As Al Davis sat down to reflect on John Madden’s coaching legacy, 30 years had passed since the Raiders’ first Super Bowl victory.
“For a while, there were words that we and he couldn’t win the big one, because we had lost so many championship games,” Davis told me in 2006 during an exclusive interview.
Fast forward to the modern-day 49ers. They’ve lost in the NFC Championship Game in consecutive years, and they’re three seasons removed from a Super Bowl collapse.
Can coach Kyle Shanahan win the big one?
Jed York, the 49ers’ CEO, still very much thinks so. He calls Shanahan “special,” and he’s banking on that justified loyalty to pay off for the 49ers just as it did Davis’ Raiders.
“We’ve been in three NFC Championship Games and one Super Bowl in the last four years. That’s a pretty good run,” York told reporters Tuesday in Phoenix at the NFL’s annual meeting. “It’s not ultimately where we want to be but it’s a pretty good run.”
York is appreciative, not angry.
He is not issuing ultimatums, when it’s annually understood “the ultimate goal is to get that trophy.”
The 49ers are mired in a 28-season Super Bowl drought. And, yet, their championship window remains open, as it has since 2019. There are no glaring signs of it closing in the next year or two, nor are there guarantees for more playoff berths.
But the York family is exercising more patience than in any other stretch since taking over as the 49ers’ majority owners in 2000. They know how rare it is to have a winning coach, not to mention one who grooms others and has produced a pipeline of minority hirings.
As Shanahan heads into his seventh season, the only 49ers’ coaches with longer tenures were Bill Walsh (1979-87), Buck Shaw (1946-54), Dick Nolan (1968-75) and George Seifert (1989-96).
Three years into the job, Shanahan got a contract extension (through 2025, with an option year). Three years later, another extension is not in the works, but there are no signs of discontent, from ownership or Shanahan.
Davis promoted Madden at age 32 to his first (and only) head-coaching job, which spanned a decade with a 103-32-7 record, plus a 9-7 mark in the playoffs.
“His records are unparalleled. He had 10 years of greatness,” Davis said in July 2006, a month before Madden’s Pro Football Hall of Fame induction. “We had adversity. We couldn’t get over the hump.
“We went several years where, in big games, we’d get beat at the end.”
The Raiders lost in the AFL Championship in Madden’s initial season in 1969, lost in the AFC Championship Game the next year upon the AFL-NFL merger, and eventually fell in the 1973-75 AFC title games before Madden, Ken Stabler and the 1976 Raiders captured Super Bowl XI at the Rose Bowl against the Minnesota Vikings.
Here is how the 49ers’ “pretty good run” has unfolded:
2019: Super Bowl LIV loss to Kansas City, 31-20, in Miami.
2020: No playoffs, after a 6-10 season marred by injuries and COVID.
2021: NFC Championship Game loss at the Los Angeles Rams, 20-17.
2022: NFC Championship Game loss at the Philadelphia Eagles, 31-7.
Now comes 2023, or Year 7 under Shanahan and his handpicked wingman, general manager John Lynch.
“Trust is earned and reestablished in any relationship,” York said of the duo. “That’s what you need in order to be successful. You have to make mistakes in order to get to a championship.”
Mistakes like drafting Solomon Thomas and Reuben Foster in 2017, like trading for a high-priced but injury-prone Dee Ford, like overpaying for Jerick McKinnon, and, in a move the jury is still deliberating, mortgaging first-round picks to move up for Trey Lance.
Other unsuspecting moves panned out, however, the last two of which propelled them into last season’s playoffs (see: Christian McCaffrey’s trade, Brock Purdy’s baptism).
York won’t publicly second-guess roster moves. For example, he said Tuesday: “I wouldn’t change anything that we’ve made about the decision with Trey. I think Trey has a chance to be great.”
The 49ers’ current business model revolves around paying superstars top-of-the-market value — Nick Bosa’s payday is in four months. Offsetting those expenses are young quarterbacks on rookie contracts. Two years from now, they’ll gladly reward a winning and healthy quarterback (Purdy, Lance, maybe Sam Darnold). That time gap allowed them to pull money from their 2024 coffers to spend now on free agent Javon Hargrave.
When the 49ers have spent largesse to re-sign players or the rare free agent, Shanahan and especially Lynch make sure to publicly thank the Yorks for their financial and overall commitment, even if some big fishes eventually do get away (see: Laken Tomlinson last year).
“Al Davis, when I coached, never turned down one thing that I wanted for the football team,” Madden told me in 2006.
Everyone wants a championship. For Madden and Davis, they won the Raiders’ first of three in 1976.
“It was big and exciting for us,” Davis recalled. “I can remember saying, ‘John now takes his place in the sun.’ ”
Davis presented Madden for his Hall of Fame induction 30 years later. Madden died 15 months ago, at age 85; Davis passed away a decade earlier, at 82.
York is 42, a year younger than Shanahan, and expect their union to last at least as long as the Davis-Madden decade.
“I feel we treat our players with respect, and we can always do a better job,” York said. “That started with my uncle (Eddie DeBartolo, the 49ers’ owner during their five Super Bowl wins). He made sure they got everything they need.”
The annual budget now must accommodate a $1 million layover between East Coast road games, which they’ve done at The Greenbrier in West Virginia the past three seasons. The 2023 schedule includes five trips to Eastern Time Zone teams.
“If you have to spend $1 million to stay somewhere, but that takes 10 hours of travel out and takes inflammation out of guys’ bodies and it gives you a better chance to win, I will spend $1 million any time to win a game,” York said. “Al Davis had a great quote about that.”
Yes, Al had a lot of great quotes, summed up best by this one: “Just win, baby.”
