Down to the Wire

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For sheer drama, I suppose it would be hard for any Super Bowl to top the one that was played in Atlanta 15 years ago today.

I'm old enough that I can admit that I saw at least portions of every Super Bowl that has been played so far. I've seen some dramatic games, and I've seen some blowouts. The Super Bowl that was played 15 years ago today was expected to be a blowout, but it turned out to be perhaps the most intense finish anyone has seen in nearly half a century of Super Bowls.

The St. Louis Rams were favored, perhaps not by typical blowout proportions (seven points) but certainly in the minds of most football followers. They scored more points that season than anyone else, averaging nearly 33 points per game. They had scored at least 30 points in seven of their last eight games, including their NFC playoff games. It was not unreasonable to believe that they could do it against the Tennessee Titans in Super Bowl XXXIV.

The Titans could score, too, but not as much. They averaged 24.5 points per game; they came in at just under that in each of their AFC playoff games.

So it was reasonable to conclude that the Rams would win the game. Just one problem. No one told the Titans.

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QB Kurt Warner passed for more than 400 yards, but he completed only 53% of his passes.

If Warner was frustrated, think about running back Marshall Faulk, who ran for nearly 1400 yards during the season but was held to a paltry 17 yards on 10 carries against Tennessee. Meanwhile, Eddie George of Tennessee ran for nearly 100 yards and scored two touchdowns in the second half.

Three Jeff Wilkins field goals gave the Rams a 9–0 lead at intermission, hardly what they were accustomed to. They added to their lead early in the second half when Warner threw a nine–yard touchdown pass to Torry Holt. Then George scored a touchdown in the final seconds of the third quarter, and the Titans went for two. They weren't successful so the Rams took a 16–6 lead into the fourth quarter.

George scored another touchdown, and the Titans trailed by three, 16–13. Then Tennessee held St. Louis to a three–and–out and drove to the Rams' 25, where Al Del Greco's 43–yard field goal tied the game.

But not for long. After the ensuing kickoff, Warner gave the audience what they came to see — a long scoring play. He connected with Isaac Bruce for a 73–yard touchdown, and the Rams led, 23–16, with just over two minutes to play.

At that point, I guess most of the people watching the game figured it was over. I know I did. But it wasn't. George and quarterback Steve McNair took the Titans from their 12–yard line to the Rams' 10. With the final seconds ticking off, McNair completed a pass to Kevin Dyson ...

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... who came up a yard short as the Rams' Mike Jones dragged him down and preserved the victory.

It was a fantastic finish to what had been a truly super Super Bowl.

Yanking the Monkey Off Young's Back

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For a long time, the knock on Steve Young was that he couldn't win the Super Bowl.

"Couldn't" really isn't the appropriate verb, though. He never had the opportunity to win or lose one until this day 20 years ago when he led the San Francisco 49ers into Super Bowl XXIX against the San Diego Chargers. It was to be his only opportunity to win a Super Bowl — and, boy, did he take advantage of it.

Young began his professional career 10 years earlier in the ill–fated United States Football League with the Los Angeles Express. In 1985, he signed with the NFL's Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who traded him to San Francisco in 1987, and Young spent the next four seasons as Joe Montana's backup. In that role, he was a participant in Super Bowls XXIII and XXIV. But he didn't get to play in Super Bowl XXIII, and he came in for mop–up duty after Super Bowl XXIV was a foregone conclusion.

In Tampa Bay, he had been judged a failure, but he showed his potential when subbing for Montana. Young became the 49ers' starter when Montana went down with a season–ending elbow injury in 1991. He was the 49ers' starting QB for the rest of that season, and he started every game for the next three seasons as well.

But the 49ers did not return to the Super Bowl until January 1995.

They were huge favorites when the game began. If you were betting on the 49ers in that game, you had to give the Chargers 19 points — the widest spread in Super Bowl history.

The 49ers led by 18 points at halftime and went on to cover the spread in a 49–26 victory. Young completed 75% of his passes for 325 yards and six touchdowns. He was, of course, the game's MVP

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It was a joyous scene on the 49ers' sideline as the final seconds ticked away, and sideline cameras brought it into America's living rooms. Young and his teammates engaged in some play acting in which Young invited them to pull the monkey from his back — a shot at those who had said and/or written that he couldn't win the big one.

There are two thoughts, really, that cross my mind when I think of that game two decades ago.

