Viking Defense Blocks Road of Flashy 49ers

SAN FRANCISCO —  One of the NFL’s most meaningful games since the last Super Bowl will eliminate either the league’s best team, the San Francisco 49ers, or the team with the league’s best players, the Minnesota Vikings, at Candlestick Park today.

“This is the biggest football game of the season,” 49er Coach George Seifert said Friday, combining a note of truth with a bit of hype.

Going into the 1 p.m. kickoff, the general perceptions are these:

--With Joe Montana at quarterback, the 49ers dominated this season. They won 14 of 16 games. Nobody else won more than 12. In defense of the Super Bowl title they earned a year ago, the 49ers have been more electrifying, offensively, than ever.

--Only 10-6 in the standings, the Vikings will send more players to the Pro Bowl this year, seven, than any other team. They also employ more past and present Pro Bowl players, 13, than any other team.

Six Vikings have been voted into the Pro Bowl the last two seasons--tight end Steve Jordan and offensive lineman Gary Zimmerman, and defensive players Joey Browner, Keith Millard, Chris Doleman and Carl Lee.

The seventh voted to this season’s Pro Bowl is offensive lineman Randall McDaniel.

In 1988, when there were nine, the others were quarterback Wade Wilson, split end Anthony Carter and linebacker Scott Studwell.

These players are still on the club along with three others who, raising the Viking total to 13, have made the Pro Bowl in recent years: running back Herschel Walker, linebacker Mike Merriweather and quarterback Tommy Kramer.

But the Pro Bowl players are merely the most famous members of an exceptional group. At least four others would win some of the postseason awards if they didn’t have to compete with the Carters and Dolemans.

They are flanker Hassan Jones, who, with spectacular leaping catches, wins as many games as Carter does; center Kirk Lowdermilk, who is on many Viking all-opponent teams, and defensive linemen Henry Thomas and Al Noga.

In other words, the Vikings have the talent to stymie Montana. With 71 sacks this season, the Vikings came within one of the league record, set by the Chicago Bears in 1984. Doleman, with 21, came within one of Mark Gastineau’s league record, also set in 1984, for the New York Jets.

Left to right, Noga had 11 1/2 sacks, Thomas nine, Millard 21, Doleman 18.

Against most quarterbacks, this group would be favored.

“But Montana isn’t like most quarterbacks,” said Millard, who has been voted the NFL’s defensive player of the year. “Montana gets rid of the ball in (an average) 2.5 seconds.

“If one (blocker) is just standing there between you and Montana, forcing you to go around or through him, you can’t physically get from the line of scrimmage to the pocket area in 2.5 seconds.”

Millard likened Montana to the Rams’ Jim Everett.

“It’s hard to get to either of them because they have so many outlet receivers,” he said. “When they see you, they just dump the ball off. They go down the field dinking and dumping.”

Offensively, the Vikings have had two problems this season:

--Injuries to three stars, quarterback Wilson, split end Carter and tight end Jordan. A broken knuckle on his left hand bothered Wilson for nearly half of the season. He never did get into sync with the speedy Carter or the Vikings’ most reliable receiver, Jordan. All will play today.

--The coaching of Jerry Burns and his offensive coordinator, Bob Schnelker, has seemed erratic. They have ordered only 18 passes to Walker, who seldom gets the ball on straight-ahead running plays--the only kind he can run. Moreover, the Vikings lead the league in field-goal attempts with 44, suggesting other kinds of offensive breakdowns.

“We’ve had difficulties inside (the opponents’) 20,” Burns said. “Everybody knows that.”

Thus, everybody picks on Burns. When you lead the league in talent but not victories, you have the kind of media trouble that Burns has run into in Minneapolis.

You also always have a chance to win.

Playoff Notes

The Bay Area’s 49er-Viking postseason competition is getting to be a traditional series. This is the first time that the same NFL teams will have met on the same field in the playoffs in three consecutive years. . . . In 1987, the Vikings won, 36-24. Then, as now, the 49ers had the NFL’s best record at 13-2. . . . Retaliating last year, the 49ers, who had had an inconsistent regular season, beat Minnesota, 34-9, en route to the Super Bowl.

Joe Montana’s last playoff pass went to John Taylor in the end zone a year ago to win Super Bowl XXIII. The player of the game that day, Jerry Rice, caught 11 of Montana’s passes. . . . Rice, who led the 49ers in receiving with 82 this season, was followed by a running back, Tom Rathman, who caught 73. Taylor was next with 60, followed by Roger Craig with 49 and tight end Brent Jones with 40.

The Vikings, 2-6 on the road this season, were 8-0 at home. They were 15-1 at the Metrodome in 1988-89, and would play host to the Rams if both teams win. . . . The 49ers were 8-0 on the road this season. Their two defeats were at Candlestick Park, where the field doesn’t help their speed.

This is the 49ers’ seventh consecutive playoff season, the most for an active NFL team. This is the first time since 1980 that Minnesota has won the NFC Central, which has been dominated by the Chicago Bears. . . . If Coach Jerry Burns gets the Vikings into the Super Bowl, it will be his seventh. He was there twice with the Green Bay Packers as an assistant to Vince Lombardi and four times with Minnesota as an assistant to Bud Grant. . . . Montana is one of four active quarterbacks with Super Bowl rings. The others are Phil Simms of the New York Giants, Doug Williams of the Washington Redskins and Jim McMahon, former Bear now of the San Diego Chargers. All played their biggest games in the Super Bowl.

The 49ers activated wide receiver Mike Sherrard for Sunday’s game. They have only three other wide receivers--Rice, Taylor and Mike Wilson. As a Dallas Cowboy, Sherrard, formerly of UCLA, suffered a broken leg twice, in 1987-88. “I never really thought I wouldn’t play again,” he said. “I knew it would take a long time. That was the hardest part--mentally--knowing I wouldn’t be playing for a long time.” To make room for Sherrard, the 49ers put uninjured nose tackle Rollin Putzier on the reserve list . . . San Francisco nose tackle Michael Carter will be sidelined, but nose tackle Pete Kugler and cornerback Eric Wright are probable. For Minnesota, split end Anthony Carter is probable and linebacker Mike Merriweather questionable. . . . The 49ers list their two oldest retreads, linebacker Matt Millen and nose tackle Jim Burt, as starters.

The Vikings’ most respected coach is their defensive coordinator, Floyd Peters, a former San Quentin prison guard whose teams have ranked in the league’s top 10 in sacks nine times in his 14 years with the 49ers, St. Louis Cardinals and Detroit Lions as well as Minnesota. As a defensive coordinator for the last 12 years, Peters has put his team in the top 10 on defense 10 times. An aspiring NFL head coach, Peters is 53. Is that too old? “Bill Walsh didn’t get a job until he was 47,” Peters said. “Bud Carson was 57. Buddy Ryan was 54.”