A thought on Singletary and where we are...

We all know that there are several things that have gone into the rebirth of this team. The hiring of Harbaugh, the promotion of Baalke, the superior drafting (both with Baalke and before he took the lead), the selective signings of quality free agents, etc. That said, I wonder if there has been an almost perfect storm in the fact that Mike Singletary preceded our current coach. Here me out...

Singletary is a big believer in the old style, smath-mouth game and thought that just being meaner and stronger would lead to wins. We all know, after watching countless games of our team floundering while trying to "run it up the gut" and winning the battle of attrition, that his theory didn't work without proper schemes and adjustments. This is one of the many areas where Singletary failed, as he just couldn't comprehend the "X's and O's" of the game and implement any type of real game plan for either side of the ball.

But, I wonder if Big Mike might have had a larger part in the 49er rebirth than he really gets credit for. We all know the influence that he had on V. Davis, and look at where that guy is now..one of the, if not the best, TEs in the league. However, I remember watching our 9ers in the 2009 and 2010 seasons and being amazed at the physicallity that they displayed, especially on defense. I really believe that Singletary instilled that philosophy with this team (or at least the guys who were there at the time...Willis, Goldson, Smith, Sopagoa, McDonald, Brooks, etc.) and that Harbaugh's vision has meshed perfectly with it. Harbaugh is just that much better at defining an offensive and defensive scheme (along with Roman and Fangio) and knowing how to coach instead of motivate.

For all it's worth, I think when it is all said and done, we all may owe Singletary a little bit more than just being glad he is gone. I think he had an effect on this locker room, and Harbaugh has harnessed that and really turned it into a winner.

I get it. He left a better framework for Harbs to work with than if he had tried to, for example, emulate an air-it-out finesse team with defense as an afterthought

Singletary is a great leader of men, but he is an awful football coach.

I give a lot of credit to him where it's due. Vernon Davis is becoming great, and he would never have done that if not for Singletary putting him in his place. Sing also made Alex Boone his pet project. Same for Ahmad Brooks. He took three talented players with severe motivational and personal issues and helped push them into being really good players, maybe even great for Boone and Brooks.

Jimmy Raye, though. I mean, Jimmy Raye. That and the debacle that was "whichever QB yells at me the loudest gets to stay in the game for another quarter", it's just obvious he isn't cut out to be a HC without allowing the OC and DC to complete control gameplans. Great guy, legend, did great things for this team, but it's a good thing he isn't the HC anymore.

He would probably be amazing as a HC at the college level though. Perfect place to mold young people and to get away with a halfway decent understanding of X and O's

dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Originally posted by jreff22:
dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Why? Patrick Willis even brought up a teaching moment of Singletary telling him to just "run over" Larry Allen instead of trying to run around him. The guy did a lot for this team, and although he was a bad coach, there are plenty of starters on the current team who wouldn't be here today without him.

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:
dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Why? Patrick Willis even brought up a teaching moment of Singletary telling him to just "run over" Larry Allen instead of trying to run around him. The guy did a lot for this team, and although he was a bad coach, there are plenty of starters on the current team who wouldn't be here today without him.

He damn near killed this team and treated Alex like a f**king neighborhood slam pig. I give him credit for getting Vernon's head out of his ass, that's about it.

Originally posted by jreff22:

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:
dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Why? Patrick Willis even brought up a teaching moment of Singletary telling him to just "run over" Larry Allen instead of trying to run around him. The guy did a lot for this team, and although he was a bad coach, there are plenty of starters on the current team who wouldn't be here today without him.

He damn near killed this team and treated Alex like a f**king neighborhood slam pig. I give him credit for getting Vernon's head out of his ass, that's about it.

What he did with Alex and his gameplans were messed up, thats true. Almost ruined Alex. You still can't take away all he did for Patrick Willis, VD, Alex Boone and Ahmad Brooks, let alone giving Bowman the start over Spikes and recognizing that. He was just out of his depth.

Give credit where credit is due.

Originally posted by jreff22:

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:
dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Why? Patrick Willis even brought up a teaching moment of Singletary telling him to just "run over" Larry Allen instead of trying to run around him. The guy did a lot for this team, and although he was a bad coach, there are plenty of starters on the current team who wouldn't be here today without him.

