Is Harbaugh the best coach we've had since Seifert?

Originally posted by thedude:

Originally posted by dj43:
Seifert was very good. Walsh called him one of the best defensive minds he had ever seen.

Perhaps Seifert's greatest strength (and one Nolan/Singletary lacked) was the ability and the will to turn over the offense to guys like Shanahan and stay out of their way. Still, like Steve Young, he will never get his just here due because he followed a legend who turned around a bumbling franchise. Walsh followed a couple of total incompetents named McCulley and Meyer where Seifert followed Walsh. Seifert was a very good caretaker and was smart enough to not mess with the winning formula.

Harbaugh is more in the position of Walsh and will likely get crazy support in this thread because of the contrast between him and Nolan/Sing. I have no problem with that as I see Harbaugh making many good decisions, not only in game planning and play calling, but in recognition of talent. Does that make him better than Seifert? I don't know. It is too soon to tell...and I don't really care as long as the team continues to improve.

Very good points, Harbaugh is in a better situation than Seifert because he's not following a legend - but he's also inheriting a team with a history and culture of losing and turning them around overnight. Harbaugh has a ways to go (and probably needs a ring before this becomes a true comparison). But when I see the talent we had in the early 90's it still frustrates me we couldn't ever get past the Cowboys and Packers except for one year when we just signed every name in free agency. Regardless, I agree with your last point - doesn't matter as long as we keep winning...and discussing this is a hell of a lot funner than comparing Singletary to Erickson!

Agree with your post. Ready to enjoy the ride to see where and how far Harbaugh will take us

I can't believe the lack of respect of some people here for George. Apart from two rings and continuing to be a perennial contender despite Plan B free agency being specifically made to weaken teams like us, he was the DC for Walsh's great teams of the 80s as well. He was an awesome coach, and had we not choked the 90 NFC championship and robbed of the 92 one, he might very well have 4 rings right now. Was he as innovative as Walsh? No. But he was a wonderful HC and I miss those days.

Marriucci, Nolan, Singletary...I'd say yes, he is a better head coach than those guys.

Originally posted by paulk205:
I can't believe the lack of respect of some people here for George. Apart from two rings and continuing to be a perennial contender despite Plan B free agency being specifically made to weaken teams like us, he was the DC for Walsh's great teams of the 80s as well. He was an awesome coach, and had we not choked the 90 NFC championship and robbed of the 92 one, he might very well have 4 rings right now. Was he as innovative as Walsh? No. But he was a wonderful HC and I miss those days.

People over simplify things - they think someone just needs to show up because Walsh built a system. But look what the happened to the Raiders after Gruden left - they had a successful system he built there too. They went down the tubes after a year.

People forget that when Seifert's team won a Superbowl, it was several years removed from Walsh, and a much different team as far as players.

Originally posted by paulk205:

I can't believe the lack of respect of some people here for George. Apart from two rings and continuing to be a perennial contender despite Plan B free agency being specifically made to weaken teams like us, he was the DC for Walsh's great teams of the 80s as well. He was an awesome coach, and had we not choked the 90 NFC championship and robbed of the 92 one, he might very well have 4 rings right now. Was he as innovative as Walsh? No. But he was a wonderful HC and I miss those days.

How does thinking Harbaugh may be better equate to a lack of respect? Seifert was a great coordinator and helped in the creation of an amazing team. He was then able to benefit himself from that pool of talent as the HC and no question he was a very good one, but his record with Carolina leaves doubt in the mind.

I don't consider I fail to respect George by speculating that Harbaugh's amazing turnaround of a not untalented but very poorly performing team, with practically no preparation time, may well end with him being ranked eventually beneath only Bill Walsh in the pantheon.

Siefert was an average HC and an excellent Defensive Coach. He inherited a great Bill Walsh team.

He made bone-head decisions after bone-headed coaching decisions. Against the Giants in the playoff game - giving it to Craig to run instead of Rathman who never if ever fumbled. Result - Craig fumbles and the Giants win on a field goal.

Against the Packers in the playoffs - having a guy with a cast on his arm/hand receive [can't remember if a punt or kick-off] and he fumbled. Result - the packers scored and won the game.

Siefert was NOT a good head coach.

Seifert can't be blamed for letting a star runner carry the ball!

At the time, following Walsh, I thought he was a fine caretaker, but when things started to decline he didn't seem to have the vision to change it up or innovate any more.

Every other coach who came in afterwards was an overly conservative, standard issue coach. Even Mooch, who was touted as this innovative and aggressive guy. None of them brought anything different or made the team better than the personnel.

Singletary was just horrid in every respect. Likely the worst coach in history. Not his fault. He said what he was going to do and so was also the worst hire ever.

I think it is clear, even this early on, that JH is far and away the best of the bunch since Walsh. Instead of having grown men wrestle on Nutjob Hill, he provided formations and plays to let them succeed at actual football. He got a team that most people felt lacked talent to perform at a level pretty much equal to the best, and he did this practically overnight.

He could fall at some point, but I think he is the Redneck Walsh at this point and we can only wonder what will happen when some of the weaker positions are upgraded and the team has a whole year of exposure to the system.

Pinning Roger's fumble on Siefert is a new one. Shall we pin the pathetic capitulations of 86 and (particularly) 87 on Walsh, too?

Of course we won't. It's an incredible tribute to BOTH coaches that we expected to win it all for 18 years and evidence how tough it actually is to win 5 rings in this league.

To English: I never equated thinking Harbaugh is better as disrespectful to Siefert. It's direct statements like "he was an average HC" or just plain "Siefert sucked" (a few pages back) that shocked me.

