Super Bowl Xxi

The winners' player share for Super Bowl XXI was $36,000 per man. The losers got $18,000 per player.

The stage could not be set any better for Chicago's Rex Grossman to join a list of quarterbacks who had breakout games in the Super Bowl. The New York Giants' Phil Simms did it in Super Bowl XXI, Washington's Mark Rypien did it in Super Bowl XXVI and New England's Tom Brady did it in Super Bowl XXXVI. On Sunday, Grossman will get his chance against the Indianapolis Colts, who will crowd the line of scrimmage in an effort to entice him to throw more. And why not?

Chicago Bears Hall of Fame defensive tackle Dan Hampton says his team is not getting the respect it deserves. He doesn't mean the 2006 Bears, or the 1985 Bears, but the 1984 Bears. And he's not referring to what those players did on the field, but what they did on the sideline. With a big Gatorade bucket.

I know this pathetic, pitiful little girl, raised in Denver and dressed all in orange and blue, pompoms in her hand, a homemade Bronco logo stitched across the front of her shirt. A real loser.

No matter what alliterative flights of fancy New York's tabloid headline writers charter, coupling Jets with juggernaut or turning their "S" into Super Bowl, they're making the trip alone. "It's one game," said Wayne Chrebet, who caught two of Neil O'Donnell's five touchdown passes in New York's 41-3 victory over the Seahawks on Sunday. "It's in perspective. It's one game, not the Super Bowl. We're 1-0." Chrebet just began his third season as a Jet, and this is the first time he has been 1-0.

Reporters were lined up three deep around Kelly, Aikman, Smith and Thomas, but Lingner, Crafts, Johnston and Barnett have roles to play in Super Bowl XXVIII. They have stories to tell, and like the game's best-known stars, they will earn $38,000 each for a victory, $23,500 for a loss. In most cases, beyond the numbers on their back, the supporting cast goes unnoticed, unless touched by fate.

After XXVII Super Bowls, memories are stamped into the mind like the smoking brands on dumb, snorting steroid-fed bulls, which is sort of what you'll see if you watch Super Bowl XXVIII. I don't mean memories of the games themselves. Let's be honest about that. XXVII years of Super Bowls have produced the same amount of unforgettable, riveting moments as a Jim Nabors concert. I mean the real memories.

Come onnnnnnnn, Denver. Let's go Super Bowling, one more time, kids. Bring the whole Mile High gang up. Bring John Elway and his mile-wide smile. Bring Bobby Humphrey home to Hubert Humphrey's dome. Bring fresh prince of mid-air Vance--excuse me; the Vance--Johnson and his easel and oils. Bring Herr Mecklenburg, too. Bring everybody from Boulder and Bedrock and all those rocky Colorado towns for one more hike toward the mountaintop.

You would be hard-pressed to cram another scrap into their scrapbooks or another dollar into their wallets. John Elway and Warren Moon need accolades like they need Derrick Thomas in their backfields. Yet both quarterbacks, well into their 30s, push on into the 1990s in search of the same elusive carrot--a Super Bowl championship. No great career is complete without one. Ask Fran Tarkenton, or Dan Fouts.

Maybe the next time Wheaties does a cereal-box cover featuring the New York Giants, they'll include quarterback Jeff Hostetler in the picture. Of course, the way Hostetler is playing, they might have to give him his own cover. Hostetler was snubbed last spring when Wheaties, banking on the Giants' popularity after their Super Bowl victory over the Buffalo Bills, produced a team box-cover for distribution in the Northeast. Sean Landeta, the team's punter, was pictured.

The teams that have won most of the Super Bowls lately are coached by two friends from the same early-1970s Stanford football staff. They are Ray Handley of the New York Giants and George Seifert of the San Francisco 49ers, who often talk about the old days, particularly the time they went out to a late gourmet dinner with the rest of the coaching staff at Palo Alto. In an hour or two, Seifert recalled recently, a party of 14 ran up a $510 tab. "Then we handed the check to Ray," Seifert said.