1989 Super Bowl XXIII

About Miami, Florida: With beautiful weather year round, what better place in the US then Miami would there be to host Super Bowl 23 in January of 1989. Residents of Miami had been preparing the city for months and Joe Robbie Stadium for thousands of visitors and millions viewing on TV around the world to watch the San Francisco 49ers play against the Cincinnati Bengals in Super Bowl XXIII.

Ticket Sales / Attendance: There were 75,129 people in attendance at the 23rd Superbowl game and it is estimated that another 81.5 million more football fans watched from their homes or other football parties around the world while tuning into NBC. The ratings the game for the game on this network were 43.5.

Team Pre-Season Stats: The San Francisco 49ers were ready for the 1988-89 season after losing to the Minnesota Vikings the previous year in the NFC playoff. Joe Montana and Jerry Rice would lead the offence again this year, while the defence was lead by Ronnie Lott and Charles Haley. Head coach Bill Walsh was nearing the end of his coaching career and wanted to end it with a championship.

The Cincinnati Bengals were coming off of a terrible 4-11 season and were hoping to improve their record. However, this would be a challenge for QB Boomer Esiason and team as both offence and defence would need to step up.

Team Roster: Key players on the 49ers roster included QB Joe Montana, RB Roger Craig, WR Jerry Rice, WR John Taylor, TE John Frank, DL Michael Carter, DE Charles Haley, and DB Ronnie Lott.

The key players for the Bengals were QB Boomer Esiason, RB James Brooks, WR Eddie Brown, DB David Fulcher, TE Rodney Holman, DL Tim Krumrie, OL Anthony Munoz and DB Eric Thomas.

Game Highlights: The first half of the twenty-third Super Bowl started slow with each team only scoring 3 points. The 49ers had a 41 yard field goal from Mike Cofer in the 1st quarter, but the Bengals responded with a field goal of their own in the 2nd quarter, a 34 yarder from Jim Breech. This was the first time in the championship game history that the game was tied going into halftime.

Once the 2nd half started, both teams again traded field goals without any TD passes or runs until late third quarter. At 13:46 Stanford Jennings returned a San Francisco kick off 93 yards for a touchdown giving Cincinnati their biggest lead of the game at 13-6. Joe Montana responded 2 minutes later with a TD pass to Jerry Rice tying the game at 13. However, Bengals kicker Breech added his 3rd field goal of the day to give them a 16-13 lead with only 3:20 remaining in the game. San Francisco then completed one of the most impressive drives in game history going 92 yards completed by a 10 yard pass from Montana to Taylor and a 49ers victory.

Game MVP: The MVP of the 23rd Super Bowl was San Francisco Wide Receiver Jerry Rice. Adding to his impressive list of NFL records he caught 11 passes for 215 yards and a touchdown including some key catches in the game winning drive.

Half Time Show: The halftime show this year was titled "Be Bop Bamboozled" and featured Florida area dancers and performers along with 3-D special effects.

Commercials: The average cost for a 30 second commercial during the 23rd Superbowl was $675,000. Some of the famous commercials during the game included the very first Bud Bowl series of commercials by Budweiser. In these commercials miniature bottles of Budweiser play against Bud Light in a championship football game. It also featured cans of beer as fans in the audience. It was one of the most popular Super Bowl commercials of all time.

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