It was 1969.    41 years ago.

      There was still an American Football League,and it had yet to win a Super Bowl.    The Green Bay Packers made sure of that, defeating the Kansas City Chiefs in the first ever clash between the two leagues, and humbling the Raiders in what turned out being Vince Lombardi's last game as the Pack's coach a year later.      Green Bay, under Lombardi's hand-picked successor Phil Bengtson, didn't even make the playoffs much less Super Bowl III.     That honor went to the Baltimore Colts who were heavy favorites to quash Joe Namath and the New York Jets.

      I was home, watching the game on NBC on our black and white RCA TV.   This is what it looked like in color:

     Too bad for the Colts they actually played the game.   Namath lived up to his boast, and the Jets prevailed 16-7.     If you want to watch the longest 34 seconds in NFL history, here's the drawn-out conclusion to one of history's most memorable football games.

         Doesn't live up to the moment, does it?

         It's fun hearing Curt Gowdy again, though, and seeing how primitive--almost innocent--the coverage was.    No confetti.    No pyrotechnics.    No histeronics.      "Here's history, folks," Gowdy seems to say.    "You don't need me to tell you what a big deal this is."

        The rivalry would live on for one more season and would end with another AFL shocker--the Chiefs beating the Vikings in the final pre-merger Super Bowl.     The Cotls would return the following year as AFC champs and would beat the Cowboys.     They wouldn't return for almost 40 years, when they topped the Bears.

        They're back as favorites heading into Super Bowl XLIV.    They're battling the Saints, not the Jets, and there's no Joe Namath around making outlandish boasts.     The ramp up to the big game has been fairly sedate.     No matter who you're pulling for, let's hope for a close, dramatic game.     

       I, for one, don't think we're going to get one.     I think the Colts will roll, taking contrrol after the half and coasting to an easy win.