This will be the Niners' 7th appearance in a Super Bowl, and their 3rd at the current home of the Miami Dolphins. It was named Joe Robbie Stadium, for the Dolphins' founding owner, from its opening on August 16, 1987 until August 25, 1996. This period included the Niners' wins in Super Bowls XXIII , over the Cincinnati Bengals); and XXIX, over the team then known as the San Diego Chargers. It also included the founding of MLB's Florida Marlins, who began play there in 1993.
It was then known as Pro Player Park until September 9, 1996, then tweaked slightly to Pro Player Stadium until January 9, 2005. Pro Player was the sports division of clothing company Fruit of the Loom. This period included the Marlins' wins in the 1997 and 2003 World Series.
It was just Dolphins Stadium from January 10, 2005 to April 7, 2006, then the S was dropped and it was Dolphin Stadium until May 7, 2009. Then the Dolphins and the stadium were bought by a group led by Stephen Ross, which also included Florida-based singer Jimmy Buffett, and, to help market a beer Jimmy was selling, it was renamed Land Shark Stadium until January 5, 2010.
After 2 weeks as just "Dolphin Stadium" again, naming rights then went to an insurance company, and it was Sun Life Stadium until January 31, 2016, a period that included the Marlins' 2012 move to Marlins Park, on the site of the previous Dolphins stadium, the Orange Bowl, and their change of name to the Miami Marlins. The current Dolphins stadium was New Miami Stadium until August 16, 2016, and it's been Hard Rock Stadium, for the Hard Rock Cafe chain of restaurants, since then.
That's 10 different names in 33 years of operation. That's even worse than the new arena of the Philadelphia 76ers and Flyers.
As for the 49ers' other Super Bowls: They won XVI over the Bengals at the since-demolished Pontiac Silverdome in the Detroit suburbs, they won XIX over the Dolphins at the since-rebuilt Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto in their own suburbs, they won XXIV over the Denver Broncos at the Superdome in New Orleans, and they lost XLVII to the Baltimore Ravens at the Superdome.
The 49ers were so successful, for so long, that it's hard to believe there was a time when they were a joke franchise. They were 2-14 in back-to-back seasons in 1978 and '79. Then a new regime came in, and turned them around, making them perhaps the most talent-laden NFL team ever.
Quaterbacks Joe Montana and Steve Young, receivers Jerry Rice and Terrell Owens, defensive linemen Fred Dean, Charles Haley, Rickey Jackson and Chris Doleman, and defensive backs Ronnie Lott and Deion Sanders are all in the Hall of Fame. So are head coach Bill Walsh and team owner Eddie DeBartolo.
Players from this period of 49er history who are not in Canton, but probably should be, include receiver Dwight Clark, running back Roger Craig, center Randy Cross, guard Guy McIntyre, linebacker Ken Norton Jr., and George Seifert, who replaced Walsh as head coach in 1989.
From 1981 to 2002, in 22 seasons, they made the Playoffs 18 times, won the NFC Western Division 14 times, won at least 1 Playoff game 13 times, reached the NFC Championship Game 10 times, reached the Super Bowl 5 times, and won all 5, including 4 in the 9 seasons from 1981 to 1989.
In 2011, '12 and '13, they went 36-11-1, made it to the NFC Championship Game all 3 times, and reached Super Bowl XLVII, although they lost it. This was when Colin Kaepernick was an All-Pro quarterback, before he became a symbol of civil rights protest. Now, they are back.
True, there were some bad seasons mixed in there, including 2-14 in 2004 and 2016, and 4-12 in 2005 and 2018. But they are back.
They had previously been good in the 1950s, including 1957 when they tied the Detroit Lions for the NFL Western Division title, but lost a Playoff; and in the early 1970s, when they won the 1st 3 NFC West titles and got to back-to-back NFC Championship Games, losing both to the Dallas Cowboys, a Playoff rivalry that would be renewed in the 1990s: From 1992 to 1997, either the 49ers or the Cowboys would be in the NFC Championship Game every year; and they played each other in it the 1992, '93 and '94 seasons.
But while they have had some success since, the San Francisco 49ers haven't won a World Championship since Super Bowl XXIX, on January 29, 1995, 25 years ago today. How long has that been?