The first is that it was the last Super Bowl of my mother's life. I don't know if she was ever the football fan that my father and I are, but she enjoyed watching the Super Bowl — especially if the Dallas Cowboys were playing in it. I was living in Oklahoma at the time, and I remember calling my parents early on Super Sunday and chatting about the game. I had no way of knowing it would be the last football game of my mother's life. She would be gone in less than four months.

So when I think of that day, I think of the phone conversation I had with my parents. I really don't remember the specifics of the conversation, only that we had one. We talked for about 20 minutes, then we signed off. Mom and Dad did whatever they did during the game, and so did I.

My other thought is of San Diego's Junior Seau, one of the finest defensive players I have ever seen play the game. It was his only Super Bowl, and, considering that he ended up taking his own life, presumably because of head injuries he suffered during his playing days, I really regret that he couldn't have had the experience of winning an NFL championship once in his life.

The Team of the Decade

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Twenty–five years ago today, Joe Montana became the second quarterback to win four Super Bowls.

Terry Bradshaw is the only other quarterback to record that achievement — if Tom Brady beats the Seahawks this Sunday, he will become the third man to do it. And one suspects that Brady will have few, if any, additional chances. This will be his sixth Super Bowl; he will be 38 years old before next season begins.

The quarterbacks who faced each other in Super Bowl XXIV in New Orleans 25 years ago had been to five Super Bowls between them. Montana was 3–0; Denver's John Elway was 0–2.

The 49ers came into the game 12–point favorites. I guess the oddsmakers knew what they were doing because Super Bowl XXIV remains, 25 years later, the most lopsided Super Bowl ever played.

The 49ers never trailed. On their first possession, San Francisco marched 66 yards in 10 plays and scored their first touchdown on a familiar combo — Montana to Jerry Rice. San Francisco led, 7–0.

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The Broncos kicked a field goal when they got the ball back, but San Francisco retaliated with another touchdown — and what was probably the 49ers' only mistake all evening, a botched point–after attempt.

After one quarter, San Francisco led, 13–3. Montana had already thrown two touchdown passes.

The 49ers scored two more touchdowns in the second quarter and took a 27–3 lead to the locker room.

At this point, I ought to mention that I was in graduate school, and I was working at the local newspaper on the sports side. We had an outdoor writer who was, essentially, a freelancer. He brought his copy in to the office on Fridays, and we published it on Sunday.

Anyway, this writer and I were chatting about the game, and he asked me if I would be willing to bet with him. He wanted to take the Broncos. I agreed to bet with him, and I'm sure he thought I was being generous when I told him he could have however many points were being offered; the truth is that I just believed the 49ers could win by a couple of touchdowns. In more than half of their wins all year (and the 49ers were 14–2 during the regular season), the 49ers could have covered a 12–point spread, and they won both of their previous playoff games by more — far more — than 12 points.

So he started with a 12–0 advantage. Obviously, though, that lead evaporated rather quickly. He was just narrowly holding on to the lead at the end of the first quarter, but he couldn't have been encouraged. The Broncos only had five first downs at halftime. By that time, of course, they trailed by 24 points.

The Broncos finally got a touchdown in the third quarter — but it was after the 49ers had added two more touchdowns to their total. It was 41–10 at the end of the third quarter, 55–10 when the final gun sounded.

The 49ers were sharp, precise, not to be denied. Punter Barry Helton only had to kick the ball away four times all day. That is how efficient the 49ers were, scoring on two–thirds of their possessions.

If you looked at the time of possession, though, and did not know the final score, you'd be convinced that Denver won the game. The Broncos held the ball twice as long as the 49ers — but the 49ers scored on long plays, four of their touchdowns coming on gains of 20 yards or more. When you can pick up big chunks of yards like that, time of possession becomes irrelevant. After all, the Broncos only had three gains of 20 yards or more all day, and none resulted in a touchdown.

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Elway was the only Bronco who was really in the 49ers' league. The rest of the team simply didn't have what it took to compete with the 49ers.

San Francisco was the team of the decade. Of that, they left no doubt 25 years ago today.

On that day, it was probably hard to find someone who could conceive of a time when Elway would return to the Super Bowl — and not only play in it but actually win it. In fact, he did return to the Super Bowl eight years later, and he won, beating the Green Bay Packers.

They Called Him 'Mister Cub'

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"There's sunshine, fresh air and the team's behind us. Let's play two!"

Ernie Banks
Hall of Fame induction speech, 1977

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In the hearts of baseball fans, Ernie Banks will always be a Chicago Cub. "Mister Cub," they called him.

