THE PASSING OF AN ERA

By Steve Wulf

"We considered Montana to be among the top two or three quarterbacks in the draft," said [head coach Bill] Walsh, who had Jack Thompson of Washington State and Phil Simms of Morehead State highly rated, "...but saw those two signal callers taken in the draft's first seven picks."--1979 San Francisco 49ers Media Guide

THE 49ERS HAD TRADED AWAY THEIR first-round draft pick in 1979 for O.J. Simpson, and they used their second pick to take UCLA running back James Owens. With their third pick, 82nd overall, they took a chance on the Notre Dame quarterback with the supposedly mediocre arm and supposedly troublesome attitude.

Sixteen seasons, 40,551 yds., 3,409 completions, 273 touchdowns, four Super Bowl victories and one renamed town later, Joe Montana is finally calling it quits. A retirement party in San Francisco and a press conference in Kansas City, Missouri, are planned for this week, and his agents are shopping him around to the networks as a broadcaster, even though Montana has a reputation for laconism. In typical fashion, Montana responded this way last week to the rumors of his retirement: "I can't say it ain't or it is."

While it's tempting to offer "Say it ain't so, Joe," it was fairly clear last season, his second with the Kansas City Chiefs, that if Montana wanted one more Super Bowl, he was facing fourth and long with very little time left. He led the Chiefs to just a 9-7 record, and they fell to the Miami Dolphins in the first round of the play-offs. Privately Montana feels that the Chiefs have not put together a Super Bowl contender and that, at 38 and with a bad knee, he's not up for Coach Marty Schottenheimer's rigorous practices. So fans can really only say, Goodbye, Joe, and thanks for everything.

And everything is quite a lot. There are, of course, the four Super Bowl victories for the 49ers: XVI, XIX, XXIII and XXIV. There is the highest quarterback rating (92.3) of any nonactive passer in history. There are the seemingly dozens of two-minute drills in which Montana led the 49ers and then the Chiefs down the field to victory. Wayne Walker, the 49ers broadcaster, once described Montana as "cooler than the other side of the pillow," and it was that grace and ingenuity under pressure, and not his arm and not his running ability, that made Montana the finest quarterback of all time. What made him especially popular was that he was never expected to be all that good.

Montana grew up in Monongahela, Pennsylvania, in an area of the state that also nurtured such N.F.L. quarterbacks as Johnny Unitas, George Blanda and Joe Namath. When he got to Notre Dame, he was seventh-string, but by his senior year he was a legend. Battling the flu and Houston in the 1979 Cotton Bowl, he gulped down two cans of chicken soup to lead his team to a thoroughly ecumenical comeback victory--he was an Italian leading the Irish to triumph thanks to a traditional Jewish remedy.

Yet a few months later, no N.F.L. team seemed to want him. The 49ers and Bill Walsh became interested only after they worked him out at UCLA two days before the draft. As Sam Wyche, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach who was then the quarterbacks coach for the 49ers, recalls, "What really impressed us was that he could immediately put into practice any coaching suggestion. He would literally eat the words right out of your mouth. Call it what you will--intelligence, intangibles, charisma--that's what we saw in Joe." But even at that, Montana still had to wait behind starting quarterback Steve DeBerg for a season and a half.

Montana's N.F.L.-highlight film began in 1980 when he rallied the 49ers from a 35-7 half-time deficit to a 38-35 overtime victory over the New Orleans Saints. In the 1981 N.F.C. championship game, he beat Dallas 28-27 on a last-minute touchdown drive that culminated in the Catch, a 6-yd. pass to wide receiver Dwight Clark at the back of the end zone. Three times Montana would be the Super Bowl mvp. After he was traded to the Chiefs in April '93, Montana added to his legend by leading them to stirring play-off victories over Pittsburgh and Houston. Ismay, Montana (pop. 22), even changed its name to Joe.

It's rather fitting that Montana is retiring just as the N.F.L. is gearing up for the draft that begins on Saturday, April 22. This is a particularly good year for quarterbacks, what with Kerry Collins of Penn State, Steve ("Air") McNair of Alcorn State, Rob Johnson of usc and John Walsh of Brigham Young all projected to go in the first round. Maybe one of them is the next Joe Montana. Bill Walsh, who held a special camp for the quarterback prospects two weeks ago, thinks John Walsh "throws much like Joe Montana." According to Wyche, "McNair is a lot like the young Montana in that he has something to prove and he looks you in the eye."

Dick Haley, the player personnel director for the New York Jets, says, "We'd love to pick the next Montana, but then in 1979 when I was with the Steelers, I didn't pull the trigger on the first one. This kid grows up 20 miles down the road from us, and we still missed him." Joe Montana was missed then, and he'll be missed from now on.