San Francisco 49ers: Top 30 all-time moments in franchise history
By Peter Panacy
No. 2: Jerry Rice Passes Jim Brown
Hall of Fame wide receiver Jerry Rice knew a thing or two about performing on the big stage, and he wasn’t afraid to use a Monday Night Football prime-time matchup versus the Los Angeles Raiders to forever cement his legacy as the greatest of all time.
Rice hauled in three touchdown passes from quarterback Steve Young during the contest. And it was his last — a 38-yard reception — that surpassed Hall of Famer Jim Brown for No. 1 on the all-time list.
Amazingly, the play almost never happened on Monday night. Head coach George Seifert pulled the majority of his starters during what had become a rout (San Francisco won 44-14). But the head coach was convinced to give Rice one more crack.
“George Seifert had taken us out of the football game,” Rice later said via 49ers.com. “All of a sudden he came down the bench, he looked at Steve and I and said, ‘Hey, look, I’m going to to give you guys one opportunity to break this here at home.’ And we ran back onto the football field. Everybody in the stadium knew exactly what was getting ready to happen.
“I remember seeing (Raiders wideout) Tim Brown almost halfway on the football field because Tim Brown was saying to me, ‘I know you’re not going to do this to us on ‘Monday Night Football.’”
But he did. And it is a play that will live forever in 49ers lore.