In the beginning, there were the guys with the jetpacks. And the idea that coathangers, properly positioned as an outside antenna, could get around a local TV blackout. And a hero who not only broke curfew the night before the game but blew past it, thinking he wouldn’t even be needed the next day.
Yes, the Super Bowl has come a long way since its debut at the Coliseum on Jan. 15, 1967, before it even was known as the Super Bowl. Then, it was just the first NFL-AFL Championship Game, a byproduct of the merger of competing pro football leagues months before.
It has grown to proportions no one could have imagined on that first afternoon, and the six succeeding games played in greater L.A. are a rough barometer of not only the growth of the championship game but the modern history of pro football in greater Los Angeles. That 29-year gap between games is proof enough, isn’t it?
Welcome back, Super Bowl. We’d forgotten how much oxygen you actually consume.
For example: There were more than 30 community events – some even having something to do with football – that were part of this particular Super Bowl week leading up to the Rams and Bengals squaring off Sunday at SoFi Stadium. Business roundtables, diversity events, eco-friendly initiatives, charity and military and art events, kids’ clinics, and even the “International Federation of American Football World Championship” flag football game between teams from the U.S. and Mexico.
That list didn’t count the televised NFL Honors show that took place Thursday night, or the annual Roger Goodell state of the league press conference and NFLPA response on Wednesday, or various news conferences to discuss security, food and beverage options, the halftime show, counterfeit merchandise, and even the design of the stadium.
Nor did this year’s schedule include the traditional yet farcical “Super Bowl Opening Night,” at which attention-seekers from fringe “news” outlets would wangle credentials so they can ask questions like, “If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be?” There were no “journalists” in weird costumes asking players questions in person, though the queries from Monday’s virtual interview sessions included one from an “Access Hollywood” correspondent asking Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow the identity of his celebrity crush when he was growing up. (I don’t believe he answered directly.)
We are reminded again of how long it’s been since the circus was in our midst: The last time the Super Bowl was here, in 1993, the Dallas Cowboys pummeled the Buffalo Bills, 52-17, in XXVII at the Rose Bowl in one of a series of one-sided Super Bowls, causing some to wonder if abolishing the extra week off after the conference championship games might lead to closer games. In retrospect, I don’t think it would have made a difference.
But how far we’ve come from Game 1, before anyone thought to affix Roman numerals, a 35-10 Green Bay victory over Kansas City before 61,946 fans in a Coliseum that then had a capacity of more than 90,000. The game was televised by both CBS and NBC but was blacked out in L.A., so KRLA (1110 AM) sent instructions to interested listeners on how to rig a directional antenna using coathangers and a broomstick to try to pull in the game broadcast from San Diego or Bakersfield. Some said it even worked. Others weren’t so lucky.
The guys with the jetpacks, one representing the AFL and the other the NFL, soared over the turf briefly at halftime during a show produced by Disneyland’s Tommy Walker that also featured Al Hirt – working for free, reportedly – as well as a 200-member chorus, the Grambling and Arizona bands, the Anaheim High School drill team, 10,000 balloons and 300 pigeons. (The NFL liked the jetpack idea so much they did it again 18 years later at Stanford for Super Bowl XIX.)
The unexpected hero was Packers receiver Max McGee, who had caught only four passes all season, was headed for retirement and didn’t expect to play. Thus, he didn’t get back to the team hotel until 6:30 a.m. the morning of the game, understandably bleary-eyed – but he was called upon when Boyd Dowler got hurt and caught seven passes for 138 yards and two touchdowns, including the first one in Super Bowl history. If we’d only known how difficult that really was.
The other vignette from that game? Chiefs cornerback Fred “The Hammer” Williamson boasted that he was going to knock out the Packers’ top receivers with the forearm to the head hit that he’d made his trademark (and which would be absolutely illegal today). But the Packers’ Donny Anderson laid him out first, early in the second half.
Every Super Bowl has a story. The next one in the Coliseum, VII in January of 1973, featured the Miami Dolphins finishing off a perfect 17-0 season – still the only start-to-finish perfecto in NFL history – by beating Washington, 14-7. It also featured the comic/tortured sight of Dolphins kicker Garo Yepremian picking up a blocked kick, rolling out and attempting a hilariously bad pass that slipped out of his hand and turned into a 49-yard fumble return for a touchdown by Mike Bass.
Super Bowl XI in the Rose Bowl, in January of 1977? That was the late John Madden’s finest coaching moment, as the Raiders won their first championship by beating the Vikings, 32-14, and then carried the wonderfully rotund Madden off the field. Oof!
Super Bowl XIV, in 1980, was the first time a team played one in its home territory. The Rams – 5-6 at one point that season – unexpectedly got there after shutting out Tampa Bay, 9-0, in the NFC championship game, only to run into the Pittsburgh Steelers and thousands of Terrible Towels in the Rose Bowl stands. L.A. led 19-17 early in the fourth quarter (and could have extended it to 26-17 but for a dropped interception by Nolan Cromwell) before the Steelers rallied to win their fourth title in six years, 31-19.
The 1983 game in the Rose Bowl, XVII, was the John Riggins game. Washington was behind all day until Riggins’ 43-yard scoring run early in the fourth quarter, and he carried 38 times for 166 yards, including eight times on the final scoring drive, in Washington’s 27-17 win. Afterward, the generally irreverent Riggins, referencing President Reagan, said, “At least for tonight, Ron’s the president but I’m the king.”
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Super Bowl XXI in 1987? The New York Giants scored 30 points in the second half to beat Denver, 39-20, despite John Elway’s 304-yard passing day. But the highlight: In the fourth quarter with the Giants comfortably ahead, the TV cameras focused on the Gatorade bucket that New York players had started dumping over Coach Bill Parcells at the end of each victory to start a football-wide tradition. After the game and the Gatorade bath and the rest of the celebration, Parcells and linebacker Harry Carson received endorsement contracts as thanks for the free publicity.
The last one in the Rose Bowl? Super Bowl XXVII in 1993 was Dallas’ first title in 15 years, a 52-17 rout thanks to nine Buffalo turnovers. That was the day the Cowboys’ Leon Lett was about to return a fumble 45 yards for another score, only to have Don Beebe catch up to him and knock the ball away before Lett got to the goal line.
It was also the year Michael Jackson performed, turning what had been a staid intermission show into pop culture history. Halftime, and the game itself, haven’t been the same since.
The common thread? Memorable and often groundbreaking moments. As the big show returns to SoCal, the Rams and Bengals have a lot to live up to Sunday.
@Jim_Alexander on Twitter