LAS VEGAS — As Super Bowl XVIII approaches on Sunday, Lisa McCaffrey is nervous.
“I’m trying to stay calm,” she said over coffee in a hotel lobby on the Las Vegas Strip on Monday. “I’m trying to stay busy. I’m trying not to think about it before kickoff.”
For McCaffrey, it’s a familiar feeling. Her husband, Ed McCaffrey, won three championships as a wide receiver for the San Francisco 49ers and Denver Broncos. Now, her son, Christian McCaffrey, will play a central role in the 49ers’ game against the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday.
“I’ll probably be more nervous this time because it’s one of my kids,” she said. “But I was really stressed at the time.”
Twenty-five years ago, just after Ed McCaffrey won his last Super Bowl with the Broncos in January 1999, that past was immortalized in magazine form.
Denver defeated the Atlanta Falcons. That’s when 2 1/2-year-old Christian McCaffrey, wearing Ed’s No. 87 jersey, which was too big for him, was confettied on the court in Miami Sprinting on the dirt, he took a photo that was listed as one of the photos in Sports Illustrated. Its complete main photo.
Her husband won another championship, so the pressure was off. But Lisa suddenly faced another worry as her young son weaved in and out of traffic at the busy football field after the Super Bowl.
“I think I lost Christian at one point,” she said. “I remember being angry.”
Christian McCaffrey and his brother Max run on the field in Miami after the Broncos won the Super Bowl in 1999. (Robert Baker/Sports Illustrated via Getty Images)
The future NFL star was already an accomplished runner at the time.
“He started walking at about seven months, which is very early,” Lisa McCaffrey said. “I know it sounds weird and you can’t believe me – but I swear that’s the truth. Ask his pediatrician. He’s doing something his mind isn’t ready to do yet. It’s like, ‘Please , do not hang from the chandelier. “
“Christian’s brain moves at a normal speed, but his body moves faster.”
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He was ready to play tackle at a young age, and that night a game involving his older brother, Max McCaffrey, and several other players’ children broke out at the Super Bowl in Miami.
Christian McCaffrey said he’s too young to remember that night, but Kyle Shanahan remembers the postgame scenes from that era. The 49ers coach was a freshman and his father, Mike Shanahan, was the Broncos coach and had just helped Denver win back-to-back Super Bowls.
“I’ve always loved Ed, and I know he’s got a bunch of crazy boys,” Kyle Shanahan said. “They just played football together outside of games and were killing each other all the time.”
Two decades later, Ed and Christian McCaffrey have a chance to become just the second father-son duo to win a Super Bowl with the same team, joining Steve and Zach DeOsi of the New York Giants . The younger McCaffrey had the opportunity to do so, and he was struck by the 49ers’ connection to the past.
“It’s surreal, man,” he said. “It’s not just Kyle and Mike Shanahan. My dad played with Brian Griese (49ers quarterbacks coach). He played with Anthony Lynn (49ers secondary running backs coach). With Kubiak has a lot of connections. When my dad was in Denver, Bobby Turner was the running backs coach.
“Even though I didn’t grow up in San Francisco, it feels like home to me. All the names in our building are names I remember my dad would say, and it’s just the next generation of them. Being able to be with all these people It’s really cool to work because we know we’re the same person.”
It’s perhaps no surprise, then, that the current 49ers vividly remind the McCaffrey family of the 1994 team that won the franchise’s most recent Super Bowl title.
In 1994, after the New York Giants waived Ed McCaffrey, he signed with the star-studded 49ers.
“That’s when I really learned what a great culture is,” McCaffrey said Tuesday in Las Vegas. “We were welcomed by everyone on the team.”
McCaffrey isn’t sure if he has a chance to make the 49ers roster. Center Bart Oates and his wife Michelle welcome Ed, Lisa and their newborn son Max, one of four McCaffrey boys The first, born in May 1994) came to their home so that the young couple would not have to buy or rent a house during these difficult times. All these uncertainties.
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McCaffrey eventually made the roster. He and Lisa have been on a season-long journey, from an early upset loss to the Philadelphia Eagles, to an NFC Championship Game victory over the Dallas Cowboys, to Super Bowl XXIX, where the 49ers defeated the San Diego Chargers.
“I remember that team feeling like a family,” Lisa McCaffrey said. “Everybody liked each other. They were friendly to each other. All the wives came to the team dinner. Even us – Ed was the low man on the totem pole behind Jerry Rice. He barely had a whiff of the field. , but they treated everyone very, very well – just like they do now. I’ve never been a part of an NFL team that was so welcoming, friendly and open.”
This openness continued into the coming decades. Harris Barton was a fixture on the 49ers offensive line of that era and he hosted many of the team dinners in 1994. Twenty years later, when Christian McCaffrey was attending Stanford University, Barton and his wife Megan (who still lived in Palo Alto) opened their doors to the next generation.
“When Christian was sick at Stanford, he would go there and they would take care of him,” Lisa McCaffrey said. “They really took him under their wing.”
Ed McCaffrey said: “From Steve Young to everyone on the team, they welcomed us with open arms. This is a completely selfless team where the players compete against each other but at the same time support each other and push each other. Be the best. As a player, they have high standards and expectations to perform well and live up to their standards.
“Even though I was only there for about seven months, a lot of those players are still good friends of mine to this day. It felt like we had been there for ten years.”
After Shanahan signed as the Broncos’ head coach in 1995, McCaffrey followed 49ers offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan to Denver. The following era saw the emergence of Christian McCaffrey. This also witnessed the most important development years of Kyle Shanahan’s playing career.
The future 49ers coach was a high school wide receiver who came to idolize Ed McCaffrey.
“(Christian’s) father is my hero,” Shanahan said. “I cut my shoes like him. I also wear shoulder pads like him.”
Shanahan said he even shook his head after catching the ball in a McCaffrey-like manner. His jersey number in Texas high school and college was 87, also a tribute to Ed.
“I didn’t know that until he was older,” Ed McCaffrey said with a laugh. “I’m honored and flattered. If I’d known he was imitating me, I would have behaved better.”
Ed McCaffrey won three Super Bowls as a player and his No. 87 jersey was later worn by Kyle Shanahan during his high school and college playing career. (Alan Key/Getty Images)
Ed McCaffrey and Lisa McCaffrey were both excited when the 49ers traded their son to the Carolina Panthers last season.
“We knew he was going to an incredible organization,” Lisa said. “There’s a winning atmosphere here that we were familiar with years ago. Not every winning team performs like this. You just don’t.”
Meanwhile, Christian McCaffrey isn’t shy about saying he’s more than happy to share the Super Bowl title with his dad. He was one game away from that win.
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“It’s definitely going to be cool,” he said. “We were lucky to have a dad who won three Super Bowls, had a lot of success, played football for 13 years and did it the right way and was a great dad. He taught us all how to Playing the game and doing it the right way. It was great to be able to share that moment with him.”
Kyle Shanahan wants to see this moment, too. Like the McCaffrey brothers, he has been a part of the 49ers organization for a long time. So he knows what a Super Bowl win means, not just to this current team, but to the larger connecting story behind it all.
“Looking back now and our history with all of this stuff, it’s really special,” Shanahan said. “We’re back and nothing has changed.”
(Top Photos: Cooper Neal/Getty Images and Robert Baker/Getty Images Sports Illustrated)
