Leaving it all behind

In 2000, Joe Montana and Eddie DeBartolo Jr. were riding in a convertible in Canton, Ohio, where they had gone for Montana's induction into the Professional Football Hall of Fame. It was a beautiful day and the top was down and everything should have been perfect, except it wasn't.

DeBartolo was feeling sad because he'd lost control of the 49ers to his sister, Denise. Montana looked at DeBartolo and said, "Do what I did. Put football in your rearview mirror."

And that is exactly what Montana has done. Or as Montana, 49, said when asked if he dwells on his legendary career, "No, no, I don't think about it."

It was strange to hear him disavow his attachment to four Super Bowl victories and his general greatness, but for Montana football is a receding image. "I don't like to live in the past," he said.

"Guys can remember details of games. I can remember some parts of one or two games. But some of the games, why would you even remember that?"

In place of football, Montana has created a life in Wine Country. Call him Squire Joe. He lives above Knights Valley where he moved two years ago with his wife, Jennifer, and their four children. He owns horses and produces wine, a Howell Mountain red called Montagia with Ed Spragia, winemaker at Beringer. The profits go to Montana's charitable foundation. He participated this July in the Imagine Auction at Chalk Hill Winery where he bought a limited edition Rolls Royce for $380,000. Not a bad life.

Along with former 49er teammates Ronnie Lott and Harris Barton, he runs HRJ Capital in Woodside, but Montana goes to the office less and less these days.

He often can be seen strolling around Santa Rosa with his family. He drives the 13 miles into town almost daily, especially now that he's junior varsity quarterbacks coach at Cardinal Newman High School where his 15-year-old son Nathaniel plays quarterback and wide receiver. His other son, Nicholas, 13, attends Sonoma Country Day and plays quarterback and linebacker.

"He loves tackling people," Montana said. "I blame that on Ronnie, his godfather."

A skinny kid from Notre Dame

It is revealing to hear Montana talk about coaching his sons, to glimpse into who Montana was and who he is now. When he played, Montana rarely allowed insight into himself, was private, even guarded. Before you hear about his coaching philosophy, you should know something about his history.

San Francisco 49ers coach Bill Walsh drafted Montana in the third round in 1979. Walsh saw something in the skinny kid from Notre Dame other teams didn't see, and under Walsh's tutelage, Montana became what many consider the greatest quarterback who ever lived.

Walsh and Montana occasionally have breakfast together and play golf. Montana lectures Walsh about leaving the 49ers in his rearview mirror, not so easy for Walsh. Their relationship is warm, like an uncle and a nephew. But that was not always the case.

Walsh rarely praised Montana when Joe played for him. At least, that's how Montana remembers it.

"That wasn't strange to me because that's how I grew up," Montana said. "My father was the same way. You expect to do well, and if you're doing well, then great. That should go unspoken.

"What Bill always tried to do was what my dad always tried to do. He'd talk about what you don't want to hear, about what you're doing wrong."

Of course, that's not how Walsh remembers it. Asked about his tendency to withhold praise, Walsh paused. When he answered, there was hurt in his voice. "I praised Joe, but I don't know if he listened. I said he's the best quarterback in football. My conscience is pretty clear on that, but I also was demanding. I would tell Joe, 'You're great but you've got to do this and this and this.'"

Now cut to the present, to Montana, who is coaching his two sons while his two older daughters, Alexandra and Elizabeth, have followed in his footsteps and moved on to Notre Dame.

High athletic standards a family trait

Montana is ordinarily easygoing, but when it comes to sports , he's internalized the high standard from his father and Walsh. "My wife (Jennifer) has a hard time with that because I treat my boys and girls like that, moreso the boys," he said.

This high standard came out in a speech Montana gave his sons. "I told them, 'If you want to play the game for fun, I'll just sit here and enjoy myself. And I will. But if you want to get better, I'm not going to harp on the things you did well. I'm going to tell you things you did wrong. I'm going to tell you the things that help you get better.' "

The approach must be working. "Until a year ago they didn't want to hear anything from him about football," Jennifer Montana said. "Because they're very interested now, they finally figured out he must have done something."