You don't often see a professional athlete who spends his entire career with a single team, especially someone whose big–league career lasted as long as Banks' did, but he spent all 19 years of his major–league career with the Cubs. I have heard him called the greatest baseball player who never played in the postseason. (He is almost 1,000 games ahead of his nearest competition on the list of players with most games played without a postseason appearance.)

You see, the Cubs haven't been to a World Series since 1945, and they haven't won one since 1908.

The Cubs came close to getting into the playoffs in 1969 (Banks retired in 1971), but they were overtaken by the "Amazin' Mets." It would have been nice to see him play in the postseason, but it would have to have been as a Cub; after all the seasons of futility he endured with the Cubs, it is impossible to imagine Banks in any other major–league uniform.

It isn't necessary to do so, of course, just as it isn't necessary to imagine Brett Favre playing in any uniform other than his Green Bay uniform. He started his career in Atlanta and finished it in New York and Minnesota.

Banks died in Chicago yesterday. He was born right here in Dallas, Texas, on January 31, 1931, grew up here, graduated from high school here.

So we could lay equal claim to him, I suppose. But once baseball took him away, as nearly as I can tell, he never returned. Oh, he probably came back for visits, but I don't think he ever lived here again. Once he got to Chicago, he stayed there.

It's hard for a Southern boy like me to understand how someone could be attracted to a place like Chicago with its frigid winters and a wicked wind that comes howling in from Lake Michigan year 'round. But it was Banks' adopted home, and he became the city's biggest booster.

Banks "enjoyed a love affair with Wrigley Field and its fans unlike any other in baseball," wrote Chris De Luca of the Chicago Sun–Times. While such a thing would be hard to prove, I am nevertheless inclined to agree with that.

I used to be more of a baseball fan than I am today, and I was never a Cubs fan. But I was in my baseball–card–collecting phase in the last years of Banks' career, and there were certain players whose cards I always wanted to get — and became my most cherished possessions once I did get them.

Banks' card was one of them, along with guys like Willie Mays and Hank Aaron and Brooks Robinson, who was always something of an icon in central Arkansas, having been born in Little Rock. When I was a kid, central Arkansas was (and, I am sure, still is) St. Louis Cardinals territory so Lou Brock and Bob Gibson were always popular with the baseball card crowd — and Chicago Cubs were the Cardinals' rivals so few Cubs cards were regarded as valuable by the guys with whom I hung out.

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Nevertheless, Banks' card transcended such team loyalty boundaries.

Ernie Banks was one of baseball's gentlemen, an eternally optimistic soul who probably started every major–league season believing it would end with him playing in the World Series.

As I say, that never happened. I suppose that kind of bad luck could leave a player feeling bitter, but as nearly as I can tell, he was always the unflagging optimist.

Rest in peace.

Montana's Second Super Bowl Victory

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I remember this day in 1985. I was working on the sports desk of the Arkansas Gazette on what is always the biggest day in sports every year — Super Bowl Sunday.

Everything else that would ordinarily demand our attention always took the night off on Super Bowl Sunday. They used to play the Super Bowl in the afternoon — until they discovered they could get a bigger TV audience by playing the game at night. So they moved it to nighttime, and since that time there have been some basketball games played in the afternoons of Super Bowl Sunday. Never very many, just a few, usually featuring big–name programs. Occasionally, sports fans have had the option of watching a hockey game or perhaps Olympic qualifying competition for skiers or skaters.

All that other stuff was usually over by the kickoff of the Super Bowl, though. We didn't have a TV in the newsroom in those days, but someone usually brought a portable TV to the office so we could watch the game. And it promised to be a good one.

It seems to me that maybe the worst thing that can happen to a professional athlete is to achieve great success very early in his career.

Because that tends to make the athlete believe that climbing that mountain is much easier than advertised, and the athlete expects to return to the championship level every year. Few athletes have made it to that level multiple times in their careers, let alone every year.

In truth, that is probably easier for athletes who participate in individual sports to accomplish than it is for those who compete in team sports.

That may have been what happened to Dan Marino, who came into the NFL as a first–round draft choice after the 1982 season. The Dolphins made it to the Super Bowl in 1982 and went 12–4 in Marino's rookie season but lost to Seattle in the divisional round of the playoffs.

In 1983, the Dolphins were 14–2 and crushed their opponents in the AFC playoffs. Waiting for them in Super Bowl XIX at Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto, California, 30 years ago today were the Joe Montana–led San Francisco 49ers.

It is important to remember that Montana was not a sure bet to be in the Hall of Fame yet. The 49ers had won the Super Bowl three years earlier, but that had been their only appearance. They were not the juggernaut that they would become, and their performance 30 years ago had a lot to do with that transformation.

