘Don’t get down because of that. I know another guy who couldn’t play much at all in his first three years because of injuries and wound up catching 750 passes.’ ”

Joiner retired after 18 seasons with 750 catches for 12,146 yards, both NFL records at the time.

Mending tendons is not Beebe’s only concern, of course. His speed makes cornerbacks sag off, which means defenses would rather see him go over the middle than get the big strike down the sideline.

Reich, the Bills’ backup quarterback, said: “When I get out there behind the center in our basic formation and look to one side and see James (Lofton) and Andre (Reed) and then look to the other side and see Don, it’s obvious a defense has it’s hands full. Don adds a great dimension because of his speed and he makes it extremely difficult for teams to double-cover the other guys.

“A lot of people think of him as mainly a deep threat, but he’s really tough going over the middle. He’s a great competitor and he’s totally fearless. You can let go of the ball and be confident that, no matter where the ball is or how much traffic there is, Don’s going to go after it.”

Beebe acknowledged that he has wondered what kind of numbers he might have if he could remain uninjured for an entire season, but right now he has no individual goals in mind.

The 10-year-old from Sugar Grove, Ill., has run away from his pals and into the big time, nearly realizing all his dreams. In fact, he caught a touchdown pass in last year’s Super Bowl, but the four-yard reception did little more than establish the final score: Washington Redskins 37, Bills 24.

“You know, this has almost become a ritual for us,” he said, surveying the crush of media swarming onto the field at Dodger Stadium. “I hope we keep doing it and stake a firm claim to being the team of the ‘90s. But obviously, the championship ring is everything now. We’ve got to win this Super Bowl.”

If the game is on the line in the waning moments of Super Bowl XXVII, the Bills might look for No. 82 in the corner of the end zone. After all, there was a time when Beebe always made that catch.