“Lopsided in what way?” he said, “When I look at lopsided, I say this team went out and got the crap kicked out of it. I don’t think there’s any other team this year — maybe the last couple years — that played Dallas more physically, more sound than we did yesterday.”

Well, the Cowboys lost to Washington, New York, St. Louis and Arizona, so I’m pretty sure at least one other team played Dallas as sound. And if the 49ers were so physical, why did they forget to jam Terrell Owens at the line of scrimmage?

On Monday, Singletary sounded disconcertingly like his old boss Mike Nolan. So we really are back to square one, with a team that not only gets crushed on the field but also with a coach engaging in delusional thinking.

To this point, Singletary’s honesty has been refreshing. He hasn’t been afraid to say what’s on his mind, even when it’s not politically correct.

He apologized after a lousy home performance, he made it clear he wouldn’t tolerate nonsense from players, he yanked a disastrous starting quarterback and he stood up to offensive coordinator Mike Martz. All of that was a needed move toward reality, away from the fantasyland of the Nolan years.

But on Monday, Singletary seemed ensnared by the 49ers’ mantra of “we’re on the right track.”

Criticized after the game for a bizarre choice of plays, Martz said nothing to reporters and took the heat. The team’s head coach and players took the heat, too, with Mike Singletary saying that Robinson got the call because “Coach Martz felt that there would be a cavity inside, so he made that call. So you’ve got to live with the result.”

That doesn’t mean they have to live happily ever after. In fact, Martz is steamed about how Monday’s game concluded. He made the call, all right, but he made it before officials re-spotted the football following a replay review and started the clock with three seconds remaining.

That makes a difference, a big difference, and I know because I spoke to Martz on Tuesday morning.

“It cost us the game,” he said. “We go to the 1 — or the half-yard line — then spike the ball when, all of a sudden, officials tell us they’re going to look at the replay. While they’re looking at it, the ball stays at the 1. So we send in a play. Then, when they make their decision, they move the ball back to the 2½ and tell us they’re going to start the clock on the official’s wind.

“We couldn’t change the play. We had to go with what we called. If it would’ve been at the 1, we would’ve made it. But they moved it and didn’t give us any time. So what are we going to do? If they would’ve moved it to the 10 we still would’ve had to run the play that was called. We got screwed because of the spot, first and foremost.”

That might need an explanation. Because officials overruled San Francisco quarterback Shaun Hill’s spike, there was no dead ball. And no dead ball means the clock doesn’t stop. San Francisco didn’t have a timeout left, so it had exactly three seconds to produce a game-winning play.

At that point, Martz said, the 49ers could do nothing but run what he called. And what he called, was a play designed to score from the 1, not the 2½.

“Obviously, if we had had time we wouldn’t have called that play for that situation,” he said. “We would’ve called a double fade and passed it. I didn’t expect anything like that. We had no recourse. We got screwed every way possible.”  (Source and the league’s defense)

“…Unless Singletary and Zorn are the only NFL coaches with testicles.”

Well little did we know that he not only has them, but may in fact be willing to show them.  From ESPN.com…

His team was down 20-3 and he wanted to illustrate how badly they were playing.

So, a 49ers spokesman confirmed, Singletary dropped his pants. The coach was wearing boxers.

The motivational tool was first reported by Arizona radio station XTRA’s Mike Jurecki and The (Santa Rosa, Calif.) Press-Democrat.

“He was just dramatizing how embarrassing it was,” 49ers director of public relations Aaron Salkin told The Press Democrat.

Given that the team did not come out fired up for the second half and lost big, it is hard to imagine how he can top that in future weeks.

Singletary tore into Davis, his incredibly talented tight end, after Davis picked up a showboating personal foul. He yelled at him in front of everyone, forced him to sit, and because that wasn’t good enough, he then kicked Davis off the sideline. Told him to go into the locker room, shower and change out of his uniform, because Davis didn’t deserve to wear it any more. Didn’t deserve to stand on the sideline with his teammates as if he was pulling rope in the same direction as everyone else. Davis was pulling rope in his direction, and Singletary called him on it. After the game, Singletary told the media, “I will not tolerate players that think it’s about them when it’s about the team.”

