Forty Niners Forever

Much will be made of this game, seeing as the Bears coaching staff could have pretty much been ours had Jed apparently  not stepped in it.  Bears fans are encouraged by their 5-6 record while we are, well, where we are.

Jay Cutler is apparently reborn with his stellar 5-5 record. Whatever. The song remains the same in this one. If the road defense remains vastly incompetent, then we will lose big. AZ, Atl,  and GB certainly have better offenses than Chi-town, and we were able to throttle them. If the D can keep us in the game, and it could be our first roadie. As usual it comes down to the line play. Protect Gabby and get some pressure on JC.

Or is Young Sir Jed simply hiding behind the latest scapegoat in his brilliant attempt to fold, spindle, and mutilate a once proud franchise? I have no idea, but on the surface, this appears to be a good move to me. There are NO football people in high places within this organization. This isn’t a prerequisite for greatness, but it sure seems to help.

For once in Jed’s (or Denise’s, or Dr. Dorkian’s) life, I’d like to see him clean out the front office and hire a football savvy GM who can then craft the organization in his image. Not this hodgepodge of pieces and parts that got lucky with 5 years of high draft picks by a guy dismissed as a drunk, and later hiring a head coach to improve a talented but rudderless team. For those not paying attention (you know who you are), that would be Scott McLaughan and Jim Harbaugh). The current GM, Trent Baalke has not done nearly well enough to replace the talent that Scotty assembled. And Jim Tomsula  certainly isn’t reminding anyone of Bill Walsh.

Jed has done things like hiring his head coach before hiring his GM, hiring coordinators before head coaches, and, if you believe the pre-season talk, nixed the hiring of Adam Gase because Gase wanted to keep Fangio, but Jed wanted Tomsula as the DC.

Which brings us to Paraage Marathe. He has worked his way up the organization for 15 years as Jed’s sidekick and confidante. Is he falling on the sword for Jed’s ineptitude? Is Marathe really the source of the leaks, as proposed by various other ‘sources?’ Is he Jed’s mouthpiece for disseminating his leaks?

Either way, I’m glad to see him gone. And he will be gone after the Super Bowl. How this all plays out is a mystery, and Jed sure has a lot of ground to make up to get anywhere NEAR being thought of as a competent owner, but could this be the first step?

Let’s hope so. Again, this whole org needs to be gutted and retooled. Start with a GM that has a clue. I’ve mentioned Scott Pioli. Maybe there are others that could come in and do some good. And don;t say Tuna or Holmgren. They’d be nice as advisers, not GMs.

Hard to come up with positive stuff when your team is apparently on a crash-course to oblivion, but news out of the locker room is that the team is getting behind Blaine Gabbert. Paul Gutierrez of ESPN is reporting that the players are impressed with his taking advantage the second coming of his career. Granted, Gabbert is 1-2 in his short starting stint as the Niners signal-caller, but he has grasped the offense and ran it fairly well. His win vs Atl was against a defense with no pass rush. However, Gabbert played OK against two very tough defenses in Seattle and AZ. Not too many mistakes, but also a lot of not being aggressive. Gabbert has struggled with the deep ball, but this could be rust. he certainly has a strong arm but has left most deep balls short.

Both teams seemed to be looking past us, but that is neither here nor there. Point being, the Niners have four very winnable games to close out the season with Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and StL coming up. Of course they are all on the road (except for the Rams, and Cincy at home should be a loss), so you have to think this throws a wrench into the best-laid plans of getting in the top 5 picks). The defense seems to crater on the road and play well at home, so I guess we just have to hope they get their rest and remember how to tackle away from Santa Clara.

Of course this plays in to the draft implications, but seriously, if they can’t win a couple of these games, this is more impetus to jettison everyone. I think this should be done anyway, but unfortunately my name isn’t Jed York. Who know how he will react to the team going 4-1 to close out the season?

It certainly wouldn’t save the jobs of most of this coaching staff. But that’s a given. My problem is the management. Baalke’s latest draft has proven to be another head-scratcher as the immediate needs at CB, O line, and ILB were not addressed. Wilhoite has been a disappointment, and OLB Eli Harold a work-in-progress. The young CBs Acker and Reaser have struggled. Marcus Cromartie, a UDFA who has bounced around Cleveland’s and SF’s practice squads, has outplayed them both.