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The 1994-95 season was the NFL's 75th, and there were a lot of celebrations, including the occasional wearing of "throwback uniforms." The 49ers chose to go with their 1950s version, as seen in the photo of Steve Young above, with "drop shadow numerals."
Since then, the 49ers have moved from Candlestick Park, at the southeastern corner of San Francisco (6 miles from downtown), to Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, closer to downtown San Jose (7 miles) than to downtown San Francisco (45 miles).
To put it another way: Whereas once they were about as close to downtown SF as the Meadowlands is to Times Square, they are now that close to downtown SJ, and further from the downtown of the city in their name than any other team currently in North America's Big Five leagues.
In addition to the 49ers, every NFL team has since moved to a new stadium at least once, with 5 exceptions: The Dolphins still play at Hard Rock Stadium, the Chiefs still play at Arrowhead Stadium, the Green Bay Packers still play at Lambeau Field, the New Orleans Saints still play at the Superdome, and the Buffalo Bills still play at what was then named Ralph Wilson Stadium (now New Era Field).
With the Raiders having since moved back to Oakland and now back out, to Las Vegas, the Oakland Athletics are the only San Francisco Bay Area team still playing in the same stadium where they had played in 1994(-95). And except for the Knicks and Rangers at Madison Square Garden, every one of the New York Tri-State Area teams has moved (counting NYCFC, which didn't exist yet, which is also true of the Red Bulls, but they've moved once as well).
So have the NFL's Los Angeles Rams, Cleveland Browns (restored) and Houston Oilers. The NBA's Toronto Raptors, Vancouver Grizzlies and Charlotte Bobcats began play, but the Grizzlies moved to Memphis, and the Bobcats replaced the Charlotte Hornets, who moved to New Orleans. The Seattle SuperSonics moved to become the Oklahoma City Thunder, and the New Jersey Nets have just become the Brooklyn Nets. In the NHL, the Quebec Nordiques became the Colorado Avalanche, the old Winnipeg Jets became the Phoenix Coyotes, and the Hartford Whalers became the Carolina Hurricanes. The Nashville Predators, Atlanta Thrashers, Minnesota Wild and Columbus Blue Jackets began play, but the Thrashers became the new Winnipeg Jets. MLS, the WNBA and the NWSL have all since been founded.
The defending World Champions were the Dallas Cowboys in the NFL, the Houston Rockets in the NBA, the Rangers in the NHL (ugh, but the Devils were about to change that), and, in MLB, well, officially, the Toronto Blue Jays, but technically nobody, since there was no 1994 World Series. George Foreman was in his improbable 2nd reign as Heavyweight Champion of the World.
The Broncos, the New England Patriots, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the New Orleans Saints and the Seattle Seahawks have each since won their 1st NFL Championship. The Philadelphia Eagles have won their 1st since it began to be called the Super Bowl.
The Atlanta Braves, the Florida Marlins, the Arizona Diamondbacks, the team currently known as the Los Angeles Angels, the Houston Astros and the Washington Nationals have since won their 1st World Series. The Giants have won their 1st since moving to San Francisco. The Boston Red Sox have since broken a drought of 86 years, the Chicago White Sox 88 years, and the Chicago Cubs 108 years.
The San Antonio Spurs, the Miami Heat, the Dallas Mavericks, the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Toronto Raptors have won their 1st NBA Championship. The New Jersey Devils, the Colorado Avalanche, the Dallas Stars, the Tampa Bay Lightning, the Carolina Hurricanes, the Anaheim Ducks, the Los Angeles Kings, the Washington Capitals and the St. Louis Blues have won their 1st Stanley Cup.
Football legends Don Hutson, Sammy Baugh, Jay Berwanger, Sid Luckman, Otto Graham, Elroy Hirsch, Don Blanchard, Glenn Davis, Chuck Bednarik and Doak Walker were still alive.
Ray Lewis and Peyton Manning were in college. Tom Brady and Drew Brees were in high school. Eli Manning, Troy Polamalu and Ben Roethlisberger were in junior high. Aaron Rodgers was 11 years old. Matt Ryan was 9; Clay Matthews and Ndamukong Suh were 8; Colin Kaepernick was 7; Richard Sherman, Russell Wilson and Nick Foles were 6; Cam Newton and Rob Gronkowski were 5; Odell Beckham Jr. was 4; Dak Prescott and Jimmy Garoppolo were 3; Michael Thomas was almost 2; and Baker Mayfield, Joey Bosa, Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow, Lamar Jackson, Sam Darnold, Kyler Murray and Tua Tagovailoa weren't born yet.
