San Francisco 49ers Forever

Baseball is here, basketball is soon to restart on July 30th, and we will have the 49ers Santa Clara’s training camp open in 5 days. Whether we are all jumping the gun, we will soon find out, but as of now it’s full speed ahead with sports. I’m sure hockey is doing something but who gives a rat’s ass? Problem is, on day one of baseball, Juan Soto tested positive for COVID. His teammates all went out and played their game against the Yankees. Fittingly the first game was a 5 inning affair that was rained out. 3 months late, and rained-shortened? Too funny.

The Giants are going against the Dodgers right now, and as of now, no positives, unless you call Clayton Kershaw hitting the IR a positive development.

Anyhow, drove through the City last week, and hit some old stomping grounds.

Rookies can report on Tuesday, quarterbacks and injured players on the 23rd, and the rest of the players on July 28th, but there is a lot of grumbling among the players and the NFLPA regarding the safety of the game and how players can be safe playing in this pandemic.

Then you have the request that players be tested every day, and the NFLPA has already put forth not playing any preseason games. In all, no one is clear if the game would be safe to resume, let along practice but here we go. I think.

A far as testing goes, my daughter was tested 2 WEEKS ago and still no results. In other words testing is useless. Must be nice for these folks to be able to get tested, with results, at the drop of a hat, and us regular folks can’t get shit.

Welcome to the NFL, Raheem Mostert. The feel good story of the 2019 season, Raheem paddled imaginary surfboards onto imaginary waves after scoring real touchdowns last season, and turned in a spectacular 220 yards on 29 carries performance in the NFC Championship game. So, naturally he wants to get some scratch for, you know, the effort. In the immortal words of the Dalai Lama, gunga la gunga. Not sure if he will get total consciousness, though.

Problem is, Mostert has no leverage. He just signed a 3-year $8.7 million deal last year. Sure it was for a guy who, before week 12 was a 3rd string RB and special teamer who has bounced around the league for 5 teams in 2 years before landing on our practice squad in 2017. And that’s the rub. Mostert has 8 games under his belt as a starter. Well, I take that back. Shanny mysteriously didn’t play Mostert until midway through the 2nd quarter of the Super Bowl.

Speaking of Shanahan, he, and his father before him, seem to be able to make any running back look like the 2nd coming of Jim Brown. His zone blocking scheme works very well, and running backs in this system are pretty much plug-and-play. Give any RB a shot to get through the line untouched, and they will pile up yards. Which makes the RB position, one of not nearly the value it once held in recent football memory, even less so with the Forty Niners. Shit, Jeff Wilson has looked very good at times. He had 4 TDs in his first two games last year.

And, sure, I like the guy, but Mostert is walking into a buzzsaw what with no leverage, fighting for playing time (if McKinnon ever sees the field), having 2 years left on his original deal, and going against Paraage Marathe and the 49ers front office. As much grief as I’ve given Marage, it has never been around his contract dealings. He’s a master of the deal, and is not someone to try and push over or bully in contract negotiations.

So, if he doesn’t want to be here, in the best system around for a guy of his talent, trade him. His value right now will never be higher, and we should be able to get what, a 3rd round pick? Even that may be a stretch. Teams don’t even draft RBs on day 1 of the draft anymore, and a guy with his limited action won’t broker any deals in the first 2 rounds, let alone the 3rd round.

Plus, the 49ers can merely sit back and say play or go home. He’s under contract, and his only move is to hold out.

Nothing seems to be stabilizing, let alone getting better in the U S of eh? I’m assuming neither baseball, basketball, or football will be played this year, despite the ramping up of something resembling training camp for baseball, and the restart of the basketball season. Baseball of course spent two months haggling about the money while the rest of the nation struggled on. During the game of chicken regarding playing, the league did nothing with the time allowed to figure out a testing protocol. Something EVERYONE knew was the biggest issue around starting the game back up. Now that we are here, the league missed their ship date for tests to numerous teams, and they look like the stupid fucks that they are.

Basketball chose the worst hotspot in the nation, Floriduh, to restart their interrupted season. That should go well. Maybe Rudy Gobert can be in charge of cleaning the press room.

But, fuck baseball and basketball. I’m more worried about football. As of now, teams are rag-tagging it, and various players are testing positive as they ignore the rules around practice. A couple preseason games have already been cancelled, and frankly with the way the powers that be have screwed the pooch in the response to this outbreak, I’m not very optimistic about the season. barring the miracle vaccine.

Well, dominoes 2 and 3 have just fallen as the NFL has cut 2 preseason games from the 2020 NFL schedule. They are saying games 1 and 4 just for fun, but this ain’t fun. As the Coronavirus drags on, the entire year of 2020 looks to be a wash for sports of any kind.

The COVID situation here in the US of A is not improving, and the Commander in Grief (thief? greed? cheat? Vlad? Pick an adjective) ain’t doing shit about it, and we are wallowing in a sea of people who think wearing a mask is a political statement. Hey, next time you get an operation, tell the surgeon to do the op in the parking lot without a mask or gloves because America!

