If you heard it once, you heard it a million times over the years, from John Madden or anyone else: Great players make big plays in big games. That was Jerry Rice of the San Francisco 49ers.

He was consistently great in his towering NFL career, but the reason he is such an icon in pro football — like Michael Jordan in the NBA — is that Jerry Rice was at his best when the lights were brightest.

5. December 6, 2004 vs. Dallas Cowboys

Jerry Rice spent the final few games of a 20-season career with the Seattle Seahawks, after spending 19-plus seasons with the 49ers (16) and the Oakland Raiders (3-plus).

Jerry Rice wasn't at the top of his powers in 2004. Aging athletes don't replicate the brilliance of their prime periods, but they are still capable — every now and then — of reminding their peers and the public that they can still reach a considerable height.

Jerry Rice did this against a foremost rival during his career, the Dallas Cowboys. Rice caught eight passes for 145 yards, giving Dallas one last taste of his excellence before the best wide receiver in NFL history rode into the sunset.

Rice delivered this performance at age 42. It was one of the two majestic bookends to his career. The other part of the bookend — the front end — is the performance we will discuss next:

4. December 9, 1985 vs. Los Angeles Rams

If Rice's 2004 masterpiece was his last marvelous work of art, this might have been his first thunderous statement in an NFL uniform. Jerry Rice torched the Los Angeles Rams for 10 catches and 241 yards on Monday Night Football.

John Taylor and Jerry Rice both tormented the Rams in their careers as 49ers, and they both did some of the tormenting on Monday Night Football. Rice began his MNF demolition of the Rams with this dismantling of the Los Angeles secondary.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElIUVt2B7WI

The superiority of the 49ers' receivers against the Los Angeles back line was a central reason the formidable Rams teams of the 1980s never made the Super Bowl.

3. 2001 AFC Wild Card Game vs. New York Jets

The one entry from the Oakland Raiders' portion of the Jerry Rice files is this game in the 2001 season's playoffs. Rice was on the downslope of his career at this point in time, more a second or third wide receiver rather than a number-one man. Yet, among all his playoff performances after winning a third Super Bowl title in January of 1995, this is clearly the best.

Jerry Rice flew past the Jets for nine catches and 183 yards. In his first playoff game for a team other than the 49ers, Rice had something to prove. Like all iconic athletes, he made his point when the world was waiting to see if he had lost his fastball.

2. Super Bowl XXIX vs. San Diego Chargers, 1995

This isn't number one on the list of greatest hits for Jerry Rice because the 1994 San Diego Chargers — despite being the first Charger team to make the Super Bowl — were not in the 49ers' league. This was varsity against junior varsity, men against boys. The 49ers' battles against the Dallas Cowboys in the NFC Championship Game were the true Super Bowls in the first half of the 1990s.

The actual Super Bowl was a coronation.

Nevertheless: Jerry Rice was at his absolute best in Super Bowls. This game had profound career resonance for Rice because he hadn't won a Super Bowl in five years. Steve Young hadn't won a Super Bowl as a starting quarterback.

Was Rice going to max out in a Super Bowl with Joe Montana NOT being there to throw downfield darts to him? Would Rice still produce like an elite receiver at age 32? Those questions still had to be answered.

Jerry Rice had no problem making his statement.

The numbers were glossy enough: 10 catches, 149 yards, three touchdowns. Yet, the bigger dimension of Rice's performance was that he smoked the Chargers' secondary early in the game. He made the big plays in the first quarter which immediately told everyone in the stadium the game was going to end in only one manner. The Bolts had no chance.

Jerry Rice rattled and shook the Chargers in the first few minutes of Super Bowl XXIX.

1. Super Bowl XXIII vs. Cincinnati Bengals, 1989

This was as good as it gets for a receiver in the Super Bowl: 11 catches, 215 yards, and huge plays on a lengthy game-winning touchdown drive which concluded with 34 seconds left in regulation. Jerry Rice was brilliant against the Cincinnati Bengals. More than that, he was brilliant precisely when he had to be at his very best.

If Rice had been anything less than outstanding, the 49ers might not have won what was clearly the toughest of their five Super Bowl championships.