In Super Bowl, It’s Experience--and Attitude

The New York Giants are making their first appearance in the Super Bowl. The Denver Broncos are making their second. There have been nine such matchups in the past, and the team making its first appearance has lost eight. The only exception were the Pittsburgh Steelers, 16-6 winners over the Minnesota Vikings in 1975.

Chuck Noll, the Pittsburgh coach, expects the Giants to become the second exception.

“A lot of it is attitude, and the attitude the Giants have demonstrated in the final few weeks will carry over,” Noll said. “It’s the same way we felt when we went to the Super Bowl. This is their time, and I think they believe that.”

Add Giants: Coach Bill Parcells, on superstitions: “I won’t pick up pennies with tails up. A cat crossing the path of your car is bad luck. But you can erase cats. You have to back up your car and drive over the line again. It’s difficult on a highway.”

Trivia Time: What do actor Alex Karras, USC athletic director Mike McGee and announcer Merlin Olsen have in common? (Answer below.)

Denver linebacker Karl Mecklenburg was quoted in Newsday as saying: “Joe Morris doesn’t scare me. He’s not as dangerous as Curt Warner.”

When Denver cornerback Mark Haynes, an ex-Giant, heard that, he said: “That’s Karl’s problem. He has to back it up on the field. What has Joe run for this year? That speaks for itself.”

In New York’s 19-16 win over Denver in the regular season, Morris gained 108 yards in 23 carries.

Add Mecklenburg: Writes Mike Barnes of United Press International: “Nothing has been easy for him--maybe that’s why he’s doing so well. He was cut from the hockey, basketball and baseball teams in high school. He had to settle for a partial scholarship to Augustana College, a Division II school in South Dakota. UCLA never returned his call when he inquired about playing there, and he enrolled at Minnesota at his own expense. George Allen, then a USFL coach, told him he would never play in the NFL.”

Here’s the quote and guess who said it: “The great trouble with baseball today is that most of the players are in the game for the money that’s in it--not for the love of it, the excitement of it and the thrill of it. Times seem to have changed since I broke in more than a generation ago.”

Ty Cobb said it in 1925.

Just Asking: Wonder if USC basketball Coach George Raveling, who doubles as a columnist, remembers what he said about writers when he was coaching at Washington State?

“The best three years of a sportswriter’s life,” he said, “are the third grade.”

Jim Finks, New Orleans Saint general manager, told Frank Luksa of the Dallas Times Herald that Vinny Testaverde’s stock remains high despite the Fiesta Bowl fiasco.

“I can’t think of any player who hasn’t had a game like that, from Bobby Layne to Fran Tarkenton,” Finks said. “Testaverde has great raw material. Not only a million-dollar arm but good touch as opposed to John Elway, who can fire it but can’t put a hump on it.

“I think he has a much better touch than Elway. He’s more of a pure passer than a thrower.”

Trivia Answer: Karras (Iowa) 1957, McGee (Duke) 1959, and Olsen (Utah State) 1961, were winners of the Outland Trophy as the outstanding interior linemen in college football.

Quotebook

Rick Sund, Dallas Maverick general manager, on a halftime show featuring a man juggling chain saws: “You have a turnover there and you’ve really got some trouble.”