Look, Ma, no fallout.

Actually, Young is 37. He only looks older when he's being chased by half the NFL, as was the case last week in San Francisco's ragged victory over New Orleans. Young was viciously dumped to the 3Com Park turf -- or the dirt infield normally occupied by Giants second baseman Jeff Kent, depending upon where Young's helmet landed -- upward of two dozen times by the Saints defenders, who used the 49ers' offensive front as a carpeted hallway to the quarterback's chambers.

"We've talked about that infield before," Young said afterward. Right: Nasty infield, hitting Young's head like that.

Needless to say, San Francisco coach Steve Mariucci spent much of this week considering his options on the offensive line. But it isn't that Young is about to be finished; it's that he'll be finished someday. And when that day comes, the Niners will be looking for the first time in nearly two decades at a future without a secure notion behind center.

Joe Montana to Steve Young to whom?

Jake Plummer Quarterback Arizona Cardinals Profile   CAREER STATISTICS COMP ATT YDS TD INT RAT 517 918 6,326 33 42 70.6

It's a slippery story, one that leans more strongly toward Walsh's version with the passing months. In 1997, remember, Bill Walsh had no official role with the 49ers; he was hanging around at owner Eddie DeBartolo's request as a weird kind of shadow advisor, an arrangement that eventually suited no one in the front office.

Walsh says he saw the qualities in Plummer that he once noted in Montana, and submitted a report to the San Francisco scouting department -- with copies to then-president Carmen Policy and then-V.P. Dwight Clark -- saying so.

Then, says Walsh, he went on his merry way while Policy, Clark and then-scouting director Vinny Cerrato looked over the data, came to a decision and drafted Druckenmiller, out of Virginia Tech, ahead of Plummer.

Those three have never denied responsibility for the draft, although in some versions of the story Walsh either offered little persuasive opinion on the subject or, in the end, agreed with the drafting of Druckenmiller. Whatever, it was a disaster: Strong-armed but slow-footed, Druckenmiller was almost immediately an ill fit in the 49ers' West Coast offense, with its emphasis on mobility and quick release.

Policy and Clark soon scrammed to Cleveland to begin the second Browns, while Cerrato landed with the Redskins in Washington. And with Walsh returning to power in San Francisco, it wasn't long before the team acknowledged the failure of the Druckenmiller draft by setting up a trade with the Dolphins at the end of this year's training camp.

Plummer, of course, has soared with the Cardinals -- he is viewed as one of the catalysts behind a mini-revival of football in the Phoenix area, last week's awful performance notwithstanding. In movement, release and the tendency to rally his side in the late stages of close games, Plummer has drawn the inevitable Montana comparison. Even Walsh won't let it go. When reporters quizzed the GM during camp about the quarterback dynasty of Montana and Young, Walsh playfully added, "And Plummer?"

It makes for great beer-and-a-shot conversation, especially with the Plummer model on display tonight against the Niners. And here's the kicker: It's all academic.

Reason? If the 49ers had indeed drafted Jake Plummer in the summer of 1997, he barely would have played a down by now. Plummer would be one of the most promising clipboard-holders in the NFL.

"I was happy for Druck," Plummer says. "I would have been riding the pine behind Young, too."

Instead, Plummer is riding a wave of nostalgia around San Francisco for an era that never existed. The 49ers get a look at the real thing tonight.

Mark Kreidler is a columnist for the Sacramento Bee, which has a web site at http://www.sacbee.com/. During the 1999 NFL season, he will write a weekly column for ESPN.com, focusing on the Monday Night Football matchup.