Shoot, I’m starting to think Singletary overdid it a little bit on Davis. But you know what? Overdoing it is better than the alternative. I’m a father, and people who know would tell you my parenting style errs on the side of discipline. Better to have too much than not enough, right? Better for me, better for my kids, better for everyone. Obviously the perfect amount of discipline — not too hard, not too soft, just right — is the goal. But perfection is impossible, so … go to your room and don’t come out until next Thursday.

That’s what Singletary did to Davis. And it’s what Zorn did to Portis, who seems like a good guy and a better teammate. He’s flaky, with his costumes and blog and occasionally outrageous commentary. That doesn’t make him bad; it makes him interesting. But on Sunday he was a little too flaky for Zorn when he took off a few plays to adjust his helmet, then trotted onto the field — all without letting his coaches know what their best offensive player was doing.

So Zorn found Portis on the sideline and tore into him. By the time Zorn was finished, Portis was hanging his head under a towel. He cares, Clinton Portis. He was mortified. And he won’t forget it, I promise you that. Neither will his teammates. By taking on his best player, Zorn showed the other 52 how it’s going to be. If Portis can’t get away with silly stuff, neither can you, Santana Moss. Or you, Chris Cooley.

Singletary has less traction in San Francisco than Zorn in Washington, because the 49ers aren’t winning. Messages get delivered with more clarity in a winning locker room. Now then, the 49ers could rally around their tough coach and do all the little things right and play with newfound restraint and begin to beat better teams with superior discipline, because discipline equals execution. Or the 49ers could chafe under the pressure and shame of mounting losses and decide Singletary is a mean bully who can’t talk to us like that. And if that happens, Singletary will go. Because the players are everything in the NFL.

In Dallas, Wade Phillips lets Owens be a jackass, and the Cowboys are an underachieving soap opera. In Cincinnati, Marvin Lewis coddled the idiotic Johnson for so long the Bengals lost their direction, and three years after going 11-5 they are halfway to 0-16 with the same core of players. In New York, Tom Coughlin soon will have a decision to make on unraveling Plaxico Burress and that decision will determine whether the Giants become serious threats to repeat as Super Bowl champions.

In Tennessee, the Titans unloaded Pacman Jones and benched Vince Young — two completely different situations, but discipline is at the heart of both — and the Titans, even without their most talented skill player on defense and offense, are 7-0.

It could be a new world order in the NFL.

Unless Singletary and Zorn are the only NFL coaches with testicles. (Source)

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Mike Singletary and the 49ers lost in Singletary’s debut on Sunday.  But that does not mean that they did not make some important progress.  From Ann Killion of the Mercury News…

Singletary’s postgame performance was commanding. His voice rose to a shout at times. He was honest and angry and disappointed. After years of listening to postgame drivel — on either side of the bay — it was riveting. I’m not sure how the players responded, but the notebook wielders were ready to strap on helmets and pads.

The Singletary era has lasted for exactly 60 minutes of football, but already has a defining moment, something you’d be hard pressed to find in the previous regime. With 49 seconds left in the third quarter, tight end Davis caught a pass. At the end of the play Davis reached out — right in front of the official — and slapped Brian Russell on the face mask. Unnecessary roughness.

Singletary yanked him. When Davis came off the field he headed toward Singletary, then tried to run an out route to avoid the coach, who strode over to meet him with angry words. Davis greeted his coach with the classic teenager pose — arms outstretched, mouthing “What? What?”

Davis went to the bench. Singletary went along for more words. A few minutes later Singletary sent Davis to the locker room. Davis headed off, but Singletary yelled at him to come back and get his helmet.

“I will not tolerate players that think it’s about them,” Singletary said. “We cannot make decisions that cost the team and then come off to the sideline and be nonchalant.

