At 84, NFL timekeeper and kidney recipient Jim Ely still keeping pace
Given the choice between lunch with Ann-Margret or receiving the news that a donor kidney had been found, Jim Ely can’t choose which was better.
“It was elation on both sides,” said Ely, an 84-year-old NFL timekeeper.
Luckily, he’s had both.
Ely’s life sounds as if it was written on the pages of a Dan Jenkins novel. Movies with Al Pacino and Mark Wahlberg, commercials with Tony Romo and Cam Newton, a day job that took him all over the world officiating sports and hall of fame inductions tell only part of the story.
Ely has another chapter to share. After his kidney transplant less than a year ago at UT Southwestern Medical Center, his mission is to spread a message of hope and perseverance.
“I have so much to be thankful for,” Ely said. “I’m here to tell anyone who wants to listen.”
Ely estimates he’s done more than 65 interviews with newspapers, magazine, and TV and radio stations since the surgery.
Ely spent nearly 40 years as a football referee and baseball umpire. His expertise led to role in Any Given Sunday and an unforgettable chance meal with Margret on the set. Ely also had a part in another football flick, Invincible, starring Wahlberg. He’s done a Pepsi spot with Romo and one for NFL Network with Newton. (Ely always plays a ref.)
Ely had to leave the field as an official in 2005 due to his failing kidney. Medication and dialysis kept him going, and in the football booth as a timekeeper.
He primarily works Dallas Cowboys games for the NFL at AT&T Stadium, along with college games there. Ely runs the play clock.
About five years ago, Ely sought a kidney transplant with the hopes of leading a more active lifestyle. His advanced age seemed to be a hurdle.
The medical team at UT Southwestern felt otherwise.
“When we evaluated him, we do a medical assessment that includes looking at his heart, looking at his lungs and his overall physiology,” said Dr. Juan Arenas, the surgeon who performed Ely’s transplant. “He was in great shape to do this surgery, but it was his motivation.
“A person his age usually gives up. He kept working out and was willing to maintain his viability for a transplant. He had the perfect combination of his health and his motivation.”
The odds of finding a kidney in time weren’t in Ely’s favor. There are more than 100,000 people on the waiting list, according to the Organ Procurement and Transplant Network. A little more than 17,000 transplants were performed last year.
Ely spent 5 1/2 years on the waiting list. (The average wait is 3.6 years.) When the call came on Dec. 4, he drove from Plano to downtown Dallas in rush hour to begin the process.
“There must have been three million cars on the road,” Ely said with a laugh.
I don’t think that I’m old. You’re only as old as you act. I want to do this until I feel I can’t do it anymore. I just take it one year at a time.
Kidney recipient and NFL timekeeper Jim Ely
The surgery happened the next day, with Ely being the oldest and last patient to receive a kidney transplant at UT Southwestern’s St. Paul University Hospital. A day later, all 194 patients at St. Paul, including Ely, were transferred to UT Southwestern’s new Clements University Hospital.
“They did things for me that I didn’t even think could be done,” Ely said of UT Southwestern Medical Center’s staff.
He’s feeling stronger every day. Ely makes sure to get his exercise in, either on his treadmill or bike, or by just walking from the parking lot up to the press box.
He’s as steady as that clock ticking away between plays.
“I don’t think that I’m old,” he said. “You’re only as old as you act. I want to do this until I feel I can’t do it anymore. I just take it one year at a time.”
Time is Jim’s friend.
This story was originally published October 15, 2015 at 4:55 PM with the headline "At 84, NFL timekeeper and kidney recipient Jim Ely still keeping pace."