We were all lucky to have caught this act

''That's exactly how I feel," said Flutie. ''Every word of it."

Doug's 43? Nah. Can't be. Won't be.

''I'm just a big kid," he laughed, as if we didn't know.

But he really is two score plus three, and last year wasn't a big yuckfest for him. That mortality business, you know.

''I had two knee scopes, and there were good days and bad days," he revealed. ''There were times when I said, 'Gee, I hope I don't have to play this week.' "

Doug Flutie afraid to play? Unthinkable. But he didn't want to go out there if he couldn't be, you know, Doug Flutie.

That's why he's spurning multiple offers to return north of the border, where, as an almost buoyant Coach Bill reminded us, ''He is more than legendary."

''I wasn't sure I could play an 18-game schedule and playoffs the way I want to," Flutie explained. ''You look at my years there. I always rushed for five or six hundred yards a year."

And yet . . .

''I needed about 20 people to talk me out of it," he said.

No one -- let me make this clear: NO ONE -- likes playing whatever it is you want to play more than Doug Flutie. In a world of doers, the 5-foot-9 7/8-inch Flutie (his own official measurement) has been the Competitor's Competitor. ''In 21 years, I've had more fun and enjoyment than anyone," he maintained. ''It's still a game to me." As opposed to a business, he means. And, unlike most others, he really does believe it.

Doug Flutie is not through playing. He's just through playing football and getting paid for it. What do you think he's going to do now?

''I promised my brothers I'll be playing in a men's baseball league," he revealed.

Touch football, basketball, and probably even hockey are sure to follow.

How good an athlete was Doug Flutie? The football you know. The rest, to you, may be anecdotal. But suffice it to say that I once asked Boston College basketball coach Gary Williams if Flutie, whom he had seen in many a pickup game, could have played for him. ''He'd be in my rotation," Williams declared. ''He'd back up [future NBA All-Star] Michael Adams." These were perennial NCAA Tournament teams we're talking about.