Longtime Chiefs wide receiver Otis Taylor dies at age 80

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Otis Taylor, the longtime Chiefs wide receiver who along with quarterback Len Dawson formed one of the NFL's dynamic duos, died Thursday after more than a decade of health problems. He was 80.

Taylor's family, who had been caring for him as he dealt with Parkinson's disease and dementia, confirmed that he had died a mere seven months after Dawson, his close friend and teammate.

Taylor spent all 10-plus years of his career in Kansas City, where he was a fourth-round pick out of Prairie View A&M in the 1965 AFL draft. He went on to have two 1,000-yard seasons during an era in which the passing game was still evolving, and he finished his career with 7,306 receiving yards and 57 touchdown catches.

«Otis made my job easy,» Dawson once said. «If you got the pass to Otis, you knew he'd catch it.»

Taylor is perhaps best remembered for his 46-yard touchdown catch in Super Bowl IV that clinched the Chiefs' victory over the Minnesota Vikings. He was part of two AFL championship teams, was voted to the Pro Bowl after the AFL-NFL merger in 1971 and 1972 and was inducted into the Chiefs' ring of honor in 1982.

Yet for all the plaudits during his playing days, Taylor continually came up short of enshrinement in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He was a senior finalist this past year but failed to make it through to the final round of voting.

Taylor was diagnosed with Parkinson's and associated dementia in 1990, and in 2012, his family filed a lawsuit against the NFL claiming it was legally responsible for health issues he experienced beginning with seizures in 1969.

With Taylor bedridden and largely unable to talk in recent years, the lawsuit sought financial help for his care, which was overseen for more than a