As Steve Atwater contemplated football immortality bestowed by the Hall of Fame, one of the toughest tacklers ever to play in the NFL began to cry, thinking about how much that gold jacket would have meant to his late mother.

“You got me all teared up,” said Atwater, slipping an index finger under his glasses to dab the puddle forming in his right eye, as we sat together at Broncos headquarters.

As the most ferocious hitter ever to wear a Denver uniform knocked patiently on the door to the Hall of Fame, heaven couldn’t wait to take his mother. On Oct. 5, Jessie Atwater passed away at her home in St. Louis. She was 75 years old, the same age as franchise owner Pat Bowlen when he died.

“Same year, same age as Mr. Bowlen,” Atwater told me. “Man, I would have liked to gotten in (the Hall) while she was alive.”

The bronze bust sculpted for every player inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame is built to last 40,000 years. During his second time as a finalist for the sport’s greatest honor, Atwater came oh-so-close in 2019 to earning an invitation to join teammates John Elway, Shannon Sharpe and Terrell Davis in Canton, Ohio.

So this 53-year-old former Broncos safety will again gather with his family inside a hotel room in Miami on Super Bowl eve, with one ear angled toward the door, hoping to hear that happy knock from Hall president David Baker, with the wonderful news Atwater has been accepted into the NFL’s most exclusive club.

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“It was crazy,” said Atwater, who still has difficulty believing the surreal manner in which he watched his mother die.

The fifth of October is the birthday of Atwater’s sister, who was celebrating at their parents’ house. Late that autumn evening, the former Broncos stalwart answered his cell phone in Indianapolis, where Atwater was on a business trip, for a video conference with loved ones in St. Louis. His mother had already gone off to bed. His sister walked into Jessie’s bedroom, so Steve could say hello.

“My little sister held the phone next to my mom’s bed, and I said: ‘Mom! Wake up, wake up! It’s me, Steve!’ But she didn’t move, even when my sister started shaking her,” Atwater said.

“When the paramedics got over there to the house, next thing I know, my sister video-called me back. The paramedics had my Mom on the floor by her bed, pumping her chest. I saw all of it, man.”

Roaming the field at Mile High Stadium, wearing No. 27 for the Broncos from 1989-1998, he was fondly known as the “Smiling Assassin.” But at the dinner table in St. Louis, Atwater was Jessie’s little boy. How a mother would have cherished seeing how dashing Steve looked when fitted for a shiny gold jacket from the Hall of Fame.

“When the finalists were announced,” recalled Atwater, “she called me and said: ‘Hey, Steve. I saw you were on the list, Son. Congratulations!’ And .I said: ‘Oh thanks, Mom. We’ll see how it goes this year.'”

As the memory of that conversation with Mom washed over Atwater, he paused, choked back tears and confided: “I was really hoping it would’ve happened, you know, during her time.”

After decades that saw the Broncos grow an inferiority complex as big as the Rocky Mountains because a proud, successful franchise felt repeatedly slighted by the Hall, has orange become the new black in Canton?

Mr. B and cornerback Champ Bailey were both honored in the Class of 2019. With an expanded roster of inductees coming this year as part of the NFL’s centennial celebration, there is legitimate hope it is prime time for Atwater, as well as Orange Crush linebacker Randy Gradishar and perhaps coach Dan Reeves, to bust down those museum doors.

“They better all get in,” said team president Joe Ellis, who listed the accomplishments of overlooked Broncos, then added: “We don’t have enough players in there. Pat always felt that. And I do, too.”

Pins and needles are warmer and fuzzier than the anxiety a finalist feels during the final hours before new Hall members are announced. A year ago, Atwater and his family huddled inside a hotel room on the first Saturday of February in Atlanta, site of Super Bowl LIII.

“We had a knock on the door,” said Atwater, setting up the punch line, “and it was … the maid.” Related Articles Broncos’ Von Miller gives fans “Mile High Salute” while sharing photo of leg in cast

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One false knock broke every heart in the room. Even the most devious novelist could not possibly imagine such a wicked plot twist, so cruel Atwater can do little now except laugh at the burnt-in-the-memory image of opening the door to the face of a maid so apologetic she nearly evaporated from embarrassment.

Nobody asked me, but the Hall of Fame has some house-keeping to do. How is it possible Atwater, who was named to the NFL’s all-decade team of the 1990s and practically invented the concept of the viral video with an unforgettably loud tackle of Kansas City running back Christian Okoye nearly 30 years ago, doesn’t already own a gold jacket?

This year, on selection Saturday, after the 48 members of a blue-ribbon panel vote five modern-era players into the Hall, the knock on Atwater’s door better be from Baker this time.

No offense to the maid, of course.