SUPER BOWL XXIV : SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS 55 DENVER BRONCOS 10 : Bourbon Street Theory Gains More Credibility

You didn’t need to analyze the statistics to forecast the Super Bowl winner. All you had to do was hang out on Bourbon Street last week and count the players from each team you saw at night. You would have seen more San Francisco 49ers than Denver Broncos.

Jim Donaldson of the Providence Journal writes:

“I have seen two Super Bowls here in the Big Easy. Both times, I have seen the winning players on Bourbon Street. Never have I seen the losing players outside their hotel.

“The Raiders rampaged through the French Quarter in 1981 like Jean Lafitte’s pirates on shore leave. The Eagles remained in their motel near the airport in the suburbs, watching game films.

“Oakland 27, Philadelphia 10.

“In 1986, while Tony Eason was ordering blackened tofu from room service, Jim McMahon was parading through the French Quarter followed by an entourage wearing McMahon masks and headbands with highly descriptive--but distinctly unprintable--messages.

“Chicago 46, New England 10.

“Call it the Bourbon Street Theory. Which is that if the Super Bowl is in New Orleans, you’re better off having your game plan drawn up by Spuds MacKenzie than some coach closeted in a dark room with a video machine.

“Party hearty and win big, that’s the way it works here in the City That Care Forgot.”

Trivia time: The Broncos suffered their other three Super Bowl losses at the hands of the Dallas Cowboys, New York Giants and Washington Redskins. The Minnesota Vikings also lost Super Bowls to four different teams. Name them.

Apples of his eye: Eddie DeBartolo Jr., owner of the 49ers, on comparisons of his club to the Pittsburgh Steeler dynasty of the 1970s: “The Steelers were so awesome. You can’t even make a comparison. It’s impossible to do. The style of football, even though it was just 10 years ago, was so much different. It’s like comparing apples and oranges. You can use computers, you can use anything you want, but unless you line the teams up, it would be awful difficult.”

Add comparisons: Denver linebacker Karl Mecklenburg on the Broncos’ Super Bowl futility and that of the Vikings: “I grew up in Minneapolis. I followed the Vikings. They were a great team. Being compared to the Vikings is no slap in the face to me. It’s much better than being compared to the Lions or somebody like that who never got there.”

A wave of the checkbook: Paul Brown, general manager of the Cincinnati Bengals, on the 49ers: “I’m so impressed by their bringing in players like (Jim) Burt and (Matt) Millen and (Mike) Sherrard. I guess you could say (such additions) is trying to buy a title. It’s one way of doing it.”

The glasnost watch: Vladimir Aleshin, the director of Moscow’s Lenin Sports Complex, was among a group of Soviet sports officials who received invitations to the Super Bowl from an American sports marketing company. A downcast Aleshin said Saturday: “Although I had the tickets and was able to leave on the 25th, we didn’t get the visa. Now we are here and the Super Bowl will be held without us.”

Set for life: Dan Reeves, the late owner of the Rams, once tried to hire Vince Lombardi away from the Green Bay Packers.

Reeves offered Lombardi a contract calling for $100,000 a year for 10 years. Lombardi told Reeves that security was what he really wanted.

“Wonderful,” Reeves said. “In that case, we can make it $10,000 a year for 100 years.”

Trivia answer: The Kansas City Chiefs, Miami Dolphins, Pittsburgh Steelers and Oakland Raiders.

Quotebook: Sal Campagna, restaurateur and volunteer food-service coordinator for the 49ers, on which wine he recommends to go with New Orleans jambalaya: “A spicy wine, maybe a gewurztraminer. If I couldn’t find that, I’d probably recommend a beer.”