Are we seeing a horribly managed free agency? Or something bigger?

Originally posted by Oakland-Niner:

Originally posted by BrianGO:
They are simply not going to overpay for players. I don't see what is so confusing about this.

Its like watching the first part of a marathon and seeing some amateur runner sprint out way far into the lead just so he can be on TV. The webzone would of course cheer him on, saying things like, "Now THATS a winner!", "HE has a commitment to excellence!", "He really CARES about winning!".

Of course, 30 min later, when the Kenyans have their legs warmed up, the tired idiot who sprinted into the lead for short term glory gets passes up by dozens of runners.

UNLESS you feel you have a shot at the Super Bowl, sprinting to the lead while sacrificing the rest of the marathon is simply idiotic. The point is to win the race, not to show off for 30 min and then get passed up by the crowd.

A losing team has to build through the draft, and look for bargains in free agency. When that team makes it to the playoffs, all of a sudden, free agents start to look and think, "Wow, they have really improved." And they are more likely to want to sign with a team on the rise. Then you can overspend, and try to win a championship.

I dont disagree with what you're saying, but I would like to add a couple of things. First, because we haven't produced a winnig record in eight years we will have to over pay for any "percieved" quality FA. The only way we can go cheap or find a deal is if we grab a guy trying to resurrect his career, ala Walt Harris/Mike Lewis. Second, even if you dont think we should "over pay," at some point you have to upgrade and spend some money. I woke up this morning thinking about the fact we will be fielding Haralson and Brooks, Spencer and T.Brown, Smith and Spillman. Honestly, we can't go into the season like that. At some point you got to shell out some money, because the fans (us) deserve it. It would be one thing if we just came off a playoff birth, but we haven't had enough success for the FO to be like, "screw it, we are rebuilding. We dont care about the 2012 record."

While we might be waiting for 'deals and steals', the one player we should not be waiting on is a Center. That person needs to be in camp when Alex gets in so they can get on the same page. I don't see any urgency around this and Adam Snyder is not going to do the trick. Personally, I don't see this as a plan, it is just plain stupid.

We're seeing year one of the Harbaulke plan. Good luck figuring out what that is because the new regime is going the Belichick route as far as releasing information. We're going to have to see a pattern to figure out the new M.O. and that's going to take a while . . . like two full seasons.

Originally posted by SonocoNinerFan:
We're seeing year one of the Harbaulke plan. Good luck figuring out what that is because the new regime is going the Belichick route as far as releasing information. We're going to have to see a pattern to figure out the new M.O. and that's going to take a while . . . like two full seasons.

I wish I could fall asleep and wake up two years from now.

Originally posted by SanDiego49er:
We are horribly managed and it is a plan. The move for Harbaugh was to placate the fan base. They do this every so often. Like Clements when we signed him too. They have to make it seem like they are trying. But lots of other teams shelled out top dollar for top FA's this offseason and are very aggressive. And we could be too. But we don't want to be. We want to save money. When FA started they said they weren't going to be major players. So they told people where they stand. But it wasn't like we were great and couldn't improve a lot. We were in fact bad.

I with u on this!! also with a new stadium in the works, players not wanting to live in the bay area, the economy and everything being so political who knows when or if our team will ever be great again!!!

im curious were the talk of us "being cheap" this year comes from. dont we have to spend like 99% of the cap this year per the new CBA?

and i aslo believe that JH has a plan with the draft and FA. unlike the last few HC/GMs who drafted players with individual stats completly indpendent of what worked with the team for fit into any plan they may have had.

we niner fans have been without a plan for so long that i feel we may not reconize one when we see it.....

[ Edited by 4t9ers on Jul 30, 2011 at 07:39:52 ]

Originally posted by 4t9ers:

we niner fans have been without a plan for so long that i feel we may not reconize one when we see it.....

Most sensible thing wrote on the zone this week

If we were in the NFC championship game last year I would agree with this. A big name free agent only makes sense if you are one player from possibly reaching the Super Bowl. Jets and Eagles, I can understand, us? Dumb move. How do so many not see Nnamdi as a repeat of Clements? Clements disappointment isn't that he can't play at all but, that his isn't what we payed for (the best corner in the league). We made FA splashes many years ago (or maybe trades can't recall) to get Fred Dean and Deon Sanders to put us over the hump and into the SB.

I'd be a lot more enthusiastic about this offseason if we hadn't pursued Nnamdi & others. I'm fine with "blowing it up", but our pursuit of him and some of the other bigger FA's make me question whether or not we're actually trying to do that.

It's also disappointing to feel like we're going through this process yet again. I'd call it "rebuilding", but that implies that something was built there in the first place. But I do understand it if that's in fact what we're doing.

Originally posted by LA9erFan:
I'd be a lot more enthusiastic about this offseason if we hadn't pursued Nnamdi & others. I'm fine with "blowing it up", but our pursuit of him and some of the other bigger FA's make me question whether or not we're actually trying to do that.

It's also disappointing to feel like we're going through this process yet again. I'd call it "rebuilding", but that implies that something was built there in the first place. But I do understand it if that's in fact what we're doing.

Love the start of your second paragraph.

