SUPER BOWL XXIV : SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS 55 DENVER BRONCOS 10 : PRO FOOTBALL : Variety of Receivers Spices the Attack

The first question is: Why did the 49ers win so easily?

A three-part answer:

--Their offense has become almost impossible to stop. The 49ers can run effectively with either of their backs, Roger Craig and Tom Rathman. Both are good receivers, too, and no other team has a backfield like that. With possibly the game’s best-ever wide receiver, Jerry Rice, plus John Taylor and a new tight end, Brent Jones, the 49ers have five good targets for a passer who is nearly flawless: Joe Montana. If he only had three blue-chip receivers, Montana wins Sunday’s game. With five, he makes it a blowout.

--Earlier this month, the 49ers knocked out two outstanding NFC teams, the Minnesota Vikings, 41-13, and the Rams, 30-3. And now they get an AFC team, the Denver Broncos, the champion of a conference that used to dominate but is now dominated. Only the exact score, 55-10, was ever really in doubt.

--If the 49ers have played better football this month than any other team has played in one month--and that seems likely--the best explanation is that their players are exceptional, their coaching sound, and their motivation unique. The club was put together in the 1980s by former coach Bill Walsh, who, in a three-Super Bowl career, recruited virtually every 49er coach and player in Super Bowl XXIV. They are good enough to win without him when motivated, and, as Montana said, their motivation was a deep desire to show him that they can indeed win without him.

It is possible that if you could line up the 1970s Pittsburgh Steelers against the 1980s 49ers, Pittsburgh would win. But as grand as quarterback Terry Bradshaw was, the Steelers, against good teams, never played three consecutive games at the performance level the 49ers reached this month.

Here’s the second question: Why did the score get so big?

The Broncos were devastated by rookie halfback Bobby Humphrey’s fumble in the first quarter at a moment when the 49er lead was only 7-3.

The Broncos collapsed immediately afterward, and they did so because they had gone into the game with the wrong attitude.

As recently as Sunday morning, the Denver owner, Pat Bowlen, was still saying: “It will be an upset if we lose.”

That was an absurd statement--but not his first this month. He and Coach Dan Reeves have spent the last fortnight making optimistic remarks that they should have known wouldn’t stand up.

The only people they fooled were their own players.

As of early 1990, what is the right attitude for a 49er opponent?

The Broncos should have set out to play every down as if it were the last down of their careers--heedless of the consequences, regardless of whether the 49ers got an early touchdown or two.

The Broncos shouldn’t have played to win. They should have let the winning take care of itself and simply played hard, as other football underdogs have done on other days, and occasionally won.

Instead, listening to their leaders, the Broncos thought they had a chance.

Montana’s first touchdown was the first blow. The second was having to settle for a field goal, and the clincher was the fumble. On the first play after the fumble, against a heavy-hearted team that had already begun to give up, Rathman plunged through the Broncos for 14 yards. And although a penalty wiped that out, Montana, on second-and-20, completed a 20-yard pass. Thereafter, the Broncos, thoroughly dispirited, were never in it.

Question No. 3: Why did Denver quarterback John Elway look so bad?

His awful performance was the result of the competence of San Francisco’s defensive backs.

The 49er secondary, the best in football, covered Elway’s receivers so closely that they were almost never in the game. Trying to find an open target in the swarm of defenders made Elway appear to be reading poorly. He wasn’t. There simply wasn’t anything good for him to read. That would make any passer have an off day.

Two weeks ago, against Cleveland, Elway played the game of his life--but it was the cooperative Cleveland defense that made it possible. Elway’s receivers were open often enough that afternoon, and he hit them often enough. In the Superdome, there was almost nothing for him to hit but the turf and the heavens, which he hit regularly.

The 49ers’ most underrated players are their defensive backs, particularly Don Griffin, strong safety Chet Brooks, and, when they use him, Tim McKyer. Free safety Ronnie Lott provides the leadership.

In the first quarter, Elway’s best pass was a better pass than any Montana had thrown to that point, but as the ball sailed toward the sideline, McKyer, who had left a cushion of five yards, flew into Bronco receiver Vance Johnson. Bang. Incomplete. A moment later, Denver’s other wide receiver, Mark Jackson, going for another Elway pass, saw Lott out of the corner of his eye. Bang. Drop.

As great as Montana is, if he were on the Broncos, and if Elway were a 49er, the outcome would have been the same. It’s a team game--and the Broncos, compared to the 49ers, aren’t much of a team.