Beyond that, the rest of the glad-handers club that Jed has built needs to go. They need, for once in their lives, to hire a football guy and not these bean-counter types.

Get a GM like Scott Pioli. A guy who was VP of player personnel in NE for their 3-ring run from 2001 to 2008. He’s been around the game as a coach, a talent evaluator, and a GM since 1988.

Get something right, Jed.

Shit, it beats the Blaine Gabbert QB non-controversy. Or where Colin Kaepernick (Philly) will land. Once again, the refs are the major back-story for a lot of disgruntled teams this last weekend. The Niners crew of Pete Morelli was dismissed from working next Sunday night’s Cowboys/Redskins game in favor of some backwater game because of their myriad fuckups last Sunday.

The NFL admitted last Tuesday that Sammy Watkins got out of bounds in the closing seconds of what turned out to be their loss to the Pats last week. What should have been a 1st down with 0:02 seconds left was instead ruled by the ref that the clock should run. Since this was the last play of the game, I guess there’s no replay allowed. Everyone runs away. This game also saw the worst call I’ve ever witnessed in my 45 years of watching football, and that was the whistle blown by the side judge DURING a play. It took a TD away from New England, and took the refs nearly 5 minutes to figure out how to fix. Which they didn’t.

The Niner game was yet another game in a litany of horribly officiated games, but we all know what happened there. I will add Bruce Arians’ comment, though regarding explanations for their multiple errors: “They were just running out of them,” he said. “It was a FUBAR on their part. They can try to explain it. They’re wrong.”

Now we get last night’s game. One where a very questionable offensive pass interference call on Gronkowski negated a 10 yard completion on a 3rd and 5 play. Seeing as this was late in the 4th quarter, this completely changed the game. Much like the phantom roughing the passer call on Quinton Dial.

If the NFL is going to keep the refs going in this manner, there will be another revolt similar to the replacement ref fiasco of 3 years ago. Look around NFL sites these days, and half the articles are about how bad the officiating is. What the NFL needs to do is either get these guys full time jobs so they can learn how to collectively and singularly do their jobs better, or put these game-changing calls under review. A couple more reviewable calls won’t change the length of games too much, and maybe these fuckers will get this shit right.

Either that, or the darker side of all the money swirling around betting, DFS, and point spreads is quietly altering games to their advantage.

Saw Mad Max with the kids the other day, and Road Warriors (0-5)  these guys aren’t. In a familiar turn though, the home 49er defense was stingy and tough as it rattled and shook (and was hosed by a shit call) and stuffed the vaunted AZ Cardinals offense. This one saw the defense make plays time and again, including an 8-play ‘drive’ from the 3 yard line punctuated by 3 (!) PI calls. The laundry was flying all over the place, and the Niners got their share of bad ones. They were pretty much legit, but my beef with those calls is Vance McDonald got called for offensive PI on a play that looked exactly like what Eric Reid got called for on Larry Fitzgerald.

Like the Chicago and AZ games last year, these calls played a big part in determining the outcome of the game. The worst however, was the roughing the passer penalty on Quinton Dial. On a clear shot where Dial led with his shoulder, he sacked Palmer. A typical straight ahead play. Alas, the laundry came out and dinged Dial. So, instead of 3rd and 18 from the AZ 24, it was 1st and 10 from the AZ 47. This lead to AZ keeping the ball for an extra 5 minutes, and the game-winning touchdown. On that same drive, Palmer clearly got the snap off after the play clock had expired, so the play should have been blown dead. Instead, he connected on a 34 yard pass down the middle to set up the Palmer score.

Sure, whining about the refs is all verboten and shit, but fuck that. The refs were atrocious. After a penalty on the Niners for 12 men on the field early in the game, it took the refs 6 minutes to determine the correct down as beleaguered ref Pete Morelli ran around putting on and taking off his headphones  trying to figure out the down and the distance. As it was, they got it wrong. What should have been 1st and 5 from the 10 turned into 2nd and 3 from the 8. AZ lost a down and ended up kicking a FG.  As Bruce Arians said, “I mean, they can’t count to three.”

