Super Bowl XXVII : THE SPOTLIGHT

MAX’S WAKE-UP CALL

The night before the Green Bay Packers were scheduled to play Kansas City in Super Bowl I at the Coliseum, a team official told Packer receiver Max McGee after an initial bed check that there would not be another one.

“That was enough for me,” McGee was quoted as saying in the book “Lombardi,” written by Green Bay teammate Jerry Kramer. “I practically ran over him getting out of the room.

“I met some blonde the night before and I was on my way to pay my respects. I didn’t feel I was letting the team down any, because I knew there wasn’t a chance in hell I’d play.

“I waddled in about 7:30 in the morning, and I could barely stand up for the kickoff. On the bench, Paul (Hornung, his roommate) kept needling me, ‘What would you do if you had to play?’ And I said, ‘No way, there’s no way I could make it.’ ”

When McGee heard Coach Vince Lombardi call his name early in the game, he figured he had been caught sneaking out and expected to get fined.

It turned out to be worse. Starter Boyd Dowler had injured his shoulder while blocking on a sweep.

“Get in the game,” Lombardi told McGee, who recalled: “I almost fainted.”

But he didn’t. He caught seven passes for 137 yards and two touchdowns.

A REAL HEADACHE

Lyndon Johnson said of Gerald Ford that he had played too many games without his helmet. But although he reached the Oval Office, Ford never made it to the Super Bowl.

Thurman Thomas, on the other hand, is preparing to play in his third consecutive Super Bowl with the Buffalo Bills. Presumably, he will make it two out of three wearing his helmet.

Thomas, the NFL’s most valuable player in 1991, missed the first two plays of last year’s Super Bowl because he couldn’t find his helmet.

“Somebody moved it from where I left it,” was Thomas’ explanation.

After the Washington Redskins’ 37-24 victory, the missing helmet was cited as evidence that the Bills didn’t have their minds on the game.

“I know people are going to be asking me about my helmet and all that, but that’s fine,” Thomas said. “People will probably be asking me about that for the rest of my career.”

FOOLED ‘EM

Injury lists are almost sacred these days, but Joe Namath said the New York Jets kept secret an injury to future Hall of Fame receiver Don Maynard before Super Bowl III against the Baltimore Colts.

Early in the game, Maynard got open deep, but Namath missed him by inches.

“It was still an important play,” Namath told the Detroit News in 1989. “Maynard was open. He got beyond their bomb-proof secondary. If his leg was healthy, we’d have scored. But he put the fear of God into them. It was a real show of courage, going all out like that. Because of that one play, they kept up their double coverage. That opened things for George Sauer on the other side.”

Maynard didn’t catch a pass, but Sauer caught eight for 133 yards in the Jets’ 16-7 upset.

STICK TO SEX

1989’s great prediction: Dr. Ruth Westheimer made the Cincinnati Bengals her favorite for Super Bowl XXIII when she learned that the San Francisco 49ers and their wives would be staying in separate hotels.

“I think that in many cases, couples being apart will create more tension than good,” the sex therapist said. “For one thing, maybe she is going to ask him, ‘Where were you last night?’ And then he’s going to ask her the same thing.”

Final score: Sleep-aparts 20, Sleep-togethers 16.

STICK TO COACHING

Would you want this man to be your television analyst? Mike Ditka, the week before Super Bowl XXIV: “If it was a 7-10 game series, you’d have to go with the 49ers. But in one game, anything can happen, and I just have a feeling Denver might do it.”

Or they might not: San Francisco 55, Denver 10.

NOT QUITE ONE-FOR-ALL

Denver Coach Dan Reeves, asked if he had imposed a curfew before Super Bowl XXII: “We’re a one-man team, so John Elway has a curfew. The other 44 guys can do what they want.”

CANNON FODDER

Think this week is exciting for the media? Here’s how CBS’ Will McDonough, formerly of the Boston Globe, remembered the days leading up to Super Bowl II between Green Bay and the Oakland Raiders:

“John Rauch, coach of the Raiders, is a bore. He says nothing at press conferences. Everyone is getting frustrated. Finally, legendary New York sportswriter Jimmy Cannon, in his own style, gets up and says, ‘OK, this guy comes up and puts a gun to your head. He says, “You tell me whether you are going to run more or pass more, or I blow your head off.” ’

“Rauch thinks for a second and answers, ‘I believe in a balanced offense.’

