OH, BROTHER!

Clay Matthews is 43, going on 17. His body is unbreakable, his spirit unshakable.

How else to explain a man who played 19 years as a linebacker in the NFL, walked away from the game with his knee ligaments intact, then turned to snowboarding and dirt-bike racing so he could hang out with his five children?

“His friend tells me he’s coming home in a body bag one day,” said Matthews’ wife, Leslie.

He plays in two adult basketball leagues, coaches his four sons in football and basketball, works out almost daily at a health club in Agoura Hills and thinks wearing a tie is against the law.

“I’m not sure there’s a tie that could fit around his neck,” friend Mark Shihabi said.

The one thing family and friends have avoided discussing with Matthews is his not having played in the Super Bowl.

His oldest son, Kyle, a senior football player at Westlake High, was watching a sports program on TV this month when the announcer said no one had played in the NFL longer without having made it to a Super Bowl than Matthews.

“Hey, does dad know that record?” Kyle asked his mother.

“I don’t think dad needs to know,” Leslie said.

But dad does know.

“He said, ‘That’s one record I didn’t want,’ ” Kyle said.

He played 16 years with the Cleveland Browns and lost three times in the AFC championship game to the Denver Broncos and John Elway. His disappointment is genuine, but there’s no obsession in reliving “the Drive” from 1987, “the Fumble” from 1989 or “the Defeat” from 1990.

Then last Sunday, the Tennessee Titans defeated the Jacksonville Jaguars for the AFC title. It was a special moment for the Matthews family. Bruce Matthews, a 17-year NFL offensive lineman and Clay’s younger brother, had made it to the Super Bowl.

“We were all watching and rooting for him,” Kyle said.

Except Clay, who was so nervous that, instead of watching the final minutes on television, he went out to do yard work.

“At the very end of the game, I couldn’t find him,” Leslie said. “He’s been in the situation, if there’s 30 seconds left, something can happen.”

Later, Clay spoke with Bruce by phone and was happy for him. He decided his brother’s Super Bowl appearance against the St. Louis Rams on Sunday in Atlanta will help erase any lingering frustration from the past. And he intends to be there.

“It’s almost like I’m going and I don’t have to worry about playing,” Clay said. “There’s no jealousy, there’s no sadness that I didn’t make it. I don’t feel any of that. I just feel excitement for him and our family. Maybe I’m living through him.”

Separated by five years, the Matthews brothers both went to Arcadia High and USC, although Clay spent his senior year of high school in Chicago, where the boys’ father, Clay Sr., was working. Clay Sr. actually set the pace for his sons in the NFL, having played offensive tackle, tight end and linebacker for the 49ers in 1950 and from 1953-55.

All are strong family men. Clay Sr. and his late wife, Daisy, had four boys and a girl. Clay has four boys and a girl. Bruce had four boys and girl--until another boy was born last October.

“These Matthews are productive in more ways than one,” Leslie said. “I said to my sister-in-law, ‘What are you doing? You just ruined the formula. It was four boys and a girl.’ He and Bruce come from the same exact mold--big-time family people, do their best, don’t drink, don’t smoke. I keep trying to find another one for my daughter. These guys are throwbacks.”

Clay is so unassuming that people meeting him, unless they know from another source, have no clue as to his football background because he would be the last one to bring it up.

“He’s very humble,” Kyle said. “He doesn’t like to be in the spotlight. He doesn’t like to brag about what he’s accomplished, which is a lot. I was old enough to be able to go to a lot of his games. I can remember going to his games in Cleveland. They were the best fans. In Atlanta, I got to go into the locker room and talk to players.

“It’s real neat having my dad as an NFL player because that doesn’t happen to many people. I didn’t really appreciate how much my dad had done until he retired and everybody said, ‘This guy is an iron man and was a great football player.’ ”

Matthews played his last three seasons with the Atlanta Falcons before retiring after the 1996 season. There was no big news conference. And how did he know it was time to quit?

When someone mistook his 14-year-old daughter as his date.

“Oh my God, and I’m probably the nanny,” Leslie said.

Matthews’ two oldest children, Jennifer and Kyle, had reached high school and he didn’t want them changing schools any longer from Georgia to California.

He left football as the Cleveland Browns’ all-time sack leader and a future Hall of Famer.

Wise investments have made it possible for him to focus on staying home to help raise his children, even though he’s still in good enough shape to play.

“I could play about four or five plays and they’d have to get me out before one of those young guys figured out who was in there,” Matthews said.

In his last year with the Falcons, Matthews weighed 255 pounds. He’s down to 250 and dropping.

“Oh my God, he’s chiseling down as we speak,” Shihabi said. “He’s got calves of steel.”

In December, Matthews finally made it to the Super Bowl--as the coach for the Agoura-Oak Park Eagles of the Pacific Youth Football League. His 13-year-old son, Clay III, played on the team that lost in the final.

He’s in demand as a coach. High school teams want to hire him. His daughter, a student at USC, heard a rumor that he might become an assistant with the Trojans.

“I’d love to coach as a career, but you get to college or the pros and it’s a big-time commitment,” Matthews said.

Since he left football, his priorities have changed. He worries about what grades his children get in school, not Super Bowls.

And how’s he doing in his new life?

“He’s definitely the best dad I could ever have,” Kyle said.