I’m a Buffalo Bills fan.
When people ask why, I love to tell them. Actually, it might be my favourite story.
I’ve told this story probably hundreds of times before. But this is the first time I’ve ever written it down. With the Bills finally in the playoffs, this feels like the right time.
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It’s not even my story, really. The story belongs to Kirk Morrison.
Both of them.
The Kirk Morrison you may have heard of played eight seasons in the National Football League. The Kirk Morrison you probably haven’t heard of is my younger brother. If I had to pick a beginning of their story, I would say it started exactly seven years ago: Jan. 4, 2011.
“So this is Twitter… I think I’m going to go play Mario Kart,” wrote @kirkmorrison at 8:23 p.m. that day.
@kirkmorrison was my brother. At the time, he was a 19-year-old university student in Regina, Sask. Clearly, he didn’t have much to say on social media.
But the other Kirk Morrison in this story certainly did.
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Two days before my brother sent that tweet, the other Kirk Morrison had just finished his first season at linebacker with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Four tackles in a loss against Houston. Before being traded to Jacksonville, he starred for five seasons with his hometown Oakland Raiders. In six seasons, he had started every single game, except one. Now he was a free agent.
My brother Kirk knew all about the football-playing Kirk. It would be hard to have the same name as an NFL player and not know. The first time he Googled himself, it was a much different guy staring back in the pictures.
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Shortly after that first tweet, my brother started getting messages from people who thought he was the football player. Kirk the football player had been on Twitter since 2009, but used his jersey number at the end of his handle: @kirkmorrison52 in Oakland and @kirmorrison55 in Jacksonville.
My brother usually ignored all the tweets he knew weren’t for him. But one user had become particularly persistent.
The first message came in March.
“@kirkmorrison Would like to send you a direct message. Can you follow me? Thanks,” it said.
Another one came in May. And again on Aug. 3.
“She must think I’m the other Kirk, right?” my brother asked.
Wrong.
Lauren Renschler knew exactly who she was after. She worked for the other Kirk Morrison. He was planning for life after football. He was thinking of increasing his social media presence. He was thinking he should be @kirkmorrison. He wanted to make a trade.
Soon an offer was on the table: autographed NFL merchandise in exchange for the handle.
“What should I do?” my brother asked.
“See what else you can get,” I said.
Here’s what he got: Two tickets to any regular season NFL game during the upcoming season, flights and accommodations.
On paper, that’s a lot for a Twitter handle. What we actually got was even better. I say “we” because I was ticket number two.
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The contract arrived a week after that last tweet from Lauren (Oh, you bet there is a contract) and when my brother signed away his Twitter handle, the new @kirkmorrison was still a free agent. In a way, so was my brother.
Tickets to any NFL game you want, that’s quite a lot of power. I’m sure you can dream of what you’d pick. But my brother made up his mind that he’d go to a game that the other Kirk was playing in. So he waited and what if-ed.
“Somewhere warm would be nice. Maybe he’ll sign in Miami?” I remember saying.
“San Diego,” Kirk said.
“Green Bay, that would be cool.”
Aug. 24, 2011 — we got the news.
Buffalo.
We checked the away games first. Sorry Buffalo. I still feel guilty about that. Lauren told us she could make an away game happen, but advised a home game at the Ralph Wilson Stadium may provide more perks. We listened to her and I’m sure glad we did.
Nov. 6 against Mark Sanchez, Rex Ryan and the New York Jets. That was our game. The plane tickets came just a few days before we were to leave. Kirk Morrison paid for them on his personal credit card.
Our plane arrived in Toronto early on the Friday before the game. There was a town car waiting to take us across the border.
“I do all my driving for the Bills,” the driver said.
We checked in to our hotel a few hours before the New York Jets did. That night, we decided to celebrate our good fortune at the Buffalo Sabres game. They played the Calgary Flames. I don’t remember who won. Beers were a lot cheaper in Buffalo than Saskatchewan.