“Three writers jump to their feet and yell simultaneously, ‘BANG!’ ”

TALKING HEAD

Win or lose--he won Super Bowl XVII and lost XVIII--for sheer volume of material, it was hard to top Joe Theismann. Here was the Washington Post’s Tony Kornheiser on the Redskin quarterback:

“Don’t you remember his virtuoso performances in L.A. and Tampa? Others may have thought those were Super Bowls, but Joe turned them into mini-series. To Joe, Super Bowl week was just one extended audition tape.

“He was the NFL’s first triple-threat media man--radio, TV and print. He had his own newspaper, Joe Theismann’s Redskin report, making him the only athlete who could give himself an exclusive story. He did it all. You leave a light on in the bathroom, and he’d do 20 minutes to an empty shower. Never met a microphone he didn’t like.

“Every night at 5, 6, 10 and 11, Joe did TV back to Washington. Every station. He was on TV all the time. John Madden should live so long.”

JUST WHAT HE NEEDED

No one made use of his prize for being voted most valuable player faster than Lynn Swann in 1976.

Swann caught four passes for 161 yards as Pittsburgh defeated Dallas, 21-17, so he got a lot of attention after the game.

“I talked so much to the media I missed the team bus to the hotel, then I missed the bus to the victory party. So I talked a guy into taking the car I won off the stand, filling it with gas, and I drove off to the victory party.”

OH, THOSE NIGHTS

Washington Redskin center Jeff Bostic, on his team’s preparations for Super Bowl XVIII, which the Redskins lost to the Raiders, 38-9: “You know, Coach (Joe) Gibbs told us to just spend the nights as we would if we were home. Unfortunately, too many guys did just that.”

EASY QUESTION

Bob Asher was a rookie backup defensive tackle with the Dallas Cowboys in Super Bowl V. The media crush was a little overwhelming to him.

“I’ve never seen so many newspapermen in my life,” he said. “Tell you the truth, I’m getting tired of answering the same question over and over.”

The question? “What’s your name?”

AN OLD TAYLOR TRICK

In Super Bowl I, both CBS and NBC televised the Packers’ victory. After the game, CBS announcer Pat Summerall was getting ready to go on the air with Green Bay fullback Jim Taylor when Bob Dailey, the director, shouted into Summerall’s headset: “Tell him to get rid of that Coke can!”

“Well,” Summerall said, “I wasn’t at that moment going to tell Jim Taylor to put down his Coke, or I guess I should say Coca-Cola.

“I had on a blazer and was sweating like a hog. So he offered me a swig and I took him up on it.

“He didn’t tell me he had laced it with Old Taylor (the whiskey). I was gagging and coughing when I heard, ‘Ten seconds to air.’ When they came to me, I couldn’t talk.”

NO XIII FOR HIM

Bill Parcells was a superstitious sort when he coached the New York Giants in Super Bowl XXI at the Rose Bowl. For the trip to the West Coast, he requested a pilot who had flown two previous Super Bowl champions. The pilot had to be flown from Los Angeles to pick up the Giants.

DA BUTT

The story of Super Bowl XX in New Orleans was Chicago Bear quarterback Jim McMahon.

To be accurate, the story was a part of his anatomy.

McMahon was treated with acupuncture for a bruised buttocks in the week before the game. He also bared his derriere to a helicopter flying over a practice.

“It’s been a pain in the ass, really,” McMahon said.

McMahon also was alleged by a New Orleans TV station to have called the local populace “ignorant” and the local women “sluts.” He denied the stories.

During the game, he changed headbands at least four times and mugged for the cameras.

All those distractions, which coaches always hate, weren’t enough to keep him from leading the Bears to a 46-10 victory over the New England Patriots.

THE LAST WORD

The Raiders’ Todd Christensen, before Super Bowl XVIII: “It’s not Brigham Young vs. Texas El Paso.”

How They Stand

The composite records for all participants in the Super Bowl:

TEAM W L PF PA Pittsburgh 4 0 103 73 San Francisco 4 0 139 63 Green Bay 2 0 68 24 N.Y. Giants 2 0 59 39 Chicago 1 0 46 10 N.Y. Jets 1 0 16 7 Raiders 3 1 111 66 Washington 3 2 122 103 Baltimore 1 1 23 29 Kansas City 1 1 33 42 Dallas 2 3 112 85 Miami 2 3 74 103 Rams 0 1 19 31 New England 0 1 10 46 Philadelphia 0 1 10 27 Buffalo 0 2 43 57 Cincinnati 0 2 37 46 Denver 0 4 50 163 Minnesota 0 4 34 95