Harbaugh leaves, 49ers suck; coincidence?

Football is the most synergistic of sports.  If a player excels at baseball or basketball, that will probably come out no matter what team they are on.  But if a football player is drafted onto the wrong team, or plays for a coach whose system is not simpatico with his skill set, then more often than not the player looks bad, not the situation (if Tom Brady were drafted by any other coach than Bill Belichick, right now he’d be the proud owner of a discount carpet store in San Mateo, California and only get to see Giselle Bundchen in his wife Judy’s Victoria’s Secret catalog).  In baseball they have metrics that can compensate for a hitter playing in a pitcher’s ballpark, but there is no such adjustment for football. 

Under Coach Jim Harbaugh quarterback Colin Kaepernick, a second round draft pick out of obscure University of Nevada Reno, rose to prominence, ousted overall number one draft pick Alex Smith for the starting job, and took the 49ers to a Super Bowl.  Flushed with success after years of sub-mediocrity, the owners of the Niners decided that Harbaugh wasn’t good enough, that they could do better with Jim Tomsula, and so ushered Harbaugh out the door.  49er ownership said that Tomsula was another Steve Kerr, someone who could take the 49ers from the unacceptable record of 8-8 and win a championship in his first year as coach. 

Fast forward to November 2015.  The Niners are 2-6, in last place in the NFC West.  They are the laughing stock of the league, one of the few teams that have no chance of even hoping for a wildcard spot in the playoffs.  The 49er brain trust has looked around and decided that the problem wasn’t that they hired a completely incompetent coach, but All-pro tight end Vernon Davis, whom they shipped to Denver in exchange for magic beans (a 6^th round draft pick in 2016 and 2017), and Colin Kaepernick, whom they benched in favor of Blaine Gabbert.

Yes, THE Blaine Gabbert who has the lowest QBR, 22.6, of any quarterback of the past ten years with more than 1,000 snaps.  The Blaine Gabbert who has a lifetime record of 5-22 and hasn’t won a game since 2012.  Meanwhile, one QB rating metric rates Kaepernick as having a higher Total QBR rating (47.6) than Cam Newton (46.9), whom no one is considering benching.  The only thing Blaine Gabbert gives the 49ers is the best shot at getting the number one draft pick in the 2016 draft.

If Jim Tomsula thinks Blaine Gabbert gives the Niners a better chance of winning than Colin Kaepernick, then he is even more incompetent than I thought.  Maybe Kaepernick can’t be as successful in Tomsula’s offensive scheme as he was in Jim Harbaugh’s, but his accomplishments over the past few season’s dwarf those of Blaine Gabbert.

Gabbert inherits the same sloppy offensive line that allowed super-mobile Kaepernick to be sacked 18 times, plus the depleted running back corps (bring on the Hayne plane!), plus the loss of Vernon Davis.  He takes over against an Atlanta Falcons team that is somewhat porous but in the top half of the NFL in fewest points per game allowed.  It’s a home game, but that won’t be much help if Gabbert struggles and the crowd starts calling for Kaepernick.

Frankly, almost nothing could make me happier than if at every remaining SF home game this season the crowd would start chanting Harbaugh’s name when the Niner struggled.  One reporter referred to Harbaugh as “he who must not be named” in 49er HQ, so having a stadium full of 49er faithful chanting the name of the coach at Michigan would send the ownership a message they needed to hear.

This is about ownership that thinks it is bigger than the team.  It is about ownership that says they want to win, but then fires the guy most responsible for the team’s success and replace him with a ham sandwich (excuse me, defensive line coach).  It is about a coach handed a team that went to the NFC conference championship game in three of the past four years and turning them into a 2-6 team looking for a new quarterback, possibly with next year’s first pick in the NFL draft.

The 49ers were irrelevant before Jim Harbaugh, and they are now irrelevant after Jim Harbaugh.  Is this what the fans thought they were getting when all those tax dollars were spent on building their shiny new stadium?