We don't know how aggressive we were in pursuing Nnamdi. Those leaks to reporters were coming from his agent to try and get the best deal for his client. I like Kawakami's take on the offseason so far. He suggests that we weren't on the phone right away, but when Nnamdi didn't sign immediately, perhaps some inquiries were made. Why not make a call.

He further discusses each move or non-move so far, and each one makes sense, when you take them individually. It's when you add them all up, that you realize there is a lot of work to be done. This goes back to the OP's point. Looks like the plan is to take some lumps this year, but it serve us better in the long haul. And who knows, we've had our share of bad bounces in the last few years, maybe some start to go our way.

Nobody thought much of Tampa Bay last year either.....

I am not going to judge until the end of the season....

Who knows? Culliver could end up being our Nnamdi

I don
t know and niether do any of you.... The NFL is a fickle thing

Originally posted by LA9erFan:
I'd be a lot more enthusiastic about this offseason if we hadn't pursued Nnamdi & others. I'm fine with "blowing it up", but our pursuit of him and some of the other bigger FA's make me question whether or not we're actually trying to do that.

It's also disappointing to feel like we're going through this process yet again. I'd call it "rebuilding", but that implies that something was built there in the first place. But I do understand it if that's in fact what we're doing.

Going after all good FAs should be a pattern...but stopping when teams get rediculous in the bidding is part of a good pattern. They will likely get their FAs at their price.

As far as rebuilding goes, when you bring in a new GM/HC and systems (both O and D) it is rebuilding. What went on in the Singletary years was tinkering with what Nolan had put in place. Both the D and the O regressed last year and if they hadn't stopped and changed directions can you imagine how bad it would have become?

Originally posted by LA9erFan:
I'd be a lot more enthusiastic about this offseason if we hadn't pursued Nnamdi & others. I'm fine with "blowing it up", but our pursuit of him and some of the other bigger FA's make me question whether or not we're actually trying to do that.

It's also disappointing to feel like we're going through this process yet again. I'd call it "rebuilding", but that implies that something was built there in the first place. But I do understand it if that's in fact what we're doing.

How much of the pursuit of Nnamdi was media generated? My understanding is that he, Nnamdi, appeared to reach out to the Niners, expressing an interest in staying in the Bay area. They'd have been foolish to ignore him, but when it became apparent that they were just being used as a tool to drive up the market, they walked away.

As for going "through this process once again" its inevitable, isn't it? Teams change every year. Teams with new coaches change even more. The changes are compressed in time this year due to the lockout, so we have less time to reflect on them as fans.

Change can be good or bad, and at least initially, any change can be disruptive. From what little we've seen of Harbaugh so far, the HC change looks like it will be a good one, as we all anticipated.

Let's let the dust settle on the new CBA and see what the new season brings. I'm not calling it "rebuilding," I'm calling it "progress."

Originally posted by 49erFaithful6:

Originally posted by BrianGO:
They are simply not going to overpay for players. I don't see what is so confusing about this.

Its like watching the first part of a marathon and seeing some amateur runner sprint out way far into the lead just so he can be on TV. The webzone would of course cheer him on, saying things like, "Now THATS a winner!", "HE has a commitment to excellence!", "He really CARES about winning!".

Of course, 30 min later, when the Kenyans have their legs warmed up, the tired idiot who sprinted into the lead for short term glory gets passes up by dozens of runners.

UNLESS you feel you have a shot at the Super Bowl, sprinting to the lead while sacrificing the rest of the marathon is simply idiotic. The point is to win the race, not to show off for 30 min and then get passed up by the crowd.

A losing team has to build through the draft, and look for bargains in free agency. When that team makes it to the playoffs, all of a sudden, free agents start to look and think, "Wow, they have really improved." And they are more likely to want to sign with a team on the rise. Then you can overspend, and try to win a championship.

so true....

Winner. You've got Niner Talk pegged.

We cut Nate Clements because he's being paid 10 million dollars more than he's worth, then missed out on Aso and Joseph. Both of those guys went to better teams. Yeah it sucks but until organization makes signs of turning the corner we're going to miss out on these guys time and time again.

Get over it. Still plenty of guys available to salvage the offseason, and no one in the West is running away right now.

Originally posted by JustMike:
In just a few short days, we all went from being happy that football is back, to bickering over the front office and this free agency. But instead of seeing this as a failure as some have suggested, maybe this is the plan.
Maybe this teams personel is very much all wrong for the kind of team Harbaugh and co. are wanting to build. We have had nearly a decade of horrible to mediocre football, instead of trying to build little by little and trying to turn a group of players 180 degrees, why not blow it up and build from scratch?
If you think about it, it actually makes a lot of the moves, thus far, add up:
Alex Smith: better a vet with little chance to succeed take the lumps during the mass transition.
Releasing some vets: out with the old and in with youth, to be trained in their earliest stages of there careers.

This is my thinking, it may be flawed or right on the money. I think its a risky move and I am for it, I would rather this team set itself up for a long stretch of success than a inconsistant run with lots of bumps in the road.

What do you people think?

This has been going on for a decade. Why are fans so willing to accept another rebuild?