Working together
Wes Welker's family recalls hard work, heartache and what it took for him to reach the top
Wes Welker's family recalls hard work, heartache

When he got the big news, Wes Welker was on his knees — grouting ceramic tile.

His brother had enlisted help after buying a house in need of remodeling. While helping his father with kitchen tile one day last winter, Welker's cell phone rang. The Oklahoma City native looked squarely at his dad when he hung up.

"That was my agent,” Welker said, "and New England has made me their No. 1 priority to secure me in the off-season.”

Then, he told his dad about the money.

Five years, $18.1 million.

"You've got to be kidding me,” his dad said.

Because the news couldn't get out without jeopardizing the deal — and because his mom was in another room painting — the Welker men celebrated $18.1 million as quietly as possible. They high-fived, then hugged, then high-fived some more.

That Welker just happened to be surrounded by family on what was then the biggest day of his life might have been coincidence.

Sure is fitting, though.

Welker set a franchise record in the regular season with 112 receptions, which also tied for the NFL lead. The 5-foot-9 receiver who was overlooked on signing day at Heritage Hall, then bypassed on draft day out of Texas Tech is now the most prolific receiver for the high-powered Patriots.

How did college teams and pro franchises miss on him?

Welker overcame not only because of his grit but also because of his family.

Every time Welker has been at a crossroads, his family has been there. Together, they decided to send him to private school, then keep him there. Together, they overcame the disappointment when the colleges didn't offer and the pros didn't believe.

One constant has remained — family. Father, Leland. Mother, Shelley. Brother, Lee.

They have molded his work ethic. They have influenced his toughness. They have been there no matter where Welker's football odyssey has led, from Heritage Hall to Texas Tech to San Diego to Miami to New England.

Next weekend, it leads to the Super Bowl.

"We had fun in high school on Friday night,” Shelley said. "Then, we had fun on Saturdays. Now, we're having fun on Sundays.”

They did it together.

Leland Welker and Shelley Wetzel first met while waterskiing at Lake Ponca.

He was home in Ponca City, on break from classes at Central State in Edmond. She was still in high school. Even though they'd grown up in the north-central Oklahoma town, they'd never crossed paths before that day at the lake.

After long-distance dating for two years, they married and settled in the Oklahoma City area.

Leland worked as a frameman at Southwestern Bell, Shelley as a nurse.

A few years later, their first son came along. Lee was a good baby and a sweet toddler.

Then along came Wesley Carter Welker.

He was everything his brother wasn't. Feisty. Active. Rambunctious. He was such a terror sometimes that he reduced Shelley to tears.

"He just had a mind of his own,” Shelley said. "Very competitive. Very strong-willed.”

Big brother did his darnedest to keep him in line. Lee played rough, and if Wes wanted to hang with him and his friends, he had to live with it. They jumped off the second-story balcony onto a couch below. They battled on the trampoline and wrestled in the yard.

Little brother learned his lessons well.

One day when they'd been getting after each other, Wes came up behind Lee and smashed a crystal ashtray over his head.

"I can't believe it didn't break my skull,” Lee said.

Roughhousing aside, soccer was the boys' favorite. They would play for hours at a time in the back yard, Lee directing and Wes doing what he was told.

"You have to use your left foot,” said Lee, now the girls' soccer coach at Heritage Hall. "You have to be able to your left and your right foot.”

Two decades later, Wes became the first player in NFL history to kick a field goal and an extra point, field a punt, return a kickoff and make a tackle in the same game.

He kicked with his left.

Early lessons in the back yard and on the playground were all good and fine. When it came to formal education, though, the Welkers faced a dilemma.

Leland and Shelley Welker bought their first home in Nichols Hills, but it had no public elementary school then.

When it came time to send Lee and Wes to school, Leland and Shelley didn't want them at a far-away public school, but they weren't sure they could afford private-school tuition. After considering other options, they sent the boys to Heritage Hall.

That first bill was a shock.

So were all the others.

Now and then, the Welkers thought about moving. They'd look at houses. They'd explore schools districts. They never found a combination better than what they had.

So, they'd refinance their house and keep the boys at Heritage Hall.

The Welkers have no idea what their total bill was — most private-school parents don't want to know — but the Heritage Hall tuition to send a child from kindergarten through high school today would be about $142,000 per student.

"It was a huge sacrifice for us,” Leland said.

Welker joked recently in a national magazine article that his parents just finished paying for their school.

"But literally,” Lee said, "they just quit paying for it.”

Why do it?

Simple. It was best for their boys. Leland and Shelley always wanted to extend them without endangering them. That's why, for example, they started Lee and Wes in soccer before they were old enough for kindergarten but wanted them to wait until junior high to play school-sponsored football.

"We never wanted our sons to play in any of these gung-ho leagues with these burly guys coaching, wanting blood and guts,” Leland Welker said.

Lee followed that plan.

Wes was another story.

