George Seifert had winced on national television when he found out his San Francisco 49ers were 10-point favorites to beat the Denver Broncos in the Super Bowl.
That was before somebody gave the 10 and plunked down $100,000 on the 49ers, sending the spread to 11 1/2.
The Los Angeles Rams weren`t even cold yet and Seifert was facing another challenge as a rookie head coach-how to keep his players from ”giggling,” as CBS commentator John Madden suspected Joe Montana was doing while completing 26 of 30 passes to dissect the Rams.
So Seifert spent Monday quietly enjoying the 30-3 victory for only ”the next few hours.” He has been successful this season by convincing his players to focus only on the game of the week, taking the ”play-them-one-at-a-time” cliche to new extremes.
The 49ers are trying to become the first team to win consecutive National Football League titles with different coaches since the 1932-33 Bears under Ralph Jones and George Halas.
If that isn`t relevant to Seifert`s players, this is: None of them has beaten the Broncos as 49ers.
The 49ers have tried four times since 1979 and failed. They haven`t beaten the Broncos since 1973, long before even Montana arrived.
Until the 49ers beat the Broncos in an exhibition game last summer, they had lost five preseason games.
These facts all seemed to make Seifert happy Monday, plus more.
”Just the fact that John Elway has played well against us, and I believe their defense has given up the fewest points of any NFL team. That gets their attention,” Seifert said. ”Plus the number of games they`ve won, and teams they have beaten.
”The fact that somebody says they`re 11 1/2-point favorites, all of a sudden we don`t say, `Oh, we`re going to back off on this thing.` We`ll be focused, because that`s what we do. It`s how we approach the game.”
Seifert also was up on his Super Bowl history.
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The 11 1/2 points represents the biggest spread since Minnesota was favored by 13 1/2 over Kansas City in the 1970 Super Bowl.
”That`s what I understand. And Kansas City won the game,” Seifert said. Overconfidence seldom is a problem in Super Bowls.
Nose tackle Jim Burt, a member of the 1986 New York Giants who beat the Broncos 39-10 in the Super Bowl, said he isn`t worried about how his new teammates will react to the overwhelming favorite role. They are used to it.
”It`s too long of a season to let the opportunity go,” Burt said. ”The fear of losing is a tremendous thing. I don`t have to warn any of these guys. These guys know. We have too many guys that love to play, too many guys who will fight you until the last second of the fourth quarter.
”You don`t ever like to be the favorite. You like to be the underdog. But you`ve got to overcome that. We weren`t overconfident (in 1986). We were scared of losing.”
The exhibition victory over the Broncos last summer (they didn`t play during the regular season) was ”important,” Seifert said.
”It was a game we talked openly about. At that moment, it was more important than some of the other preseason games, to shake that thing a little bit,” Seifert said.
”It had been on some of the veterans` minds that we hadn`t beat them,”
second-year safety Chet Brooks said. ”It will be on our minds until January 28.”
Brooks joined the hype immediately, saying ”nobody comes close to comparing with” Elway`s arm. ”If a receiver is covered, he can still drill it in there.”
But what about poor Jim Everett, the Rams quarterback who threw more touchdown passes than anybody else in the league?
”(Elway) has a better arm than Everett, a lot better,” Brooks said.
There are reasons for 11 1/2-point spreads, however. The NFC dominance over the AFC in the last five Super Bowls is only one factor. Another is this year`s common opponents.
The 49ers and Broncos played four common teams-Buffalo and Indianapolis from the AFC and the New York Giants and Philadelphia from the NFC. The Broncos beat the Bills and Colts, but lost to both the Giants and Eagles in Denver. The 49ers beat all four teams.