Jerry Rice sat next to wife Jackie at their son Jerry Jr.’s high school football game Saturday in the Bay Area. It was approaching halftime of a game their son’s team would win 48-0.
“I could see he was deep in thought the whole game,” Jackie said of her husband. “I could almost see the wheels spinning in his head.”
Just before halftime, just before the clock ran out, time stood still.
At least, for Jackie Rice, it felt that way.
“He just turned to me and said, ‘You know, I think this is going to be it for me; I’m not going back,”‘ Jackie said. “I asked him if he was sure. He said, ‘That’s it.”‘
Time moves on.
The NFL and the Broncos move on without Jerry Rice. The league had him for two decades, the Broncos for three months.
One more season would not do. Being a little-used reserve would not do. Rice may love football, he may love competition, but he does not love blending into a crowd. Sitting in the back seat is not his thing. He tasted greatness long ago, and it suited him.
He saw the best the Broncos had to offer, and it sickened him.
It pushed him over the edge. Out of the game. Finally he could stomach it, his first time in the NFL where time stood still.
At least, for Jerry Rice on Monday, it felt that way.
In his retirement news conference, he was rolling along nicely, chatting about his love of football, his determination, poise and pride, how he played the game just like a kid – and then Jackie’s name rolled from his lips. The kids, three of them, two present Monday, the other one, Jaqui, already a freshman at Georgetown, have been supportive, Rice said.
But Rice became emotional when he talked about Jackie. He began to weep, softly, silently. Jerry and Jackie. Never took a vacation for the first 10 years of their marriage because of Rice’s dedication to his year-round training regimen, he said.
Later, he admitted, there was a time he wondered if the two of them would make it this far.
Because in 1996 when their third child, Jada, was born, Jackie suffered complications from childbirth that caused her to endure five surgeries in 72 hours, intensive care for five weeks and two months total time spent in a hospital. She would use a wheelchair for a year because there was no feeling in her legs. Then she was able to use a walker. Then crutches. Then braces. Then a cane.
She did not walk without assistance until three years had passed from that childbirth.
“We’ve had some trials, but I won’t complain,” Jackie said, smiling, looking radiant and warm Monday, standing out of the spotlight but, really, so much a part of it.
“We’ve gone through a lot in life,” Jerry Rice said. “That situation taught me as much as anything about how to keep my composure. Now I get to spend time with her, with my family, that would not have been possible.”
Someone asked Rice how he will feel when he wakes up tomorrow.
“I think you should ask my wife,” Rice said. “I think she’s terrified to death.”
No. Jackie Rice said she knows there will be challenges, changes. But there should be more time now for them all to share. She said time has never stood still like this.
For the Broncos, the Rice hookup started this past spring with coach Mike Shanahan and Rice connecting on a curl route that brought Rice to Denver. A few weeks in, Rice pondered retiring before training camp. This past Wednesday, before Denver played its final preseason game at Arizona, Shanahan told Rice that he would not be the team’s No. 3 receiver. By Saturday, it was over.
It is just beginning, though, for Jerry Jr.
He is a running back, wide receiver and safety. He wears No. 17, not No. 80 or No. 19 like his dad.
“I had to go with something different and leave my dad’s numbers and records for him,” Jerry Jr. said. “I had to start something new.”
And so does his dad.
And so do the Broncos.
Rice is gone, and so is another experiment (Maurice Clarett) and familiar faces (Quentin Griffin, Luther Elliss) but the season beckons at Miami on Sunday and it is nearly time to go play. As far as Rice’s role, as far as him having increased competition among the Broncos, especially among the receivers, Shanahan could not be happier.
Rice put in untold work over the past 20 years in the NFL and decided to rest from football for good on Labor Day. He kept looking for work he could live with until there was no more. And that tarnishes his image?
Of course not.
He knew better than all of us when time would stand still for him. He gained the glory. He earned the right to gauge the clock by his own standards. Over the weekend, he heard and saw its final tick.
Jackie was the first to know.
Jerry made sure he was first and last to see it.
Staff writer Thomas Georgecan be reached at 303-820-1994 or tgeorge@denverpost.com.