Wes Welker came home one day begging and pleading to play football.

He had tagged along with a couple of his buddies to practice. He watched them go through drills and plays, but when the boys started doing sprints, he started running on the sidelines. He wasn't just keeping up. He was winning.

"You play football?” the coach asked him.

"No,” Welker said.

"You want to?”

"Yeah.”

Leland and Shelley weren't so sure, but Wes would not be denied. After his folks met the coaches, they decided he could start football a year early.

He joined a team that consisted mostly of players who hadn't been picked for other teams. Their first couple games were ugly, but then, things started to click. Namely, Welker started to click. The team ended up tying for the championship.

Welker scored five touchdowns in the finals.

"Once he figured it out, he just continually got better and better and better,” his brother said. "Since he started playing football until right now, he has always gotten better.”

Welker got so good so fast, in fact, that his parents wondered if staying at Heritage Hall was the best thing for him. Would he benefit from being at a bigger school? Would the competition, the coaching, the exposure be better for him?

In the end, what brought the Welkers to Heritage Hall was what kept them there.

It was best for the boys.

The recruiting letters came so fast at first that Shelley bought a 3- or 4-inch binder to hold them. It filled with mail from Southern Cal and Tennessee and Miami and every other team.

By the end of his senior season, Wes Welker had everything a football player could want, state title and player of the year included.

The only thing missing was a college scholarship.

An offer never came.

Finally in December, Tulsa called. Keith Burns had just been hired and wanted the family to come to campus for a visit.

When the coach pulled the Welkers into his office to chat, they expected to leave with a scholarship offer. Instead, he told them that there was no scholarship. Tulsa had offered a spot to Carl Scott, never expecting the Tennessee player of the year to commit — Scott appeared on Tulsa's 2000 roster and never again — but his commitment left no more scholarships.

Welker and his dad were speechless.

His mom was not.

"I promise you,” Shelley said, "if you give him a scholarship, he will turn this program around.”

Burns looked at her at said, "My mom thinks I should be the head coach of the Dallas Cowboys, but that isn't going to happen either.”

After driving back to Oklahoma City, the Welkers met with Rod Warner, then the football coach at Heritage Hall.

There wasn't a dry eye in the room.

"It was devastating,” Warner said.

Cindy Philbrick felt the pain, too. She had been close with the Welkers since their boys became buddies in preschool. Her son, Graham Colton, eventually played quarterback alongside Welker at Heritage Hall.

"They're such good solid people,'” Philbrick said of the Welkers. "I never heard anybody say, ‘It's not going to work out.”

The Welkers sat inside the Texas Tech student union the weekend after signing day. Scholarship offers had all but dried up, but the family traveled to the far-flung outpost that they'd only known as a town in West Texas seeking an oasis from a man named Mike Leach.

"Well, we want to offer you,” the Red Raiders coach told Welker, "but we need a decision pretty quick. How quick can you give us an answer?”

Welker said, "How ‘bout right now?”

That was the first of many times the Welkers would be together in Lubbock. Leland and Shelley went to just about every game, home and away. Lee and his wife, Sarah, often joined them. Grandparents, too.

What they saw was another record-setting career. Much like his days at Heritage Hall, Welker became a star. He set the NCAA record with eight career punt returns for a touchdown. He appeared on billboards all over West Texas. He became an icon.

Fans loved him for his demeanor, too. On the field, he busted his tail. Off the field, he shook every hand and signed every autograph.

Then again, Welker learned those lessons from his parents. They were always church-going folks, and they looked at everyone as equals. They also went to work every day without fail, Leland spending almost three decades at Southwestern Bell before taking early retirement a few years ago, Shelley still working at Mercy Health Center after almost two decades.

Was it any surprise, then, that Welker holed up in his room studying San Diego's playbooks after the Chargers signed him as an undrafted free agent? After two, thick books arrived on the FedEx truck, Leland and Shelley didn't see him for nearly three days.

Leland always told his boys, "You don't want to look back and have any regrets.”

Next weekend, Wes Welker will play in the Super Bowl.

The entire family will be there.

Sometimes when Leland and Shelley Welker are in the stands at a game, they just have to squeeze each other.

"It's overwhelming,” said Shelley, who's had her share of happy tears this season. "What a dream for a kid. Every man would probably say, ‘I would love to play in the NFL.'”

"Let alone for the New England Patriots,” Leland said.

Shelley, by the way, was the last one to know about that. Last winter when Welker got news about the deal, he had to keep it quiet. If Miami found out, it could tender a first-round selection and the deal might be off.

So, the Welker men kept it secret from Shelley.

"I should've known,” she said. "They were always huggin' and high-fivin' each other.”

Leland even joked about it — "I've got a millionaire football player helping me lay tile” — but it wasn't until the deal was signed and Wes told his mom that the entire family was involved.

Then again, the Welkers have been involved all along.

Leave a Comment

News Photo Galleriesview all