Going into the game that was played three decades ago today, the 49ers were favored — but only by 3½ points.

It was billed as a showdown between Marino and Montana. Marino was everyone's MVP, having completed more than 64% of his passes (he averaged almost three dozen attempts per game) for more than 5,000 yards and four dozen touchdowns.

Marino may have thought it was all incredibly easy when the gun sounded ending the first quarter. Miami led, 10–7, thanks to Uwe von Schamann's 37–yard field goal and Marino's two–yard touchdown pass to tight end Dan Johnson. But Marino, who averaged three touchdown passes per game during the regular season, would have no more touchdown passes on this day.

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Montana and the 49ers seized the lead in the second quarter. Montana threw a touchdown pass to running back Roger Craig, then Montana ran in from six yards out, then Craig scored again.

Von Schamann kicked two field goals to cut the deficit to 28–16 at the intermission, but the Dolphins were done scoring for the day.

The 49ers got a field goal from Ray Wersching and Montana threw another touchdown pass to Craig, and it was over. The 49ers had won in convincing fashion, 38–16.

And Montana, who had not been named the MVP of the season, was named the MVP of the Super Bowl. As a two–time Super Bowl–winning quarterback, he joined an exclusive club. In a few years, he would win back–to–back Super Bowls and join an extremely exclusive club of four–time winners. So far, the only other member is Terry Bradshaw, who won his fourth Super Bowl 35 years ago today. New England's Tom Brady will be seeking to join that club a week from Sunday.

No doubt, many people believed on this day 30 years ago that Marino would soon win a Super Bowl. He might even win multiple Super Bowls in his career. He was, after all, only 23 years old, and, if he stayed healthy, he clearly had the skill.

But he never made it back to the Super Bowl. The closest he got was conference championship games following the 1985 and 1992 seasons. The Dolphins lost both.

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For the second time, the 49ers gave coach Bill Walsh a victory ride. He would get another four years later.

When Bradshaw Secured His Legacy

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On this day in 1980, Terry Bradshaw became the first quarterback to win four Super Bowls.

"He couldn't spell cat if you spotted him the C and the A," Dallas' Hollywood Henderson had said a year earlier, just before Bradshaw's Steelers beat the Dallas Cowboys in Super Bowl XIII. As Henderson learned, you don't have to be able to spell to be a Super Bowl–winning quarterback.

In the 35 years that have passed since, only one other quarterback, Joe Montana, has won four Super Bowls. It took him eight years to become the second member of the club.

If New England's Tom Brady wins the Super Bowl a week from Sunday, he will be the third member of the club, but he will have required 13 years to accomplish it.

But on this night, Bradshaw stood alone at the top of that mountain.

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Victory did not come easily. The Steelers' opponents, the Los Angeles Rams, were making their first appearance in the Super Bowl and refused to go quietly against the Steelers, who were making their fourth appearance in six years.

Actually, Super Bowl XIV was almost like a home game for the Rams. The game was played in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. At that time, the Rams played their home games in nearby Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, which is where the University of Southern California also plays its home games. Perhaps the Rams had an unacknowledged home field advantage.

The Rams and Steelers took turns seizing the lead through three quarters. The astonishing Rams led, 7–3 after the first quarter, 13–10 at intermission and 19–17 at the end of the third quarter.

But then the Steelers sprung to life. Bradshaw hit wide receiver John Stallworth for a 73–yard touchdown pass with 12:15 to play, then Franco Harris put the game on ice with a one–yard touchdown run with 1:52 remaining.

Bradshaw received his second consecutive Super Bowl MVP award.

The 10½–point favorite Steelers covered the spread with a 14–0 fourth quarter, but the Rams, who had been 9–7 during the regular season, had proven that they could trade punches with the big boys.

For there was no bigger boy in the NFL at that time than the Pittsburgh Steelers.

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And it seemed at the time that the Steelers were poised to dominate the NFL in the foreseeable future.

As it turned out, though, the Steelers did not return to the Super Bowl for 15 years — and they did not win one again until February of 2006, more than a quarter of a century later.

The Rams, as I recall, were mostly seen as a flash in the pan — good enough to continue to dominate what seemed to be a weak division but unlikely to return to the Super Bowl any time soon.

The Rams did not return to the Super Bowl soon. It took them 20 years. But they rarely won their division in the years after their first Super Bowl appearance, either.

Picking Oregon to Win It All

Well, the national championship game is being played in nearby Arlington tonight. Kickoff is in about an hour.

Oregon and Ohio State survived the semifinals on New Year's Day and are playing for the title tonight.

