49ers Cash In at Twice the Price

Don’t worry about it, Anthony Newman told Jim Price as they commiserated at midfield late in the fourth quarter.

“Everybody’s human,” Newman said.

“Nobody’s perfect,” Newman said.

“As they say,” Price would say in the locker room a half-hour later, “it’s always more than one guy’s fault when you win or lose a game.”

Price wasn’t buying any of it.

If the Rams’ gallant stab at an upset at Candlestick Park comprised the entirety of Price’s world Sunday afternoon, Price had the whole world in his hands.

Twice.

And then he dropped it.

Twice.

First came a fourth-quarter pass, over the middle, with the Rams ahead of the San Francisco 49ers, 17-10. The pass was high, but catchable. Price got his hands on the ball, but that’s all.

Deflection by right outside linebacker Bill Romanowski, interception by left inside linebacker Keith DeLong, 17-17 tie coming right up.

Next came another pass, over the middle, but deeper, well beyond those trouble-making linebackers.

Price made the play, which grew bigger with every stride--18 yards, 20 yards, 23 yards. . . . And then, strong safety David Whitmore reached in and stripped the football, sending it bouncing onto the grass, all the way into Johnnie Jackson’s arms, for a recovery at the San Francisco 48.

Three plays later and 49er quarterback Steve Young is playing pinball in the Rams’ secondary, pinging Newman, bumping Pat Terrell and dragging Robert Bailey into the end zone for the go-ahead touchdown.

The 49ers eventually win, 27-24, on a last-second field goal by Mike Cofer, but don’t try leaving it at that with Price.

“If there was ever a case where one guy lost a game,” Price said, “today was it.”

Price is known among Rams as a thinking man’s tight end. He’s from Stanford, he’s young (26) and he’s impressionable.

No amount of feel-good cliches, however well-intended, could obscure the facts the way he was seeing them.

“If you isolate those two plays,” Price said, “if you take those plays out of the game, there is not any way we could have lost. If I hang on to two balls, we win. . . .

“We had the lead, we had the momentum. All I’ve got to do there is hold onto the ball so we keep driving and kick a field goal.

“I’ve got to be smarter than that.”

Smarter?

Price had dumb hands on Sunday, maybe, but no one was questioning the wheels that were grinding upstairs.

No one except for Price.

“When a team is down, they’re going to try to make plays like that,” Price said. He was referring to Romanowski batting the ball, Whitmore blatantly tackling the ball.

“I really don’t think about fumbling while I’m out there. I don’t often fumble. Before today, I think I only had one (in the NFL). But after this, I’m going to be thinking about not fumbling, especially in that situation. I’m going to be more conscious of it now.”

Experience can be the cruelest teacher, and Ram Coach Chuck Knox offered no sympathy from behind the lectern.

“Two turnovers hurt us,” Knox said sternly as soon as the television lights flicked on. “I thought we had a chance to win, but we turned the ball over twice and it resulted in 14 points for them. . . .

“Until then, we were playing good football on all three units.”

Newman, the Rams’ fifth-year strong safety, took a different tack when he saw Price hanging his head after the midfield fumble. Newman grabbed Price by the shoulder pads, shook him gently, and told him, “Don’t worry about it. We’re going to stop ‘em here and you’re going to get another chance.”

Newman’s words were half wise. The Rams’ defense didn’t stop ‘em--if Candlestick Park had been an open-ended facility, Young would still be running--but Price did get his second chance. Jim Everett threw to him on first and goal from the nine-yard line, but Price could make no play, getting crunched in front by cornerback Don Griffin and from behind by free safety Dana Hall.

On the next play, Everett went to Flipper Anderson instead, in the back of the end zone, and Flipper went digging in the dirt for a spectacular, diving scoring catch.

“I wanted that ball Flipper caught,” Price said. He could envision making the same play, he could feel the ball slapping his palms and not touching one solitary inch of earth.

“You can’t cry over spilled milk,” Price reasoned. Or spilled footballs. “You’ve got to go out there on the next play and do it better.”

Anderson’s touchdown temporarily tied the score at 24-24, but once again, the defense couldn’t hold ‘em. Brent Jones beat cornerback Sammy Lilly for a sensational two-handed catch. Jerry Rice beat Lilly for a sensational one-handed catch.

Then came Cofer’s foot.

It hit Price like a kick in the stomach.

“I have never. . . . I have won some games before, but I have never been in a situation like this,” Price told the crowd of reporters hovering around his locker stall. “Everybody, I guess, has to go through it once. This is my turn.”

He glanced at his helmet.

It was still painted blue, with golden ram’s horns, not goat’s horns.

He just wanted to make sure.