X'd, O'd And Ko'd

Walsh and Ray Wersching, the kicker, also concocted a new style of kickoff, a hard squibber specially designed for the Silverdome's AstroTurf, which is seven years old and rock-hard. The squibber was bobbled twice by the Bengals, both times inside their five-yard line. The 49ers recovered the second one, setting up a gimme field goal with five seconds left in the first half. The hard squib was put in on Tuesday.

"I'd go out with Wersching early in practice and shag kickoffs for him," 49er Publicist Jerry Walker said, "and that squib was bouncing up and hitting me in the face, all over the place, and I'm reasonably coordinated. Then he felt sorry for me and started kicking them soft, and I still couldn't handle them. They were devastating."

"It was," said Archie Griffin, who fumbled the last one, "something we didn't expect."

Maxims of Playoff Football: You dance with who brung ya; you don't get away from your strength; people win, not formations. Forget them, says Walsh, the mind in motion, a walking collection of X's and O's seeking only a blackboard, a piece of lined paper, a napkin, anything.

"We keep surprises in our back pocket," Cooper says.

"Every week," says Solomon, "Coach Walsh keeps coming up with more X's and O's."

During the off week following the 49ers' defeat of Dallas for the NFC championship, Walsh studied the films of Bengal Quarterback Kenny Anderson, and he didn't like what he saw. Anderson was playing with supreme confidence, cutting up the 3-4 defenses, killing them with his scrambles. Gut pressure, Walsh thought, we've got to get pressure on Anderson from inside, something to make him think. "I want more blitzes," Walsh told his defensive coordinator, Chuck Studley, "something we've never shown before."

Studley came up with the Nickel Blizzard, Carlton Williamson blitzing from his strong safety position, which the Niners had never done, and he reached into the past for another defense that was a supreme bit of exotica. The inspiration for the latter was the old Oakland Raiders' original 53-defense, the forerunner of Miami's famed 53, only this No. 53 had been the late Dan Birdwell, a tackle with a linebacker's number, a rover who slid along the line, searching for the inviting pass-rush lanes. Studley set three linemen in the middle, to occupy the guards and the center. He put two outside linebackers, Bobby Leopold and Keena Turner, in a down position, playing the outside shoulder of the offensive tackles, and then as a middle linebacker, roving at will to find a blitzing lane, he set Fred Dean, the supreme sacker, the 49ers' Pro Bowl passrusher.

"Fred's eyes lit up when I showed it to him," Studley said. "I said, 'Gimme a name for it, something with real impact.' 'Cobra,' Fred said. 'Call it Cobra.' "

Cobra made its appearance late in the first quarter, with the 49ers leading 7-0 and the Bengals on their own 41, third-and-10, after having picked up two first downs. Dean blitzed between Cincinnati's center and right guard. A hand reached out and slowed him. Anderson, about to step up in the pocket, retreated when he saw Dean in such an unlikely spot; he dodged to his right side—and into the arms of Turner, who got the sack. End of series. Score one for Cobra, over and out.