Current Chiefs coach Andy Reid was an assistant coach with the Green Bay Packers. Current 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan was in high school in the suburbs of Denver, where his father Mike was head coach of the Broncos.
Barry Trotz of the Islanders was the head coach of the Portland Pirates, a minor-league hockey team in Maine. Mike Miller of the Knicks was the head coach at Texas State University. David Quinn of the Rangers was an assistant coach at Northeastern University in Boston.
Aaron Boone of the Yankees was playing in the Cincinnati Reds' farm system. Alain Nasreddine of the Devils was playing for the minor-league Chicoutimi Saguenéens. Chris Armas of the Red Bulls was playing for the minor-league Long Island Rough Riders. Ronny Deila of NYCFC was playing for Odds Ballklubb in Skien, Norway. Kenny Atkinson of the Nets was playing in Spain's basketball league. Luis Rojas of the Mets and Adam Gase of the Jets were in high school. Joe Judge of the Giants was in junior high school. And Walt Hopkins of the Liberty was 9 years old.
The Olympic Games have since been held in America (twice), Japan, Australia, Greece, Italy, China, Canada, Britain, Russia, Brazil and Korea -- and had never previously been held in South America. The World Cup has been held in France, Japan, Korea, Germany, South Africa, Brazil and Russia -- and had never previously been held in Asia and Africa, or in a joint venture (2002 in Japan and Korea).
The idea that people of the same gender could marry each other, and have all the legal rights of married couples, was considered absurd. But so was the idea that corporations were "people," and entitled to all the rights thereof. Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer were the only Justices then on the U.S. Supreme Court who are still on it now.
Bill Clinton was in his 1st term as President. George W. Bush had just been inaugurated as Governor of Texas. George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford and their wives, and Lady Bird Johnson were all still alive. (Reagan, Mrs. Johnson, and Mr. and Mrs. Ford have since died.) Barack Obama was teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago. Joe Biden was the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Donald Trump was with his 2nd wife, and the idea of him entering politics was ridiculous.
The Governor of California was Pete Wilson, a hard-line conservative Republican who loved the death penalty and hated immigrants. The idea that California would rebel against him and became one of the most reliably Democratic States was considered a pipe dream. But it happened. He had hoped to ride his re-election in 1994 to the Presidency in 1996, as former Governor Ronald Reagan had done, but he dropped out before 1995 was over. The Mayor of San Francisco was Frank Jordan. Wilson and Jordan are both still alive, in their 80s.
Current Governor Gavin Newsom was a real estate developer, specializing in restaurants and hotels. Current Mayor London Breed (that's her real name) was at the University of California at Davis, outside Sacramento -- putting her, at least in terms of physical distance, closer to the Governor of her State than to the Mayor of her City.
The Governor of New York was George Pataki. Current Governor Andrew Cuomo was Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. The Mayor of New York City was Rudy Giuliani. Current Mayor Bill de Blasio was an aide to Congressman Charlie Rangel. The Governor of New Jersey was Christine Todd Whitman. Current Governor Phil Murphy was running the European office of Goldman Sachs in Frankfurt, Germany.
The holders of the Nobel Peace Prize were Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat -- and now we know how that worked out. The Pope was John Paul II. The current Pope, Francis, then Jorge Mario Bergoglio, was Archbishop of Oca, Spain.
There were still surviving veterans of World War I, the Easter Rising, the Bolshevik Revolution and the Mexican Revolution. There were still living survivors of the Johnstown Flood of 1889, the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, the General Slocum disaster of 1904, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911, the sinkings of the Titanic and the Lusitania, and the workers on the Panama Canal.
The Prime Minister of Canada was Jean Chretien, and of Britain John Major. The monarch was Queen Elizabeth II -- that hasn't changed. Manchester United were the holders of both the Premier League and the FA Cup, but were about to cede the former to Blackburn Rovers of Lancashire and the latter to Everton of Liverpool. There have since been 4 Presidents of the United States, 5 Prime Ministers of Britain and 3 Popes.
