By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com
LA JOLLA, Calif. -- There were no guarantees. The last of the six doctors J.B. Holmes saw told him brain surgery probably would help him. Probably.
"Difficulty-wise, he said for brain surgery, it was only about a 1 out of 10,'' Holmes said. "That made me feel better. But it was still brain surgery. Scary at first."
Copyright 2012 RealClearSports
By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner
The man understands how the 49ers feel. The team for which he played 30 years ago also came within a game of the Super Bowl.
"We were one dropped pass away," he said.
The man, who needs to remain anonymous...
Copyright 2012 SF Newspaper Company
By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com
SAN FRANCISCO — Something was going to happen. Eli Manning made that observation. Something always does happen. Football, like life, is about timing.
Football, like life, also is about accountability.
Eli and Tom Brady are going to another Super Bowl, verification of their skills and, on pass patterns, their timing.
© RealClearSports 2012
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SAN FRANCISCO -- The 49ers fans kept chanting "defense,'' and they got defense. From the Giants.
That's the way a team gets to the Super Bowl, by giving the opponent very little. When it counted, that was what the Giants gave San Francisco, controlling the line of scrimmage, controlling the clock. And getting a turnover that turned the game.
Ultimately, that turned the Giants...
Copyright © 2012 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner
What can we say? What should we say?
Remember that Adlai Stevenson remark, that “it hurts too much to laugh, but I’m too old to cry”?
It’s hard to hold back the tears after this one. As hard as it was for star-crossed Kyle Williams to hold the football.
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SAN FRANCISCO -- When Greg Roman came to the lectern in the tent-like facility at Santa Clara that the San Francisco 49ers use for media interviews, he noticed a plastic bottle of water next to the microphone.
He reached for it, halted and then, with a smirk, asked, "Vic didn't drink from this, did he?''
Copyright © 2012 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — There is a rhythm to Jim Harbaugh's words, if not exactly a pattern. After all, any football coach wants to keep the opponent guessing, make him feel off balance, and maybe nobody does that better than Harbaugh.
Maybe nobody coaches better either.
In his first season in charge, Harbaugh has the San Francisco 49ers...
© RealClearSports 2012
By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner
Now it's not an issue of redemption. Alex Smith has made it through the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, made it past the New Orleans Saints. Now it's not a matter of words, of arguing his worth.
Now it's getting to the Super Bowl.
He knows he's endured, knows he's survived, knows he's been called a bust...
Copyright 2012 SF Newspaper Company
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- He wasn't supposed to be here, one game from the Super Bowl, not after the criticism, the boos and time on injured reserve.
Then again, as the first player picked in the 2005 NFL draft, a quarterback chosen to lead the San Francisco 49ers, Alex Smith was supposed to be here, facing the Giants on Sunday in the NFC Championship Game at Candlestick Park.
Copyright © 2012 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com
SAN FRANCISCO – They were The City’s team, in name and function, created here, not transported from New York or Philadelphia. And if they never reached the top, they were no less entertaining than a ride on one of those cable cars halfway to the stars.
The 49ers were so very San Francisco, adored, beloved and invariably stuck in the fog of mediocrity. Oh well, let’s go down to the Buena Vista Café and have an Irish coffee.
The Niners originally played at an expanded high school stadium in Golden Gate Park...
© RealClearSports 2012
By Art Spander
For GlobalGolfPost.com
The AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am is the tournament where a one-liner becomes as important as a one-putt and no swing, not even one as enticing as Sam Snead's, could ever be as beautiful as the view across Carmel Bay to Point Lobos.
It's played right after the Super Bowl, when most of the country is ankle-deep in winter misery — and sometimes the AT&T courses on the Monterey Peninsula are ankle-deep in mud.
Copyright 2012 Global Golf Post
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- They are happy to be staying home, which is no surprise.
"You'd rather not have to get on a plane and fly to Green Bay, where you don't know what the weather is going to be like,'' 49ers safety Donte Whitner said Monday.
Yet the 49ers are not particularly happy to be facing the surging Giants...
Copyright © 2012 Newsday. All rights reserved.
By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner
Think he managed that one well enough? You want to compare Alex Smith to Joe Montana or Steve Young? Well compare away. Alex is the new miracle worker by the Bay.
What he managed to do on Saturday at the ’Stick was turn logic and inevitability upside down.
This was one for the ages, and for the Niners. This one was redemption for Alex Smith...
Copyright 2012 SF Newspaper Company
By Art Spander
Special to Newsday
SAN FRANCISCO -- The other quarterback was the magic man. Drew Brees did what he could, but Alex Smith did what nobody thought he could -- become a winner.
Smith, maligned in his previous six seasons after being taken as the overall No. 1 pick in the 2005 NFL draft, threw a 14-yard touchdown pass to Vernon Davis with nine seconds remaining to give the San Francisco 49ers a 36-32 NFC divisional playoff win over the New Orleans Saints Saturday.
Copyright © 2012 Newsday. All rights reserved.
This is what makes it appear hopeless for the 49ers in the NFC divisional playoff game Saturday at the ’Stick. Their opponent, the New Orleans Saints, scored 45 points each of their past three games, including Saturday’s wild-card win over the Detroit Lions.
This is what makes it appear less than hopeless for the Niners: The Saints never have won a road playoff game.
The 49ers have gone beyond expectations and predictions. Who imagined, after eight consecutive losing seasons, they’d finish the regular season with the second-best record in the NFL? Who dared think they would have the top defense against the rush?
A bye in the first round of the playoffs? That’s for teams like the old Niners or the new Packers, except these Niners reached that pinnacle — and it is a pinnacle as well as an advantage — while the Saints and Steelers, Super Bowl entrants the previous two years, did not.