More regarding his honest and passion demonstrated in his post game comments on Vernon Davis.

Most coaches would have said it was between the player and the coach, a misunderstanding, a blah-blah-blah. Not Singletary. He was mad. He was honest. He was more interested in accountability than happy talk.

Finally, the bottom line…

That’s the team Singletary inherited. In the remaining half season, he can’t change the roster, the team structure, the general manager or the owners. But he can change the mind set. The culture.

And he made a big step in his first game. (Source)

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I say not much.  From the Seattle Times…

So much for Mike Holmgren’s quiet motorcycle ride into that self-described “sabbatical” next year.

The exiting coach of the skidding Seattle Seahawks had a chance on Wednesday to slam the door on rumors he is a prime candidate to take over his hometown San Francisco 49ers in 2009.

Instead, he left it partially open.

“When I was at Lincoln High School, and for years, that was my dream job. And it never quite came to fruition,” Holmgren said to members of the San Francisco media in a conference call. “But times change and right now, I think it’s been stated … for the 27th time: the plan for me and Kath (wife Kathy) is to take a year off after this time in Seattle. We’ve been here 10 years, and we love it here, and that’s the plan.

“While I’m flattered – we have a lot of friends in the Bay Area – that’s the plan right now.”  (Source, Italics Added)

Art Thiel of the Seattle P-I says the job is too good for Holmgren to pass on.

The bet here is that Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren is highly unlikely to switch sides before the game Sunday in hometown San Francisco against his old team.

With just about the same assurance, here’s the second wager: He’ll be working for the 49ers next year.

For Holmgren, it’s irresistible. Too good to pass up. Chance of a lifetime. When Mikey Comes Marching Home Again, Tra-La, Tra-La.

Next to the Fetish Festival/Herbal Aurapalooza, Holmgren’s return to rescue the 49ers will be the biggest thing to hit San Francisco in years. He’ll get a higher vote total than the 105 percent scheduled to go to Barack Obama.

And regarding the aforementioned “right now” phrase…

Holmgren goosed along the speculation, presumably inadvertently, by saying nothing had changed. For right now.

In fact, by unofficial count in interviews with reporters here Wednesday and in San Francisco by phone, he used the phrase “right now” 12 times.

As in: “I’ll tell you what I said last week: Right now, the plan is to stay with the plan I told you.”

As in: “I’m not going to burden (Kathy, his wife) with that right now.”

In answer to a question as to whether he could envision a day when he came to the 49ers in some capacity, he said, “Well, you know what, if it’s OK with you guys, I’m going to refrain from commenting on that. I think it would be unfair to a lot of people. … It’s too much of a hypothetical. Things in this crazy business change on a day-to-day basis.”

Things do indeed change day to day. That’s why saying “right now” as a qualifier means he could change his mind today or tomorrow or after the season ends. (Source)

Carroll has a great thing going at USC, and it would take a perfect situation — if that — for him to leave. The 49ers job might not be as big a draw as it seems.

First, the 49ers play in the NFL (despite appearances), and winning consistently on that level is much, much harder than it is in college. Carroll annually lures top-shelf talent to USC. He seldom, if ever, faces a team with better players. He doesn’t have to work within the confines of a salary cap or a draft system that punishes winning organizations. College football is littered with coaches who tried the NFL, either failed or didn’t like it, and returned soon after: Nick Saban, Bobby Petrino, Butch Davis, Steve Spurrier, Dennis Erickson, et al.

Second, the 49ers might not offer the total-control opportunity that conceivably could pull Carroll from the college ranks. They have a general manager in Scott McCloughan. Ownership conceivably could fire him, too, but it isn’t as clean a situation as it would have been had Nolan been the coach/GM.

Third, the aforementioned ownership. The York family does not carry the respect in NFL circles that, say, a Bob Kraft or Jeffrey Lurie do. I don’t know whether Carroll knows the Yorks or has a relationship with them, but it’s reasonable to assume he’d want to work with an owner he likes and respects. Plus, the York family already went the college route with Erickson, and that ended badly. (Source)

Who might a better choice be?  At least as a GM, Mike Holmgren?  The buzz from the Seattle-PI…

The perceived answer to everything that continues to ail the franchise, meanwhile, will be standing on the opposite sideline Sunday in the looming — and luminous — presence of Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren.

