Lowell Cohn: No question: 49ers of the '80s surpass the rest

My editor and I throw hypotheticals at each other. It's part of the fun. “Could Muhammad Ali beat Joe Louis?” That kind of thing.

My editor's name is Jim Barger and he's a sports editor deluxe, saves my bacon once a week. I love working with the guy. Here's his latest challenge to me via email:

“Maybe a Lowell column: The Warriors are really good. Has any Bay Area team ever been so clearly head and shoulders above its competitors? I know the 49ers had a dynasty, but I don't think their team was ever way out front of all the competition. NFL is too balanced, even the great teams are always a step away from failure. But could the 49ers have withstood losing their Steph Curry - Joe Montana - for even one playoff game?”

That's our assignment for today, to compare the Niners - when they were the Niners - to the Warriors. Jim and I know we're comparing teams from different sports and different eras, and that makes this exercise half-cracked. That's the fun of it. Pretend we're at a bar, you drinking a Pliny the Elder, me an Unti Zin, and come along for the ride.

It is an honor to cover the Warriors. I say that at the get-go. The team plays in joy. It's exciting. It's the league champion and it won those 73 regular-season games, a league record. And it won its first 24 games, a league record. The Warriors have the best player in the league - no need to name him. And he seems nice, normal and regular. The Warriors are a dream to root for and write about. They are 6-1 in the playoffs largely without their star.

But I have quibbles. I guess I'm quibbling with Editor Jim. Forgive me, dude. Dominance in the NBA is different from dominance in the NFL. Easier to come by.

The Bulls won six titles in the '90s and just happened to have the best player who ever lived. The Celtics had two great eras coinciding with Bill Russell and then Larry Bird. The Lakers had a great run with Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Basketball. Five guys from one team on the court at a time. Fewer moving parts than football. One or two great players skew the equation in hoops. Never can happen in football. I'm saying the kind of dominance the Warriors may achieve is a basketball-only phenomenon.

It's still one heck of a phenomenon.

And there's something else. The Warriors have not achieved anything this season. Sure, they won all those games in a row to start the season and won more regular-season games than any team including the Bulls. But the whole shebang is about winning the championship. And that discussion is ongoing.

It is dangerous to canonize the Warriors - as much as we want to - until they actually put away the Trail Blazers, until they beat the Spurs or the Thunder and then nail the Cavs, who rival the Warriors as a 3-point shooting monster. The road ahead is filled with landmines. Not one coach on the Warriors thinks the championship is a done deal.

But the 49ers are a done deal. Five championships under the Bill Walsh-George Seifert regime. I covered that. Nothing compares to it. Sorry, Stephen Curry.

Jim asked if any team dominated like the Warriors. The 49ers did.

I'm not a stats guy. But I'll stick my toe in the shallow water for these brief ones.

The 1984 49ers were head and shoulders above great opposition. They took apart Dan Marino and the Dolphins in the Super Bowl at Stanford Stadium 38-16. In the postseason, they outscored opponents by 56 points. Their record that season was 15-1, 18-1 including playoffs.

That's head-and-shoulders material. And it gets better.

In 1989, the Super-Bowl-winner 49ers outscored playoff opponents by 100 points. Their record was 14-2, 17-2 including playoffs.

Head and shoulders. A machine.

Walsh changed football in a way Steve Kerr has not changed basketball. No knock on Kerr, a wonderful coach and man. Walsh perfected the West Coast Offense. He did not invent the West Coast Offense. Sid Gillman did. Walsh got Gillman's offense from Al Davis when Walsh worked for the Raiders.

Gillman and Davis included several deep passes in each offensive game plan - “chunk plays” intended to produce touchdowns right then and there. Walsh was more conservative. Wanted shorter precision passes, many going to backs who came out of the backfield on delayed routes. Instead of long passes, Walsh stressed yards after the catch. Walsh rarely went for it all on one big play - although sometimes he did. This may have been about Montana, who did not have great downfield range.

Kerr's influences are Phil Jackson and Gregg Popovich. He admits it. But he is not a Jackson-Popovich clone. He coaches to his personality - open, cheerful, verbal. Players talk to each other, even criticize each other. In Oakland this works. Put Kerr with the Knicks and Carmelo Anthony. Good luck.

Walsh created a family tree of coaches. To his everlasting credit. Kerr is doing exactly the same thing - Alvin Gentry and Luke Walton. To his everlasting credit.

But Kerr is in a tricky situation. If the Warriors win the championship, everyone anoints him as a legend. Absolutely. What if the Warriors do not go all the way? Nothing is preordained or guaranteed. Well, what if they don't?

The 73 wins and the 24 straight wins become ironic details. “Gee, they did all that but flopped in the postseason.”

It's all on the line for the Warriors right now: Greatness or a flop.

The Niners never flopped. Did not lose a Super Bowl until Jim Harbaugh - great coach but not a Walsh disciple.

One other thing. In his email, Jim asked if the Niners could withstand losing Montana for even one playoff game as the Warriors have withstood losing Curry. Yes, the Niners could have withstood.

They would have played their other Hall of Fame quarterback and done just fine.

For more on the world of sports in general and the Bay Area in particular, go to the Cohn Zohn at cohn.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Staff Columnist Lowell Cohn at lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.