Montana was recently out of town and Nathaniel came to Jennifer and said, "I can't throw at all. I really need him. Ask him what's wrong with my throwing motion."

The request really interested Jennifer. "That throws Joe back into the same situation and he loves that," she said.

Montana's father, Joe Sr., lives near his son a few miles north of Calistoga. Montana's mother, Theresa, died about a year ago. Joe Sr. worked as a manager of a finance company in Pennsylvania and Theresa worked in the same office with him for 20 years.

Joe Sr. coached Montana in basketball, football and baseball when he was growing up in Monongahela, Pa., a small coal-country town about 20 miles from Pittsburgh that was a busy riverport a century ago. It was as though Joe S r. was the first incarnation of Walsh. "I thought Joe had to work on fundamentals," he said. "You work on steps to get away from the line of scrimmage. Some quarterbacks take two steps before they even get away from the line. Joe was away on his first step."

The father did more than lecture. He participated. He would take Montana to a field at a nearby school and run pass patterns while his son threw him the ball.

"It was hard to find kids to play with," Montana said. "He was always there. He knew quarterbacks didn't always stand still. He worked on rolling out. We started when I was 8, maybe a year before."

So, Montana's incredibly demanding standard of achievement has been part of his upbringing since he was a boy. In that sense, he's never changed. In most senses he's never changed. People close to Montana say he's still shy, doesn't say a lot, downplays his achievements.

"I'm uncomfortable with the position I'm in," he said. "I played a dumb sport so many years. People think of you a different way. I just try to be normal like everyone else."

What does he mean by a "dumb sport?"

"Instead of having a job that's meaningful, I played a dumb game. It would be like playing checkers for a living."

Many people don't consider football a dumb sport. But that's not the point. The point is Montana's tendency always to turn the spotlight away from himself.

"He's humble and shy," DeBartolo said. "I've been places with him in public and he goes all out to sign autographs. If he doesn't, it's because he's embarrassed. I don't know why anyone would be embarrassed with his legacy. He's like a little kid around stuff like that."

For Barton, his former teammate and current business partner, Montana is "like Peter Pan, the kid who never grew up.

"He loves life. He'll walk by you and hit you in the back of the head. You'll get into an argument about who can throw a wad of paper into the waste basket and you end up playing a game of horse. I remember before Super Bowl XXIII (in Miami) his pregame meal consisted of a couple of Pepsis and Snickers bars."

'An obligation to be successful'

To Jennifer Montana, her husband has two personalities. "When he played, he could be very aggressive. I never see the person guys on the team describe to me. He seems to have a grace about him. I see him tired of being him sometimes. He feels an obligation to be successful and that puts additional pressure on him."

This is how Montana sees himself: "I get protective. You get taken advantage of and it's hard to let people see the real you until you're comfortable that they're comfortable."

Here's something to consider. If Montana never was a quarterback, never became THE Joe Montana, what would he have been? In the past, Montana might have avoided this question. Now he's happy to answer, and his response will surprise you.

"It's strange," he said, "I never smoked cigarettes. I don't like cigarettes. But I have an infatuation with cigarette packs. I'd stand in the checkout line and stare at cigarette packs. I wondered why people bought different brands."

It is an interesting, endearing image, the young Joe Montana, the Notre Dame Joe staring at Winstons, Lucky Strikes and Chesterfields and wondering what people saw in them. Which means he had a fascination for marketing. And who knows, maybe he would have been a genius at that, too. He's moved past cigarette packs in his life, is trying to focus on the basics of family and friends. He says he doesn't have a best friend, but he has close friends - Lott, Barton, Steve Bono, Dwaine Board who lives nearby. "I rely on Jennifer more than anyone," he said.

Of course, he's had other significant people in his life. You may wonder how he feels about them. Here's what he said.

Walsh: "A teacher. I look back on our relationship and understand the distance he kept from me."