Saturday afternoon, the two Kirks met for the first time in person. After the night before, we were glad it was in the afternoon. He met us in the hotel lobby. He had the tickets for the game (and on-field passes for pregame). We had butter tarts and maple syrup we brought with us from Canada.
I know, lame.
Kirk Morrison is even nicer than we thought he’d be. He told my brother how glad he was to finally meet him (right?), explained his mom was in town from Oakland and would be sitting with us at the game and posed for a picture right there in the lobby.
When he left, my brother and I exchanged glances — that was cool. On the way to the elevators, we passed by the hotel gift shop. In the window I could see the same bottle of maple syrup I had just handed to Kirk.
We got up early on game day. We had to because once again Twitter had intervened.
Sometime on Saturday, my brother got a message. It was from a woman named Therese. She explained she had seen Kirk’s story in the newspaper and wanted to make sure we had the best time possible in Buffalo.
She asked if we knew fans were supposed to wear white to the game. We didn’t.
She asked if we planned on going to a tailgate party. We hadn’t.
She asked if we had a ride to the game. Nope.
“I’ll pick you up at the hotel at 9 a.m.,” she said. The game was at 1 p.m.
Therese made us call her Tee. She is the kind of person you want to know. She’s an event planner and as far as I can tell, a good one. I still follow her on Twitter.
She had two friends in the car already and two bottles of champagne. None of them could believe we lived in a place called Regina. It took about 30 minutes to drive from the hotel to where the stadium is. Plenty of time for champagne.
“Hi my name is Pat, welcome to the tailgate. Food is over there, beer is over there.”
That’s how we were greeted at our first stop. Tee had introduced us to Pat Sheridan. Before we had even told him our story, he’d already given my brother his card and said we were welcome any time we came to a game. That’s what it’s like in Buffalo.
The party was in the parking lot of what I think was an old hotel surrounded by trees. Everyone was wearing Bills gear except for us.
“We need to buy jerseys as soon as we get to the field,” my brother said.
There’s a reason Tee made sure we stopped at Pat’s. Everyone was so nice. I wish we could have stayed longer.
“We have to go,” Tee said.
“Are you sure? We are having fun,” I said.
“Trust me,” Tee said.
When we were back in the car, Tee turned to look at us as she was backing out of her spot.
“Do you guys know who Jim Kelly is?”
Five-time Pro Bowler Jim Kelly? Bills legend Jim Kelly? NFL Hall of Famer Jim Kelly? Finally, we could answer her with a “yes.”
“We are going to his private tailgate party.”
We had no answer for that.
At that point in the 2011 season, the Buffalo Bills were 5-2. They had beaten the Patriots at home in September and everyone believed this might be the year they finally got back to the playoffs.
Jim Kelly’s tailgate party was not far from the stadium. There were giant RV’s parked almost in a circle. NFL Films was there doing a story about the Bills’ hot start.
We walked up just as the door of one of the RVs burst open. It was Jim Kelly.
“Let’s show ’em how we party in Buffalo!” he screamed.
The small crowd in front of him went wild. The TV cameras panned right to my brother and I. We went wild too.
I wish I could tell you Jim Kelly is now my best friend or that he invites us back to Buffalo every year. We’re lucky, but not that lucky. Still, everyone was very nice to us again and happy the Bills fanbase had grown by two. Tee introduced us to Christopher McDonald. She called him Shooter McGavin.
I would have stayed at that party all day, but my brother was adamant we sneak away. He needed a jersey. We literally ran to the nearest store we could see. Kirk Morrison will always be our favourite player, but you weren’t going to find his jersey hanging in the Bills store that day. Kirk picked Kyle Williams (great choice) I picked C.J. Spiller (less great).
We ran back to the tailgate party, but we weren’t there for long. We had to leave for the stadium because our passes got us on the field for pregame.
Tee walked with us to show us which gate to go in. She asked a man named Thurman to walk with us. Thurman also thought it was funny we came from a place called Regina.
Halfway to the gate, I whispered to my brother: “Is that Thurman Thomas?”
He looked Thurman over. Shorter than both of us, Bills hat pulled over his eyes.