They've met eight times before — most recently in the 2010 Rose Bowl. Ohio State is 8–0 in those games.

It really should be a good game. It matches two Top 10 offenses — Oregon is ranked third in the country, Ohio State is ranked ninth. I expect a lot of scoring.

Ohio State's defense is ranked well ahead of Oregon's. The Buckeyes are 17th in the nation; the Ducks are 84th.

I guess those rankings suggest that Ohio State will win the game tonight. Perhaps the Buckeyes will. They have already surprised me twice, beating Wisconsin in the Big 10 championship and then Alabama in a national semifinal — both pretty handily, too — despite being without their injured quarterback. Impressive.

But, really, I'm inclined to pick Oregon. The Ducks have the Heisman winner, and they buried Florida State, the defending national champions, on New Year's Day. That's pretty impressive as well.

So I pick Oregon to win. Perhaps it will go to overtime. Even if it doesn't, I expect it to go down to the wire.

Enjoy.

Bowls: 7–8

Season: 213–58

The Day I First Saw Football On a Color TV

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This is a significant date for Kansas City Chiefs fans. It was 45 years ago today that the Chiefs won their only Super Bowl.

So far.

I have a friend who is a Chiefs fan, and he would remind me that the entire history of pro football has not been written — and, like Chicago Cubs fans who insist that one day their beloved Cubbies will return to and win the World Series, he has faith that the Chiefs will return to the Super Bowl and win it.

I am not a Chiefs fan — I'm a Packers fan — but I remember vividly the day the Chiefs beat the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IV. Why? Because it was the first time I ever saw a football game on color TV.

We had a black–and–white TV in our home. It was the TV on which I had watched every football game that I had seen to that point in my young life. No one in my neighborhood (and I use the word neighborhood very loosely here because I grew up in the country, and my neighborhood was hardly a conventional one) had a color TV — until a few days before Super Bowl IV.

Our neighbors (and, again, the word neighbors is used very loosely here; they lived close enough to us that we could walk from our house to theirs instead of driving) bought a Zenith color TV and invited us to watch the game with them. My father is an avid football fan so he accepted the invitation, and we walked over there. It may have snowed. Sometimes we got snow in central Arkansas in January; if it did snow, we trudged through it. No obstacle would keep us from watching a football game in color.

I'm pretty sure the game was played in the afternoon, too. The NFL didn't move Super Bowl kickoffs to the very late afternoon/early evening until several years later. Besides, my mother would never have allowed my brother and me to stay up as late as we would have if the game had been played at night — as it is today.

I remember being astonished by the color of a football game. OK, Super Bowl IV may have been more colorful than most. The Chiefs were dressed in their bright red home jerseys.

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The Vikings wore their road whites, but the uniform still incorporated splashes of the trademark Viking purple — and gold trim.

And the game was played in New Orleans, one of the most colorful cities I have ever visited.

I sat transfixed by the color. I remember looking at my father at one point. The look in his eyes told me we would have a color TV in our house soon, too.

And we did.

That was a time when ownership of a color TV was a real status symbol. It was also a time when networks would announce whether a program was being presented in color. Many in the audience — like my family — still watched black–and–white TVs, and sometimes in those days when a program was being broadcast in color, it had kind of an odd effect on the appearance of the program on black–and–white sets. Believe it or not, people really did call channels to inquire about oddities in picture reception.

Mind you, this was at a time when picture reception was about as imperfect as it could be. It was years before cable took hold, and most customers probably received transmissions via antenna, either of the outdoor variety or the rabbit ears that were on the back of each set.

Consequently, if a customer called because image reception was bad, there must be something to it.

Of course, my parents told my brother and me that the color TV would enhance our enjoyment of educational and cultural programming. I accepted that — not because I particularly believed it but because I knew what had put the hook in my father — the afternoon we spent watching the Super Bowl at the neighbors' house.

It's funny when I think back on the Chiefs' 23–7 victory over the Vikings, who came into the game as 12–point favorites. The Chiefs had been in two of the four Super Bowls and were expected to be in Super Bowl conversations for years to come — but they haven't been back to one since.

The Vikings were making their first Super Bowl appearance and were expected to be contenders in the future, which they were. They went to three more Super Bowls in the next seven years but lost them all and haven't been back to the Super Bowl in 38 years.

In the meantime, ownership of a color TV is no longer a status symbol. Ownership of more exotic variants — high definition, perhaps — are the status symbols now. But virtually all modern TVs are equipped to provide color pictures.

I'm not sure they even make black–and–white TVs anymore.