Former 49ers quarterback Joe Montana and former Steelers quarterback Terry Bradshaw decided to stay home, while former Dolphins MVP Jake Scott was traveling in Australia.
Montana, the league's only three-time Super Bowl MVP, and Bradshaw reportedly turned down the invitation over money.
Both denied the reports.
In a phone interview with "Quite Frankly" host Stephen A. Smith on Monday night, Montana vehemently denied forgoing the ceremony over money and reiterated that his absence was due to his preference to see his son's basketball game.
Montana told ESPN last week that he wasn't going to attend the Super Bowl because his son had an important basketball game he wanted to attend. Bradshaw, according to the Chronicle, told league officials he wanted to be with his family.
Montana said money was never an issue and that he would not have attended the Super Bowl ceremony even if the appearance fee had been greater than the $100,000 he was reported to have requested.
Former MVPs were given $1,000 for incidental expenses while in Detroit, along with other amenities such as plane tickets, car rental and game tickets.
Sources told each paper that Montana asked for a guarantee of at least $100,000 in appearance money.
When the league balked at Montana's demands, the quarterback declined to be in attendance.
Bradshaw, through a representative, denied the Chronicle's report that there was a dispute over money.
http://www.49erswebzone.com/cgi-bin/news/news.cgi?action=display&num=2223
Please move this article to General/Chat. My apologies.
Montana probably saw a better game.
Good for Montana.
The NFL turned it into a product promotion anyway and were surely well-paid for that.
From ESPN: In a phone interview with "Quite Frankly" host Stephen A. Smith on Monday night, Montana vehemently denied forgoing the ceremony over money
Who you gonna believe???
I wish they would have paid Joe $100,000 to sing the national anthem.
when they say it's not about the money, it's about the money .... agreed about the anthem/ can't anybody just sing it?
I watched Terry on Leno last night. He said that it wasn't about money. He doesn't go to superbowls. Too much of a zoo.
He needs to do more situps and quit bitching about the ex who apparently took him to the cleaners. He also tried to get a plug in for his quarter horse breeding business.
Terry must be hung like a horse!
If Montana was busy, I can't figure out why they didn't call me. I would have gone.
Say it ain't so Joe....
The NFL bitching about players being mercenary is kind of like a street hooker complaining that popular fashions have gotten too "racy".
So, who has a kids' basketball game on Super Bowl Sunday? 'Cause he could have travelled on the day of the event.
Joe, at the height of his football career, insisted on an honorarium when his hometown, Monongahela, Pennsylvania (in the economically depressed coal/steel region south of Pittsburgh) wanted to honor him.
It left a bad feeling that clouded many townspeople's attitude toward Joe. Still, it didn't prevent the locals from naming a bridge on a new super highway after Joe. The other bridges on the highway are named after local Congressional Medal of Honor winners from the respective towns nearby.
One is left to ponder whether Joe needs the money that badly, which is sad.
When the Superbowl was in Houston a few years ago the NFL was looking for local volunteers to help run all the activities. Cheapskates couldn't even hire the people and pay them for their time. Needless to say alot of fools signed up.
my thoughts: Bradshaw probably wanted money, but I wonder if there was a contract issue with Fox vs. ABC
Montana wanted the money. His excuse that he put football "behind him" (as reported on the radio this morning) is bs. He makes commercials in his uniform and does show up for appearances if the money is right.
Joe Montana is my football hero, and I don't believe this money cr** at all!! So there...(stamping foot).
The NFL was offering to provide him essentially a free infomercial touting his glorified status to an audience of tens of millions.
He should have been paying the NFL, not the other way around.
The NFL had a rookie running the Super Bowl and they offered chump change to the game's biggest stars for a for-profit event. Not a good idea to offend the NFL's biggest stars in your debut and then have league underlings like Aiello seeking out sycophant writers to damage the reputations of people we know and like.
If the NFL had announced they were donating $10 million to charity, I'll bet Bradshaw and Montana would have been the first ones there.
The people who should be embarassed are the lowballers and the backstage sneaks trying to impugn the reputations of people greater than themselves.
Now I've heard Montana's side. Who do you believe? It does seem hard for me to believe that Montana - who I'm sure is set for life - would demand that kind of money for an appearance that included all the other MVPs.