“Nah,” he said.
A few minutes later, we waited outside the stadium so Thurman could sign some autographs for the fans waiting at the gate.
When we got inside, I sheepishly asked Mr. Thomas if he would pose for a picture. I’m not proud.
We walked onto the field through the same tunnel the players use. The turf at Ralph Wilson Stadium (Still the Ralph to me) was shimmering in the sunlight when we stepped out of the shadows. If I close my eyes and think hard enough, I can feel the heat of the sun from that day even though it was November.
We stood on the sidelines in awe of the size of the players in front of us. We turned around in awe of the size of the stadium above us. In awe of the whole thing, really.
Our seats weren’t hard to find: 50-yard line, right behind the Bills bench. Kirk’s mom was already there to wave us in.
“There’s my boys,” she said. She hugged us both. “I love that name, Kirk.”
The Bills lost that game and the next six that followed. Kirk didn’t start a single game all year. It was a disappointment, but you wouldn’t know it by the way he and his mom treated us that day.
When the game was over, Kirk climbed up into the stands to give his mom a hug and to take a picture with my brother while in uniform.
“What are you boys doing now?” Kirk’s mom asked when he was gone to the locker room.
We had no answer, again.
“That’s fine. You’ll come with me and eat with the team,” she said.
It takes a long time to get from the 50-yard line behind the bench to a skybox at the Ralph. Probably longer than it takes you to read this whole story.
When we got there, the food was laid out buffet style. There were dozens of families already eating and slowly, the players filed in too. We tried to keep to ourselves, but Doris Morrison wouldn’t let us.
She took my brother around to all the players.
“This is my other son, Kirk,” she said.
Fred Jackson signed a poster for us. Marcell Dareus could only laugh.
“Kirk, this is your brother?” He yelled across the room.
“Brother from another mother,” Kirk said.
I bought a Marcell Dareus jersey online when I got home.
“How are you going to get back to the hotel?” Kirk asked when the meal was done.
By now, we were used to saying we didn’t know.
“No problem. I’ll drive you,” he said.
The ride home may be my favourite part of the whole thing. It was like riding in the backseat of your friend’s car on the way home from little league.
“That Rex Ryan had you figured out in the second half,” Kirk’s mom said.
“I know,” Kirk said.
“Mark Sanchez isn’t as good as you made him look today,” she said.
“I know,” he said.
“That girl who sang the anthem was cute, Kirk,” she said.
“The blonde?” he said.
“I knew you were looking,” she said.
When we got to the hotel, Kirk got out, hugged us both and told us how much fun he had with us in Buffalo.
“Are you kidding?” I said. “We will tell this story for the rest of our lives.”
Well, here we are.
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The Bills have finally broken that playoff drought and given me a reason to tell the story again. I hope you enjoyed it. But, it didn’t end that night in Buffalo.
That winter, Kirk sent me an autographed jersey. I gave it to my brother for Christmas. He now has it framed at his house with a program from the game and a copy of the contract.
Kirk Morrison played one more season with the Bills before he retired. He covers college football for ESPN. He is an Los Angeles Rams analyst and works for Sirius XM NFL. He tweets a lot.
This spring my brother and I were in LA. He asked Kirk if he’d like to have a beer. He met us at the State Social Club on Sunset Boulevard. He apologized for being late — he had to put his kids to bed.
When the waitress came around to get his order, he pointed at my brother’s glass. I’ll have what he’s having. Of course. We sat together in that bar for two hours telling stories about out time in Buffalo and learning about where life had taken us since. We laughed a lot.
“You know I ate all those butter tarts,” he said.
These are the things I’ll be thinking about when I watch the Bills in the playoffs for the first time since becoming a fan. I’ll be thinking of Kirk Morrison and his mom Doris. I’ll think of Pat, Tee and their tailgates, Jim Kelly and Thurman Thomas too.
No doubt my brother will be thinking of them, probably wearing his Kyle Williams jersey. I bet he’ll even send a tweet. You can find him @kirkjmorrison these days.
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