The second FG by AZ was marred by another stupid display of ineptitude. On a pass where the AZ WR went OB and came back and caught the ball, a flag was thrown for illegal catch. The refs mistakenly gave AZ another down. It didn’t matter as they didn’t convert that one either, but things like down, distance, and basic penalty enforcement should be easy to figure out.

Throw in the bad roughing call, and the insane laundromat posse on the goal line, and you have a shit-fest. As is becoming more and more apparent, the refs and the league are ruining this sport with stupid rules (explain ‘football-move-after-a-catch’ to me again. 2 feet down, and getting hit OB, and the ground can STILL cause an incomplete pass?) and the random enforcement of PI, roughing, illegal use of hands, and many other penalties leaves me to think the refs and the league are looking to control some aspects of the game that should not be in their control.

time to see who’s staying and who’s going. Player wise. The front office and coaching staff should be jettisoned come Jan 5th.

Yeah, I know. Back to the trainwreck, back to reality. The front office is playing the rest of the season trying to minimize the extent of the losses, it seems. This of course is based on the fact that the team, when down by a couple scores, refuses to take chances on 4th down, or kicks field goals when they should be going for touchdowns.

The philosophy now seems to be for Blaine Gabbert to be careful rather than take the risk of an int. Don’t throw in the end zone when inside the 10. Just check that bitch down. The problem with this is, well, the defense often lets teams score early and often, so the way they are playing it is nothing but a slow-down technique. The safe route. You know. What Nolan and Singletary preached to Alex Smith.  To me, this looks an awful lot like they are minimizing the point disparity to bolster their decision to bench Colin Kaepernick.

No one in their right mind feels that the 49ers will beat the Cards, so I guess our intent will be to try and stay within 17 points. Yay! Moral victories are so sweet. Go Niners! And take Baalke and Marage with you.

Apropos of nothing, just thought I’d interrupt the hurricane of doom following the 49ers to bring y’all the news that the Golden State Warriors are poised on breaking the record for most consecutive wins to start a season. They are tied with the Houston Rockets, among others, with 15 wins to start s season. Better yet, they can beat the record against their down-state rivals, the LA Lakers.

A better team to demolish on their way to a record I can’t imagine. Other than them, maybe Charles Barkley can come out of retirement to get a facial from Draymond Green. For the past 1.25 seasons all we hear is that a 3 point shooting team can’t win the championship. The Dubs lucked out because they didn’t play the Clips and Spurs.

Know what? Tough shit. If the Clips were so good, how did they lose to Houston after being up 3-2 with a 20 point lead in the 3rd quarter, at home (gutless)? Same goes for San Antonio (old). If they were the team to beat, they would have made it through their preliminary rounds. Waah waah waah! Sir Charles can suck it as well.

What the national wonks, and most of the east coast media, fail to see is, for al the treys, splash brothers hype, and outside scoring this team does, this team scores a lot of points in the paint. All the dirty work that Bogut, Green, and Thompson (and now Curry) do on defense and on the glass. The offensive boards that the Black Falcon grabs. Let them all twitter and fume while this team keeps rolling and winning. After all, this is the best defensive team in the NBA.

Someone tell Sir Charles.

Well, there you have it. Chris Meyers said during the game yesterday that a front office person told Chris that Colin Kaepernick ‘left 20 touchdowns on the field this year.’ Whatever that means. Granted, the announcers did make a point to talk about the shitty tackling and poor line play, but they sure seemed to go out of their way to criticize Kaepernick. Apparently this front office’s job is to talk shit about a guy who was diagnosed with an injury in week 4 and let him take a pounding, and then bench him.  All behind his back.