He damn near killed this team and treated Alex like a f**king neighborhood slam pig. I give him credit for getting Vernon's head out of his ass, that's about it.

Point taken. He was a horrible HC and was lost as far as how to scheme a game. That's not my point...my point is he MAY have had a pretty large part of how this team plays their games, week to week. I am not at all saying he is worthy of notability for what he did, only that he really may have complimented what Harbaugh is doing very well.

I give him credit for the overall toughness of the team. I'll give him credit where it's due.I don't think this team has the same tough mindset if not for him. Harb would bring that toughness, but Singletary probably made his job a bit easier by instilling that attitude already.

I'm glad he's gone though and I don't really like him being brought up. We should have been in the playoffs a LONG time ago and we spent 2 or 3 years spinning our wheels b/c of bad coaching. He was a good motivator and probably a good Linebacker coach, but as a head coach he was terrible and caused us to go through more losing than was necessary.

Just another coach that became a casualty of Alex the coachkiller...

the one thing i can thank singletary for is getting fired so we could get harbaugh.

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:
dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Why? Patrick Willis even brought up a teaching moment of Singletary telling him to just "run over" Larry Allen instead of trying to run around him. The guy did a lot for this team, and although he was a bad coach, there are plenty of starters on the current team who wouldn't be here today without him.

He damn near killed this team and treated Alex like a f**king neighborhood slam pig. I give him credit for getting Vernon's head out of his ass, that's about it.

What he did with Alex and his gameplans were messed up, thats true. Almost ruined Alex. You still can't take away all he did for Patrick Willis, VD, Alex Boone and Ahmad Brooks, let alone giving Bowman the start over Spikes and recognizing that. He was just out of his depth.

Give credit where credit is due.

As a linebacker coach (all he should ever be) he did a great job. He never gave Bowman the nod, that didn't happen until 2011. The drafting of Boone would not be a credit for Sing...he didn't do it.

The only notable things he did was fixed up vernon davis.... yeah thats it

Originally posted by jreff22:

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:

Originally posted by shawny:

Originally posted by jreff22:
dont want to see that guys name in ninertalk ever again

Why? Patrick Willis even brought up a teaching moment of Singletary telling him to just "run over" Larry Allen instead of trying to run around him. The guy did a lot for this team, and although he was a bad coach, there are plenty of starters on the current team who wouldn't be here today without him.

He damn near killed this team and treated Alex like a f**king neighborhood slam pig. I give him credit for getting Vernon's head out of his ass, that's about it.

What he did with Alex and his gameplans were messed up, thats true. Almost ruined Alex. You still can't take away all he did for Patrick Willis, VD, Alex Boone and Ahmad Brooks, let alone giving Bowman the start over Spikes and recognizing that. He was just out of his depth.

Give credit where credit is due.

As a linebacker coach (all he should ever be) he did a great job. He never gave Bowman the nod, that didn't happen until 2011. The drafting of Boone would not be a credit for Sing...he didn't do it.

Not the drafting of Boone, no one drafted Boone. What Singletary did to get him to start to realize his potential.

"He picked San Francisco because the offensive-line coach at the time, Chris Foerster, had lobbied to take Boone with the 49ers' final pick – they went with defensive lineman Ricky Jean Francois instead – and because the head coach was Mike Singletary.Soon after Boone arrived in Santa Clara, Singletary pulled him aside, locked onto him with his owlish eyes and told him, "You're getting on the wagon or you're getting the hell out."

It was the kick Boone needed.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/17/4733711/fighting-to-play-sober-alex-boone.html#storylink=cpy"

Originally posted by gold49digger:
The only notable things he did was fixed up vernon davis.... yeah thats it

VD, Boone, Brooks and Willis are all people that have been documented as having Singletary kick their ass into gear or give them extra teaching to make them reach their potential (obviously no one ever needed to give Willis a kick in the ass, but to point him in the right direction as far as technique goes). That doesn't count for anyone else he helped that may not have been documented in public.

He was an AWFUL HC, and he almost ruined Alex Smith, but he did a lot of good things and he should be commended for helping us be where we are now.