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Buffalo Bills great Don Beebe recalls having one of worst rookie cards in NFL history
Born in Aurora, Ill., Don Beebe was a multi-sport star at Kaneland High School in Maple Park. He excelled on the basketball court, in track and field, and on the gridiron.
He started his college career attending Western Illinois University and transferred to Chadron State College in Nebraska. The all-around athlete set various school records during his one season on the football field. In 2000 he was inducted into the school's athletic hall of fame.
The lightning-fast wide receiver was selected in the third round of the 1989 NFL Draft by the Buffalo Bills. Beebe spent six seasons catching Jim Kelly passes, going across the middle, hustling and sacrificing his body any way he could for the Bills, and playing in an amazing four Super Bowls during his time in Orchard Park.
Beebe then played one season in Carolina and two in Green Bay, securing his first Super Bowl ring with the Packers in Super Bowl XXXI.
Beebe retired after the 1997 NFL season. During his career, he had 219 receptions for 3,416 yards and 23 touchdowns.
The speed burner has spent decades coaching young athletes. He founded Don Beebe’s House of Speed, a company that specializes in training young athletes in various aspects of performance and character building.
The Super Bowl champion also is head coach of the Aurora Spartans, his alma mater. The longtime coach led the Division III school to a 20-5 record in three seasons there while going undefeated in conference play.
Beebe is also a very active public and motivational speaker, booking countless engagements around the country throughout the year.
The Buffalo fan favorite remembers signing his first autograph — for his sister — as well as the grainy image used on his 1989 Pro Set rookie card and wishing for a jersey swap with Walter Payton.
Do you remember the first time you were asked for your autograph?
It would have been my sister. She wanted me to sign my full name. It’s the only autograph I ever signed with all of the e’s in my signature outside of signing a check. As an autograph, it’s the only one with the e’s in it. She was the first one. I think it was right before the draft or on draft day. She got the first one.
You have had 193 cards produced. Your rookies appear in the 1989 Pro Set, Score and Topps Traded. What was your experience seeing yourself on a trading card for the first time?
The funny thing is, I probably had a little different experience. Pro Set came out with their card and they didn’t have any photos of me. The only thing they could get was something from me in college at Chadron State. It was the middle of nowhere, Nebraska. It was like the end of the earth. It’s a really small town and NAIA Division II back in the late ’80s. It was rated the worst card in the whole set. The picture was so bad I think they were still on Rolofilm back then. Our sports information guy at Chadron took the photo. It became famous because it was rated the worst card in the set. It didn’t start off too well for me, Tony.
With that being said, I just laugh at it today. I remember my first Score card. I get made fun of [with] that one because it looks like I had a mullet. I didn’t think I ever had a mullet. I had longer hair, I will give you that. I will say the Score card was a cool one. That 1989 set was rated as one of the best sets of all time. I come from a huge family. They would buy the boxes just to open up the packs to see if they could find my card, which was pretty cool back in the late ’80s and early ’90s.
That 1989 Pro Set rookie is an image that is ingrained in my head, even to this day.
The funny thing is, I think they came out with the next year’s cards, and the irony is it was my rookie year that I landed on my head, which is a famous play in my career in the playoff game against the Cleveland Browns. They came out with the rookie card and, yes, I was catching it and the play was almost the exact same play but I was doing a deep dig route about 18 yards downfield. I got my feet taken out on the picture featured on the Pro Set card at Chadron State and I landed on my head. The next Pro Set card that came out was the play that I landed on my head again. It was kind of a cool card. I think they were trying to make up for the bad picture from the year before.
With your long career and all of those cards being produced, do you have a single favorite card of your own?
Yeah, my favorite is — and I’m not sure who produced it — but I was in a Bills uniform and I was kneeling down saying a prayer. I was doing the Tebow before Tim was doing it. That was the only card that ever had pictured me doing that position. For me, personally, that was always my favorite. People send me that one all the time. I probably signed that one and the Score rookie card the most over the years.
Did you manage to hang on to any memorabilia or cards over the years?
I used to have a lot of stuff. My family, especially my brother, was big collector back in the early ’90s. Now it’s the hottest it’s ever been, from what I understand. Back in the early ’90s, it was really hot. He used to collect a lot of things. I never really got into the collecting part but what I did like was getting items from friends and great moments. Another favorite of mine is another Pro Set card. I was catching a touchdown in the back of the end zone at Super Bowl 26 and Darrell Green was in the picture. It’s just about collecting great moments and friends and great players. I have a lot of things but probably my favorite thing is, because of Reggie White and the relationship I had with him, he was a good friend. The passing of him at 43 years old was a tough thing to see him go on. He signed me a jersey ‘To my main man Beebs.’ That is a very special item for me.
I have heard from other retired football greats that Reggie had an absolute shrine of memorabilia in one of his homes. It could have rivaled Canton form what I hear.
There are a lot of guys that have a lot of cool stuff. I know Jim Kelly has an absolute barrage of memorabilia he’s collected through the years of friends. Just going into his house, he has a ton of stuff, too.
Buffalo has one of the most passionate fan bases around. Football means so much to so many people there. Do you have a memorable fan story that displayed to you first-hand how impressive that fan base is?
I had a lady — and I was right at the end of my career or my career was just over — I have four children [and] she purchased every card I ever had made, even cards from overseas. She collected every card, bought four of each and put them in a big binder and sent me all four of those binders. It was a really unique and crazy gift.
The funniest thing I had happen in Buffalo — and there were a lot of things — it was my rookie year and it was the first time I ever stepped on the field. It was the third game of my rookie year and I finally got to play. The first pass to ever go my way was a 63-yard bomb from Jim Kelly. The DB was Cris Dishman. It went for a touchdown. If you watch the video, Cris reaches out his hand to try to tackle me and grabs my jersey and rips off the middle ‘e’ in my last name. So 97 Rock, the number one radio station in Buffalo at the time, did a whole thing the next week. Whoever brought the best ‘e’ to the next game gets a free trip to Houston. That entire week they were playing songs and making up songs on 97 Rock. ‘No e, No e, Beebe.’ I came into the stadium and out of the tunnel, and I’m not kidding you, this guy had an ‘e’ that was 20 feet tall. It was on a big wooden stick. It stood out so bad. He won, by the way. I never met him but I remember that big ‘e’ distinctly.
Who would you want to go back and do a jersey swap with?
Walter Payton. He was at the end of his career at the beginning of mine. He was a hero for me growing up in the Chicago area. I loved his style of play. He would be one. Jerry Rice, you could argue the greatest football player of all time. Certainly he and Tom Brady are the two in that conversation. Those two I probably looked up to the most due to their work ethic and style of play. I loved the way they approached the game from a professional business standpoint.
