It seems like every week we go into this approval rating, something happens that gives folks pause about Mike Singletary, and something else happens that gives fans further reason to support Singletary. Coming out of this past weekend, that little equation has gotten a bit harder to even out (or view in a positive light). Over at ESPN.com, they ran their weekly coaches' ratings and Singletary is down to a career low 84%. It's impressive that he's been at such a high rating, but given the path of his head coaching career, it's a number that has to be taken in a specific context.
As we look at Sunday's game, Florida Danny had an especially pertinent comment in the recap thread.
point #2 is that this game was nolan-esque from a coaching perspective. all those delays and wasted timeouts were pretty nolan-esque. what’s really a disgrace though is that the performance we saw today was based on two week’s-worth of preparation. how does a team have 2 weeks to prepare for a game, and come out as flat and unprepared as the 49ers did today? again, nolan-esque.
During and immediately after the game, two camps seemed to develop. There is one that viewed the performance as very much Nolan-esque. They viewed the delays and wasted timeouts as sitting on the coach's shoulders in the game management aspect of his job. Danny's own language pointed to the frustrations that developed under Mike Nolan. At that point folks were quick to jump on Nolan.
The other camp looks at some of the issues as having more to do with Alex Smith's rustiness. He might be in game shape physically, but he needs some time to get the mental side of the game completely back and going. I think one of the Texans fans in the recap or game thread was talking about that and I think some folks latched onto that theory. Does anybody agree on this? Always fun to be able to mix the QB discussion into every possible thread, right?
So, the team has fallen to .500 and faces a tough stretch of games with a new starting QB. Do you approve of Mike Singletary's work at this point? We'll also be back later this week with the Jimmy Raye approval rating.