The buzz in the Bay Area is that the Seahawks’ outgoing coach is just what is needed to massage the mess that has been created by Nolan, and Dennis Erickson before him, as well as owner John York.

Be it as coach, or general manager, or a combination role, it doesn’t matter — just as long as Holmgren is on the horizon after his final season with the Seahawks.

In the San Jose Mercury News on Tuesday, columnist Ann Killion wrote: “Here’s what I’d like to see the Yorks do: Hire Mike Holmgren as the general manager. Holmgren is clearly burnt out as a coach and his lame-duck status has been a disaster in Seattle. In my perfect world, I’d like to see (secondary coach) Jim Mora take over the Seahawks right now so Holmgren can spend some recharging time with his wife, Kathy.”

In the Contra Costa Times, NFL writer Cam Inman offered: “In an ideal scenario, the 49ers play this season out under (interim coach Mike) Singletary, show progress and gain momentum for a fresh start in 2009 under different leadership. Ideally, they bring in Mike Holmgren to either coach or oversee the football operations (a la Bill Parcells’ role with the Miami Dolphins).” (Source)

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Ray Ratto of the San Francisco Chronicle thinks that the 49er front office blew it…again…by letting Mike Nolan go when they did.  It was not that he deserved to keep his job, but that waiting would have made more sense.

The results speak for themselves, and apparently beating Seattle on Sunday wouldn’t change that. The near-universal clamor for Nolan’s head finally had caused John York to face a fact he chose not to consider in the offseason.

But choosing Monday rather than the bye week to make the change suggests that this was a knee-jerk decision based on public dissatisfaction rather than a measured plan for the future. In other words, same as it ever was.

Choosing Mike Singletary rather than Mike Martz to replace Nolan has its intriguing side – Martz’s brain exploding in frustration as he learns he is not going to be on the fast track to his next head-coaching job immediately comes to mind. But given that Singletary has not been a head coach before, common sense suggests that he could have used the extra week for preparation.

Instead, because the Yorks were in such an all-fired hurry to get Nolan off their plates after being so fiercely loyal to him in January, Singletary has not been put in position to do his best work right away. Hell, even Al Davis knew when to fire Lane Kiffin, and he’d wanted to do it for months.

This is the theme that runs through the 49ers’ administration – it has a spectacularly lousy sense of timing.

And finally…

For those of you who wanted Nolan gone at all costs, congratulations. You win. Only once again, you lose, because Nolan is merely the sneeze that leads a clever diagnostician to the pneumonia above. The real problem remains: the complete and utter absence of a sensible and unifying vision for the franchise. (Source)

Forbes Magazine released a list of sports’ 10 franchises that are most likely to move. Mixed in among old standbys such as the Florida Marlins and Minnesota Vikings are … your San Francisco For Now 49ers!

Now, the 49ers have made no threat to move, and the Forbes list is highly speculative. But the man building a stadium in Los Angeles mentions the 49ers as one of eight possibilities, and questions will linger until there’s a stadium deal up here, and how’s that coming anyway?

Forbes being about money, the list is based on team valuations (they estimate the 49ers rank 30th in the NFL at $865 million), annual revenues (they’re 31st), the quality of the venue and the terms by which teams occupy it. Market size also factors in, leading the magazine to conclude that the Bay Area isn’t big enough for the 49ers and Raiders.

“The Raiders’ more passionate fan base makes them more likely to stay,” the writeup says. Is that the more passionate fan base that doesn’t buy tickets or the more passionate fan base that generates lower TV ratings? Hard to tell. We agree that the 49ers would have an easier time finding greener pastures, but for a different reason. Could you imagine anyone doing a $1 billion stadium deal with Al Davis?