We are annoyed that we lost all those championship games (I still insist we were $%$%ing robbed in 92) and never give him credit for turning out the championship calibre team year after year. We are indignant (rightly) for the 83 interference calls, but we conveniently forget the 86 & 87 chokes

And why do we care so much about how he did at Carolina? Other multi-championship winning coaches have screwed up too (Bellichick famously, Gibbs redux etc etc). While George was here he gave us a perennial contender and two rings - and the argument that he inherited Walsh's team doesn't apply any more in 94, nor does the fact that we scooped up all those FAs that year (the usual excuse given by Sour Grape Troy Aikman all the time) invalidate his achievement. If signing up expensive FAs is all that's required, the Skins would have 10 rings by now

Its amazing that he is doing exactly what Singletary wanted to do all along, just in a whole different way; i think he is the best HC since Walsh and its not even close. Walsh, with the teams Seifert had, would have won 3 more super bowls

I'm still not ready to anoint Harbaugh yet but what he's done thus far is extremely impressive. He's a players coach, a leader, Xs and Os guy. We'll find out how good he is when adversity hits. I love his creativity on the offensive end though. Nice to see us keeping the offense guessing.

I think Seifert gets a bum rap. Yea he inherited a stacked team and winning situation, but it's still no easy task following a football genius like Walsh and being successful, much less winning 2 Super Bowls. And the '94 team, at least on the defensive end, was far different than what he inherited in '89.

Mooch was solid but looking back was kind of soft i thought. Loved him as a coach but in hindsight, we should've won at least 1 Super Bowl with those teams.

Then you get into the lost decade. Erickson was a joke and should've never been hired. Nolan was just an ass who thought he was better than he really was. Singletary was your typical cheerleader coach who thought he could win games with fiery lockerroom speeches and positive encouragement.

Originally posted by djfullshred:
People over simplify things - they think someone just needs to show up because Walsh built a system. But look what the happened to the Raiders after Gruden left - they had a successful system he built there too. They went down the tubes after a year.

People forget that when Seifert's team won a Superbowl, it was several years removed from Walsh, and a much different team as far as players.

Originally posted by djfullshred:

Originally posted by paulk205:
I can't believe the lack of respect of some people here for George. Apart from two rings and continuing to be a perennial contender despite Plan B free agency being specifically made to weaken teams like us, he was the DC for Walsh's great teams of the 80s as well. He was an awesome coach, and had we not choked the 90 NFC championship and robbed of the 92 one, he might very well have 4 rings right now. Was he as innovative as Walsh? No. But he was a wonderful HC and I miss those days.

People over simplify things - they think someone just needs to show up because Walsh built a system. But look what the happened to the Raiders after Gruden left - they had a successful system he built there too. They went down the tubes after a year.

People forget that when Seifert's team won a Superbowl, it was several years removed from Walsh, and a much different team as far as players.

Agree with both of these posts. It's disgusting the lack of respect Seifert gets. People are acting as if coaches come in ALL the time and keep a successful system going. More often than not, dynasties crumble when someone like Walsh leaves. They certainly don't win multiple Super Bowls. They don't keep the team a perennial Super Bowl contender almost 10 years after the person that built the system left. How long did it take the Giants to crumble after Parcells left? How long did it take for the Redskins to crumble after Joe Gibbs left? Look at what Barry Switzer did to Jimmy Johnson's Cowboys. And BTW, in the case of the Giants/Redskins, the new head coaches were promoted from within. It's because of Seifert's run on top of what Walsh had already accomplished that made the 49ers the greatest dynasty. Teams have done what the 49ers of the 80s did before (basically being a dynasty in one decade). For Seifert to have continue it into the 90s was unprecedented.

With that being said, Harbaugh has to show some more before I put him ahead of Seifert.

Disrespectful.

Also, didn't Seifert lose Steve Beurlein for the season, leaving him to start rookie QB named Chris Weinke? He got a bad deal in Carolina. Similar to what Mooch got in Detroit.

Originally posted by LasVegasWally:
Siefert was an average HC and an excellent Defensive Coach. He inherited a great Bill Walsh team.

He made bone-head decisions after bone-headed coaching decisions. Against the Giants in the playoff game - giving it to Craig to run instead of Rathman who never if ever fumbled. Result - Craig fumbles and the Giants win on a field goal.

Against the Packers in the playoffs - having a guy with a cast on his arm/hand receive [can't remember if a punt or kick-off] and he fumbled. Result - the packers scored and won the game.

Siefert was NOT a good head coach.

You are really reaching when you put indiviudal contributer mistakes like those on a head coach. There was no reason not to trust Craig wuld get the job done. This is revisionist critiquing of player mistakes.

Originally posted by djfullshred:
People over simplify things - they think someone just needs to show up because Walsh built a system. But look what the happened to the Raiders after Gruden left - they had a successful system he built there too. They went down the tubes after a year.

People forget that when Seifert's team won a Superbowl, it was several years removed from Walsh, and a much different team as far as players.

You are talking about his second superbowl-but agree...his first however was right after Walsh retired after winning one.

mooch was a good enough coach but he was ultimately a p***y that let T.O. go apes**t and destroy the leadership of the team. i blame mooch and donahues dumbass for the fall of the niners. erickson had no chance, nolan was a double talking snake and singletary was a good man with absolutely nothing to offer in terms of being a head coach. Harbaugh will return us to the promised land and it looks like its gonna be sooner than we all expected!!!