But I digress. The truth is, this looks to be a slow inevitable crawl to the cancellation of the entire 2020 season. I hope not, but without some real progress getting this shit under control, we are all just hoping against hope something good comes out of this.

The Hall of Fame game in Canton, OH was just cancelled, to the surprise of no one. It is getting grimmer and grimmer regarding the 2020 season, as the country has pretty much screwed the pooch in regards to containing the virus. Of all the sports, baseball is the least onerous when it comes to spreading things, if you take away the licking and spitting and drooling in the dugouts. Korea is playing, minus fans, and it is going fine.

Basketball? That’s gonna be tougher. There’s a lot of contact, and no way to distance. I mean it won’t affect guys like James Harden and Russell Westbrook, who don’t play defense anyway, but I can’t really see how that is gonna work.

Then there’s football. A game where EVERYONE is in close contact with everyone else.From the players and coaches on the sidelines, to the offensive and defensive huddles, to the 14 guys on the line of scrimmage, to actual crashing and hitting and blood and sweat flying. They’ve had the longest time to wait for a solution, as this took off right when the Super Bo, uh, nevermind, but the point being, we haven’t even gotten over the first wave of this, let alone the predicted second wave once fall and winter hit.

I wish there was good news coming around this, but I’m not very optimistic at this point. Barring some kind of miracle around a vaccine.

Trent Williams gets a restructured deal that gives him some up-front money from his last year of his current contract. And an interesting caveat that prohibits the Niners from franchising him next year. Not that it means much as that is going to George Kittle, but all this is of course mere speculation.

Other than that, 5th round tackle Colton McKivitz signed his rookie deal, as did 7th round WR Jauan Williams.

Hoping against hope we have a football season, but at this point nothing looks very clear. If baseball and basketball reopen without too much disaster, I guess it’s a possibility, but with cases going up instead of down, who knows?

Just got word Deebo Samuel broke his foot today practicing with teammates today, and is already undergoing surgery to fix it. The diagnosis is him being out 3-4 months, but ‘a source’ told ESPN that Samuel would be ready for opening day September 1.

We will see, but let’s hope this isn’t a trend. Trent Taylor had a similar injury last year and as we all know, he didn’t play a down. His first surgery didn’t take, and he got an infection after his second surgery, thus the lost season. FWIW, the usual recovery from this surgery is 6-8 weeks.

So far in this sportsless landscape (golf? NASCAR? zzzzzzzzzzzzz), the NFL has been waiting on the sidelines hoping for things to calm down while baseball and basketball deal with the ramifications of sheltering during games, and all the logistical nightmares that go with it. Actually baseball is fighting over money, but that’s beside the point. Stupid fuck idiots, the lot of’em.

Thing is, with restrictions being mildly lifted, Ezekiel Elliott, and ‘several cowboys and Texans’ per a CBS report have tested positive for the Coronavirus. Elliott himself is asymptomatic and doing fine. None of the players were at their facilities, and the teams know and follow the protocols, but therein lies the rub. Open this stuff too early and the feared second wave hits. Baseball and basketball with most certainly have to deal with this contingency where they would have to shut their games down a second time.

Football is waiting against all hope that there is some kind of hope that the season will not have to be shortened, pushed back, or God forbid, cancelled. Seeing as this just took hold after the (FUCK) Super Bowl, we’ll have to see if they can dodge that bullet.

Say what you will about Tom Brady, but I’m still going with Joe Montana as the best quarterback to ever suit up in the NFL. Yeah, Brady has more appearances (9) in the Super Bowl, and more wins (6), but he also has 5 picks, 3 losses, and a couple real gift victories. Sure Tom’s numbers are solid. 235–for–357 with 2576 yards, 18 touchdowns and five interceptions. Joe? 83 of 122 passes for 1,142 yards and 11 touchdowns, and NO interceptions.

Tom Terrific could very well be 4-5, but for the Seattle Pete Carroll brain fart, and the Atlanta Kyle Shanahan/defensive fuck-a-row debacle. Throw in the tuck rule game that got the whole thing started, and he loses another one to be 3 and 5.

The other caveat of course is the fact that the NFL bent themselves backwards to change the rules for Brady (and Rodgers) as you now can’t hit a quarterback below the waist, above the shoulders, land on him, breathe on him, or brush the facemask without the unsportsmanlike call. Joe routinely took shots that cost him playing time that Brady never had to endure. The shots by Jim Burt and Leonard Marshall, among countless other shots Joe took, would be flagged today and neither were.

The other argument is that Joe had superior talent. He had Rice, Taylor, Roger Craig, Brent Jones, yadda yadda yadda. But Rice and Taylor weren’t on the team for the first two Super Bowls, but Mike Shuman was! And there was the fact Brady had Randy Moss for a few years. Strangely enough, Moss never won a Super Bowl with them (2 losses) or with us.

Anyhow, Happy 64th Birthday, Joe!