DeBartolo: "The biggest-hearted, most loving person I ever met. He's like family."

George Seifert, the former 49ers coach who traded Montana to Kansas City and gave the 49ers' quarterback job to Steve Young: "To this day, I like George. I just wish I could have had the opportunity to compete for the job. I don't hold it against him. I did then. I would have loved to finish here."

Steve Young: "You can only be so much of a friend to someone who wants to take your job, and it was something I loved. I respected what he could do. I treat him the way I would treat any teammate."

And while we're talking about his feelings, does he have any for the current 49ers? "No."

Why? "I still remain friends with Eddie."

So that's it. DeBartolo has been banished from his kingdom - first by the NFL because of a Louisiana gambling scandal and then by a bitter split with his sister over the family's assets - and Montana remains loyal. It's a kind of loyalty you respect. Montana and DeBartolo talk on the phone many times a week. DeBartolo recently went to Montana's home for dinner.

Walsh, who created the 49ers when they were, well, the 49ers, also has been pushed out of the organization, in his case to a desk job at Stanford. Recalling Montana, he said, "Neither of us has much interest in the 49ers. I never expected that. I can't speak for him but I'm totally detached. It's almost like it never existed, but it did. I wish I saw more of Joe. I have such a strong feeling for him. He made me what I am and I'm sure I helped him be what he is. It was a Camelot era."

Adjusting to life without football

There's another reason Montana is distant from the Niners. It's called the "little death" and it occurs when an athlete's career ends. Montana has dealt with it simply by staying away.

"I miss Sunday afternoon," Montana admitted. "I miss the thrill of the game, the challenge of the game. I went back to Notre Dame for the spring game. I was an honorary captain with (Joe) Theisman.

"Coming down the tunnel, just the smell of the grass - I don't know what it is. It just gives you goose bumps. It's hard not to miss it. I had to quit cold turkey. Basketball players can get a pickup game. I can't find 11 guys that can probably walk or run well enough to even get a pickup game."

Still, the fact remains that Montana has adjusted to life without football. And he's made the transition better than most. How did he do it? It's impossible to say, really. Montana himself isn't even sure, but Lott has a theory worth thinking about.

"Joe grew up by himself (an only child)," Lott said. "He played a lot by himself in his back yard. He's comfortable being by himself - it's part of his DNA. He's always been comfortable in his own skin."

Maybe being alone as a kid formed Montana, gave him that sense of independence and detachment everyone around him notices. Former teammate Randy Cross once said of Montana, "He thinks of himself in the third person."

"I learned to rely on myself, to find ways to entertain myself," Montana said. "Here's a good example of being an only child. We'll put all the kids in the car and I'll get so frustrated when they argue. Jennifer laughs. 'You don't know because you're an only child. This happens all the time.' I say to her, 'Are you kidding me?' "

A new competition: Horses

Which brings us to the final issue. Has Montana been able to replace the passion he found in football? The answer will surprise you. "I found something where I can actually compete and have fun," he said. "It gets my adrenalin going."

To get the adrenalin going, Montana rides cutting horses, participates in competitions, and is good at it. "I won't say it's a life saver," he said. "But when you get on a horse and walk down the side of the arena getting ready to go into a herd of cows, it gets you going."

Montana recently gave a glimpse of his horsemanship. He was at a San Francisco hotel where he was engaged in an anti-high-blood pressure campaign sponsored by Novartis Pharmaceuticals, which he represents. Montana was diagnosed with high blood pressure, which is now under control through medication, diet and exercise. He travels around the country to educate people about the dangers and treatment of elevated blood pressure.

He booted up his computer in his hotel room and searched for a video. And there he was about six inches tall on his horse. Big Joe watched Little Joe gracefully separate out a cow and perform maneuvers to head it off. He was impressive, a great athlete taking up another sport.

Little Joe wore a white hat and chaps and looked like a buckaroo. Watching him, Big Joe was completely engaged, happy, focused, alive. For a moment, he was Joe throwing The Pass to Dwight Clark, the whole world going insane.