S.F. Examiner: Are Phillips, Broncos playing possum?

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

The current Raiders coach, Jack Del Rio, was the Broncos previous defensive coach. The current Broncos defensive coach, Wade Phillips, was out of work but hardly out of ideas. Or out of superlatives about the current player who concerns him most, Carolina quarterback Cam Newton.

“He makes plays nobody else makes,” Phillips said.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner

S.F. Examiner: Elway in line for historic player-executive perfecta

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

He was the coach’s kid, and there’s no better place to begin. But John Elway was his own man and is still his own man, using talent and lessons acquired if not necessarily taught. It wasn’t that Elway could throw a football so hard — when his receivers occasionally missed one of his passes, they often were left with a bruise, a mark that looked like the seams of the ball, or the “Elway Cross” — it’s that he knew when to throw or when not to throw.

The offspring of those in athletics have an advantage. Not only genetically but also perceptively. They grow up within the game, grasping the nuances. Look at Barry Bonds, who as a toddler was with his father, Bobby, in the Giants clubhouse, listening and watching. Never mind the steroid stuff. Barry understood how and where. He always threw to the right base. He always set up in the perfect position in the outfield.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner

S.F. Examiner: Broncos’ cry: ‘Get it done for Pat’

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

It is disease that frustrates as well as debilitates. You lose contact with loved ones, friends. And they with you. The moments that would be shared, should be shared, the joy, the pain, can no longer be. “They can no longer communicate with you,” said Beth Bowlen Wallace about the victims of Alzheimer’s. “You feel like you’ve lost them.”

Her father, Pat Bowlen, is one of those victims. He also is the longtime owner of the Denver Broncos, who Sunday at Levi’s Stadium play the Carolina Panthers in Super Bowl 50. Not that Bowlen is aware. The team that is his no longer is his.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner

S.F. Examiner: Super Bowl in Silicon, leaving The City with silicone

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

So it’s another Not-in-San-Francisco Super Bowl to be played in a city named for another saint, Santa Clara, which used to be full of orchards and now has a stadium where too many 49ers games are filled with regret.

It’s a beautiful place, of course, which is expected when something costs more than a billion dollars. And when it’s named for the denim trousers created by Levi Strauss out of miners’ tent fabric back when sourdough was a description of certain people, not the best-tasting bread anywhere.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner

S.F. Examiner: Kubiak cools down Denver hot seat

By Art Spander
Special to the Examiner

Two seasons ago, Gary Kubiak collapsed while walking off a field at halftime. He was hospitalized with “a mini-stroke” yet was so dedicated to his craft that he resumed coaching the Houston Texans shortly afterward, only to be fired weeks later.

So he could handle any challenge, including the one presented this season by his good friend in Denver, John Elway.

Read the full story here.

©2016 The San Francisco Examiner