I mean we all remember last year, right? I felt it was time for Harbaugh to move on, but Jesus, the innuendo coming out of the front office, by way of leaks, was really a firehose. Sing and the rats? same shit different people getting tossed under the bus. As a sidenote, to think Tomsula is the rat is pretty much in the St. Jim is Vince Lombardi’s equal school of thought. Cretins, in other words. Tomsula is nothing but a foot soldier who has been chosen to be the fall guy for a front office that has no accountability. Like Kaepernick, Tomsula will be forced to fall on his sword at the conclusion of the season. He won’t give them any trouble as they strip away more players and lose what talent Scotty M put together. Hell, they might even keep him around one more year to make sure they have a scapegoat for 2016. By then Gabbert will be fully ensconced as our savior, and we’ll have yet failed to draft a QB in the first 3 rounds.

‘Win with class’ is a phrase they like to throw around. More like fuck the fans with impunity. Funny thing is, a lot of fans agree with the decisions being made.  This front office is a miasma of idiots. Eddie said it before Harbaugh got here. Too many chiefs. No lines of communication. The convergence of Scotty’s drafts and Harbaugh’s arrival gave them a respite as they nearly won. But the talent retired, left, or was forced out. Baalke has done little to restock the roster with anything on offense, and the glaring problems seem by everyone at the conclusion of last year, ie offensive line depth, cornerback depth, WRs, and ILB help were ignored by Baalke. Armstead is OK. tartt looks good, but we needed O line help desperately and did nothing about it but sign Eric Pears and pray that M Martin would improve significantly, and pray that Kilgore Trout would return to health.

No such luck. Now, we’re fucked.

Well, here we are at yet another crossroad, with Seattle in the headlights. The team, in my estimation, has done everything wrong, what with the latest news that Colin Kaepernick is on the shelf for the rest of the season, and likely his career, with the 49ers. So, here we sit, with our QB, Blaine Gabbert, the guy recently voted the worrst backup in the NFL, as our standard-bearer. Our backup QB is the one and only Dylan Thomas, who epically wrote, “Do no go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” Certainly this proves that he’s a follower of the 49ers.

Oh, Dylan Thompson? Ahhh. He’s our backup QB. Undrafted, cut, and PSed, he famously said, “What’s a Gamecock?” So, this latest tossing of our budding superstar gone awry to the scrap heap comes with the usual amount of WTF? because, as of yesterday morning, CK was listed as probable, and no one was very concerned about his non-throwing-shoulder injury. Reports are he wanted the surgery, but no one has outright said that. There is the school of thought that they want out of the contract and will cut him before the $11.6 mill 2016 salary (and injury ins) kicks in, so they said, you’re finished this year.

So,  once again the focus of the 49ers falls upon the shadowy machinations of a front office that seems to breed discontent and whispered innuendo as a staple of their existence. From Nolan/Sing forward, there always seems to be a lot of backroom whispering among the brass about how to deal with problems. None of which are straightforward and transparent. Singletary talked of rats on the ship, and Harbaugh certainly dealt with his giant obfuscation pie dealing with Baalke and York. Problem is, he had his own spin machine set to overdrive, and the mutually agreed-upon napalming of their coexistence went up in a cataclysmic and virtually guaranteed fireball.

Now we have this. Our once-and-future quarterback, hand-picked by Jim Harbaugh himself, a superstar in the making who is now seemingly lost and befuddled by an offense that was, in their words,  dumbed down so he could run it effectively. Sure, that sounds good on paper, and the results these last 2 seasons bear this out, but the problems with the team are much more than just Kappy’s doing. The player turnover was not his doing, nor the last few  dogshit drafts, especially on offense,  of our teflon GM, Trent Baalke.

This team bears no resemblance to the Scotty-built team that underachieved so greatly under Singletary, but was loaded with high draft choice talent. I don’t know if Baalke resents Haraugh so much that he wants to distance himself from everything St. Jim, or if he really feels that the way to go is Blaine Gabbert. Makes NO sense if this was their decided course of action, because they should have drafted a backup to Kaepernick at least this year, if not 2014. So, again, this front office has the perception of being a bunch of clueless idiots that can’t see further than their collective noses. Can’t say I disagree. Kappy may not realize his full potential, but he certainly is better off somewhere else.

The 49ers? Well, we are in fine fettle with our backup QB raging against the dying light.