They Did It Their Way : Six AFC Quarterbacks Had Reason to Celebrate (but Didn’t) After Getting Their Teams Into Playoffs, Each in a Unique Style

Jim Harbaugh celebrated his playoff invitation by shrugging.

“I’m resigned to the fact that people don’t think I’m very good,” he said.

Dan Marino celebrated by doing the only thing he does better than passing, which is sneering.

“It shouldn’t have been this hard,” he said.

Steve Bono, heretofore best known for being one of the few NFL players wearing braces on his teeth, celebrated in accordance with a resume that contains neither enthusiasm nor anecdote.

“How it feels? I don’t know,” he said. “I’m not going to spend much time thinking about it.”

Stan Humphries celebrated by fingering a white neck brace and wincing.

Neil O’Donnell celebrated by staring at the sky and cursing.

Jim Kelly celebrated by sitting on the bench and spitting.

They are six quarterbacks, charged with leading the six teams in the AFC playoffs, which begin this weekend.

They are six different athletes, having six different styles, using six different shoulders.

Upon which rests one chip.

They are not champions, with little time left to become one.

Their average age is 32.

They have no Super Bowl titles among them.

Time has touched their personas, once rich and bright, with skepticism and bitterness.

“After a while, you just don’t care what anybody thinks,” Harbaugh said. “I just go out there and let ‘er rip.”

Harbaugh of the Indianapolis Colts, O’Donnell of the Pittsburgh Steelers and Bono of the Kansas City Chiefs have an average of eight years experience apiece. None has played in a Super Bowl.

Marino of the Miami Dolphins and Humphries of the San Diego Chargers have played in one each. Their teams were outscored in those games, 87-42.

Kelly of the Buffalo Bills has played in four Super Bowls, all losses, with his team outscored, 139-73.

For the winner of this season’s AFC tournament, which ends with the conference championship game Jan. 14, all of this could change.

For the five losers, perhaps it never will.

“It’s great to be in the playoffs, but everything is back to zero now,” Humphries said. “We understand that.”

Here’s a list of the six quarterbacks, and the teams they have come to symbolize.

THE UNDERSTUDY

Bono is such an ordinary interview, not once this season did anyone request his presence on the league’s national media conference call.

Bono is such an ordinary player, he is considered only the fourth-most important person on his offense. After his center and two guards.

But there’s a funny thing about this anonymous 33-year-old whose uncomfortable smile makes him look as if he wishes he could hide from the world behind Joe Montana.

Come the fourth quarter in a big game, you can’t miss him.

He led the Chiefs to 17 unanswered points in a three-point victory over the New York Giants in the home opener. And the final 10 points of regulation in an overtime victory over the Oakland Raiders.

He needed only 1:12 to lead a game-tying touchdown drive in the final seconds against the Chargers.

After spending four years playing behind Montana, he spends the last 15 minutes of nearly every game acting like him.

It’s uncertain what will happen the other 45 minutes; Bono might be the lowest-rated quarterback (79.5) to lead a team with the league’s best record.

THE SURVIVOR

Harbaugh was the leading passer in the NFL this season, with his 100.7 rating edging the 99.5 rating of the Green Bay Packers’ Brett Favre.

Yes, he thinks it’s funny too.

“I’m not Steve Young or Troy Aikman,” Harbaugh said. “I can sometimes make big plays if I scramble but . . . as ugly as it is, I don’t recommend it for anyone else.”

Harbaugh has been ripped from the Midwest (playing for Bo Schembechler at Michigan) to the Great Lakes (playing for Mike Ditka with the Chicago Bears) to Hoosierville (he was benched at the start of the season behind Craig Erickson).

Yet he is hard to lose. When Erickson stumbled in the second game of the season, Harbaugh took over and led the Colts back from a 24-3 deficit to defeat the New York Jets. He has been the starter since.

That he has hung around long enough to step on the San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium field Sunday should be considered triumph enough.

“I told myself, I’m over 30 years old now [32], I don’t have much more time to enjoy this game, so I’m really going to enjoy it,” Harbaugh said. “Then I pick up a Pro Bowl honor when all I thought I’d be doing was picking up splinters!”

THE REBORN

O’Donnell hasn’t actually said he is growing a beard because former Steeler great quarterback Terry Bradshaw used to grow beards when the games began to count.

But after being voted MVP by his teammates Wednesday, O’Donnell, 29, is suddenly sounding like the leader he never was.

“I knew they were going to ask me to do more this year--spread it out more, push the ball downfield,” O’Donnell said, referring to a request from his coaches after the Steelers lost Barry Foster and Eric Green last spring. “From Day 1, I was excited about the opportunity.”

Suddenly, you were hearing names such as Yancey Thigpen and Ernie Mills and Kordell Stewart and Erric Pegram and . . . are those great linebackers still on this team?

Suddenly, not only was O’Donnell revived, but so was an entire offense. Whether the Steelers can now win a long-overdue AFC championship is up to the quarterback, who finally seems up to it.

THE HALF DEAD

Kelly at his worst: He undergoes off-season knee surgery and completes 16 of 49 passes in his first two regular-season games.

Kelly at his best: He injures the rotator cuff in his throwing shoulder while making a tackle one week and passes for 316 yards the next.

Even at 35, Kelly is, simply, the biggest reason the Bills are surprising the football world again. Without him there is Alex Van Pelt and Todd Collins, and there is chaos. Witness their season-ending loss to the Houston Oilers, which Kelly watched.

His numbers aren’t great--with an 81.1 rating, he’s ranked ahead of only five other passers in the AFC. But two of those passers are Humphries and Bono.

The Dolphins’ Bryan Cox knows he can’t hurt him. The Steelers’ Greg Lloyd knows that if they meet in the second round, he won’t scare him. And the Chiefs know that in a possible championship game, the jet-engine noise of Arrowhead Stadium won’t faze him.

THE TORTURED ONE

Can Marino, 34, finally win a Super Bowl? Heck, can he finally advance to a Super Bowl for the first time in more than a decade?

Frankly, he would settle for getting through one game without publicly humiliating a teammate.

“I don’t necessarily like getting on people, it’s just a reaction I have, it’s the way I play,” Marino said. “I’m always going to be intense.”

Watch him Saturday in Buffalo. The cameras will capture his every curse, his every gesture at every perceived bad play.

They might also capture passes such as the lousy ones he made at the end of the Dolphins’ loss in Buffalo two weeks ago. And capture his inability to keep the team’s high-priced offensive stars under control under pressure.

Having sneaked into the playoffs, the Dolphins have the means to win them. But they need Marino to worry less about his teammates and more about himself.

THE SWAMP THING

Humphries ended his regular season flat on his back, his body twitching, his eyes spinning.

Once again, he had the rest of the NFL right where he wants it.

Humphries, 30, will play Sunday despite a sprained neck suffered in the season finale against the Giants last week. And despite a knee injury suffered earlier this year. And despite having the league’s worst looking body--it’s as lumpy as a sack of potatoes, but with more bruises.

“Stan’s the kind of guy, he just gets it done,” said Reuben Davis, Charger defensive tackle.

He gets it done with no running back--even if Natrone Means returns Sunday after sitting out most of the last two months, he’ll be far from sound.

He gets it done with receivers who have yet to prove they can make a big postseason catch--even though Tony Martin did finish second in the AFC with 90 of the regular variety.

When Humphries put on his helmet Tuesday for the first time since his injury, “It felt like about 30 pounds.”

Which is considerably lighter than the team-wide burden he will carry this weekend.