Major novels of 1995 included The Horse Whisperer by Nicholas Evans, Independence Day by Richard Ford, The Rainmaker by John Grisham, High Fidelity by Nick Hornby and Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt. Timothy Findley published a novel titled The Piano Man's Daughter. It was not about Alexa Ray Joel.
None of the Harry Potter, A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones, Bridget Jones, Twilight or
Hunger Games novels had yet been published. And no one had yet heard of Robert Langdon, Lisbeth Salander or Bella Swan.
Major films of early 1995 included Higher Learning, Murder in the First, Before Sunrise, Miami Rhapsody, Boys on the Side, Billy Madison, and the Western The Quick and the Dead. Pierce Brosnan's 1st outing as James Bond, Goldeneye, would premiere the following November. Dean Cain was playing Superman on TV, but Val Kilmer's turn as Batman on film would be a pathetic mess. And Sylvester McCoy was still the last man to play The Doctor.
Television shows that had aired, or were about to air, their final first-run episodes were Empty Nest, Blossom, Full House, Matlock and Northern Exposure. Newly-debuted were NewsRadio,
Sliders and the entire WB and UPN networks (eventually to merge), including Star Trek: Voyager. Soon to debut were Ned & Stacey (the 1st series to star Debra Messing), Caroline in the City, JAG, MADtv, The Drew Carey Show, and a show only slightly more cartoonish than that one, Pinky and the Brain. And yet, it was the Yankees who ended up taking over the world.
No one had yet heard of Ash Ketchum, Carrie Bradshaw, Tony Soprano, Jed Bartlet, Master Chief, Jack Bauer, Omar Little, Rick Grimes, Wynonna Earp, Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Michael Bluth, Michael Scott, Don Draper, Walter White, Jax Teller, Richard Castle, Leslie Knope, Sarah Manning, Jane "Eleven" Hopper or Maggie Bell.
The Number 1 song in America was "Creep" by TLC. The surviving members of the Beatles were finishing The Beatles Anthology. Michael Jackson released HIStory. Tupac Shakur got married in prison.
Kourtney Kardashian and Pink were 16. Michelle Williams (both of them), Ben Savage, Kim Kardahsian, Christina Aguilera, Alicia Keys, Kelly Rowland, Hayden Christensen and Jessica Alba were 14. Natalie Portman, Beyonce Knowles, Britney Spears, Sienna Miller and Kirsten Dunst were 13. Prince William, Matt Smith and Anne Hathaway were 12. Prince Harry and Khloe Kardashian were 10.
Lady Gaga was 9, Rob Kardashian Jr. 8, Kevin Jonas and Rihanna 7, 7, Joe Jonas 5, Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson 4. So was Sarah Hyland, and the rest of the Modern Family kids had not yet been born. Nor had Kendall and Kylie Jenner. Louis Tomlinson was 3. Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato, Nick Jonas, Miley Cyrus and Zayn Malik were 2. The other One Direction singers, Liam Payne, Nial Horan and Harry Styles, had yet to reach a 2nd birthday. Justin Bieber was about to have his 1st, so he wasn't a "Boyfriend," he was a "Baby."
Inflation has been such that what $1.00 bought then, $1.71 would buy now. A U.S. postage stamp was 32 cents. A New York Subway token was $1.25. The average price of a gallon of gas was $1.20, a cup of coffee $1.74, a McDonald's meal $5.29, a movie ticket $4.35, a new car $17,900, and a new house $158,900. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the preceding Friday at 3,857.99.
The tallest building in the world was the Sears Tower in Chicago. The Internet was still new to most of us. Most of us had never heard of Microsoft or Netscape or America Online. There was no Facebook, no YouTube, no Twitter, no Instagram and no Pinterest. VHS videotapes were still the dominant way of recording and playing back movies and TV shows. Mobile phones were still roughly the size of the communicators on Star Trek. The birth control pill was long-established, but there was, as yet, no Viagra.
Rose Kennedy, and Peter Cook, and former Middleweight Champion Carlos Monzón died. Megan Thee Stallion, and Leonard Fournette, and Arsenal players Calum Chambers and Héctor Bellerín
were born.
January 29, 1995. The San Francisco 49ers won the Super Bowl. It was their 5th win. There has not yet been a 6th.
They will have the chance for that 6th Super Bowl win this Sunday, playing the Kansas City Chiefs -- one team trying to break a drought of 25 years, the other a drought of 50 years.