Flutie’s Number Looks Pretty Good to Chargers

Doug Flutie has never belonged in the NFL. The NFL requires measurements, numbers, charts and graphs to tell it who is good and who isn’t. The number which has always hurt Flutie is 5-10. That’s 5 feet, 10 inches. That number has meant too many coaches general managers and owners have ignored other numbers.

Flutie is 33-14 as an NFL starting quarterback. That’s a winning percentage of 70.2. Teams that win 70% of its games will be somewhere around 12-4 or 11-5. Those are playoff numbers almost every year. But nobody has ever really wanted Flutie and his 70.2% because of the 5-10. Until now.

The San Diego Chargers want Flutie. They want him for his quick release, his poise, his cleverness, his quickness and his heart.

More than anything, for his heart.

“Doug’s leadership speaks volumes,” says fullback Fred McCrary, a five-year NFL veteran and a three-year member of what had been, until Flutie, an NFL embarrassment--the team Ryan Leaf quarterbacked.

“What is Doug? Doug’s a winner,” McCrary says after the Chargers conquered the previously undefeated Cincinnati Bengals 28-14 Sunday at Qualcomm Stadium. This makes the Chargers 3-0. Numbers worth paying attention to.

“Doug has heart and Doug has smarts,” McCrary said.

Now there are two things Leaf never had.

Flutie will turn 39 later this month so now he’s not only too short to play quarterback, but also too old. Yet finally, after too much whining, sulking, always-being-injured Leaf, Flutie has himself a team that isn’t looking for someone bigger or stronger or younger or taller.

Jim McMahon once called Flutie “America’s midget” and McMahon didn’t mean it in a nice way.

Mike Tomczak, another Chicago Bear quarterback, who was replaced by Flutie, said that Flutie ran “the sawed-off shotgun.”

Again, not a compliment.

This was 15 years ago when Flutie was 23 and short. After less than two years and after being the object of derision among his own teammates, Flutie was sent away from Chicago and the Bears haven’t had a good quarterback since.

The Bears sent Flutie to New England where he was unwanted by his coach, Raymond Berry. Even after the Patriots went 6-3 in his nine starts in 1988, Flutie was benched in favor of Tony Eason. Flutie then spent nine years, his prime years, playing in Canada. When he came back to the United States, it was to Buffalo and a team owner who didn’t really want him. Ralph Wilson desperately wanted the 6-4 Rob Johnson to be the man.

So now Flutie has come to the Chargers, “America’s Pitiful Team.” A team where dysfunction was a way of life, where Leaf was big and strong, a No. 1 draft pick who didn’t work hard, didn’t care much and who was given more chances in a single practice to prove himself than Flutie has gotten in 15 years from the NFL.

“I said it in the lockerroom. I’m glad I’m here,” Flutie says. “And I think it’s reciprocated by the other guys. They’re glad I’m here. I’m the No. 1 guy and it’s nice. I don’t know that I’ve ever had that before in the NFL.

“I believe this is my ship to take as far as it goes.”

Flutie inspires in simple ways. He’s on time to practice. He’s on time with his passes. The ball gets to where it is supposed to be when it is supposed to be there. Flutie moves to the right places. His team moves with him.

“Doug doesn’t make the big mistake,” receiver Jeff Graham says. “Doug isn’t going to cost us games and he’s going to win us games. That’s something we’ve been missing.”

“You know what,” McCrary says from across the aisle, “I’ll tell you what I think about Doug. I think we can’t put it into words what he’s been for us. It’s that huge. Doug brings us a feeling of calmness and confidence.

“You need that from a quarterback. Maybe you can’t measure that but you need it.”

Flutie won’t win a game by himself, but not many quarterbacks can. He disappears into the huddle, dwarfed by the monster men who fit the height and weight charts.

Then Flutie takes the snap and takes over. He will sidearm a ball so that it sinks underneath a linebacker’s arm and hits a cutting receiver right in the stomach. He will duck and weave when he has to but stand and deliver when he needs to.

“Doug is great at spreading the ball around,” Graham says. “Doug is great at knowing when to throw and who to throw to,” McCrary says.

Ultimately a quarterback can’t con the guys he has to look in the eye, the guys in the huddle.

If the Chargers find themselves looking down a bit more than usual when Flutie is making the call, so what?

Because the look they get back says, “We can get this done. Just follow me.”