The San Francisco 49ers are trailing the Miami Dolphins, and as they close in on a franchise-record 10-game losing streak, it appears to be every man for himself. Each week, the game announcers get a chance to talk with players, coaches, and front office personnel from both teams. It is probably not a coincidence that we are hearing more and more from the announcers during the game attempting to defend general manager Trent Baalke.
We’ve heard this kind of stuff before from the Chris Myers/Ronde Barber team, and now we can add Thom Brennaman’s crew. The FOX announcers got into a discussion about the state of the 49ers, and lead announcer Thom Brennaman had some “interesting” comments. He pointed to the team’s struggles and having fewer wins than the Jim Tomsula-coached 49ers. He also pointed out that, “a lot of people that follow the 49ers” think the 49ers is better aside from the various injuries.
That was followed by analyst Chris Spielman suggesting Chip Kelly and Trent Baalke are not on the same page. The other analyst, Charles Davis, pointed to the problems at the quarterback position.
I don’t know who is leaking what, but somebody (or somebodies) is putting this out there. And it only makes the 49ers look like more of a laughing stock than we already knew the current organization to be.
Here is a transcript of their comments from late in the third quarter. That is followed by further comments in the fourth quarter.
Thom Brennaman: Harbaugh fired after an 8-8 season. Jim Tomsula brought in. And many are wondering, how bad was Tomsula now? I mean, they won five games. This year, they’ve won one. And there are a lot of people that follow the 49ers that will tell you that their roster, outside of some key injuries on defense, but those have come recently, that was a better roster this year than the one they had last year. So ultimately, what does that mean for the general manager, who by the way has been here for all three of those coaches, in Trent Baalke and the one-year head coach, at least so far, Chip Kelly.
Chris Spielman: I don’t know if Chip and Trent are on the same page. We talked about Chip saying to [inaudible], you know, we’re only built to run the ball. In other words, they need to get skill and get better out on the edges in my opinion.
Charles Davis: And don’t forget how this season began. Remember Kaepernick got benched last year. Blaine Gabbert became the quarterback, but Blaine Gabbert did not turn out to be the world-beater at quarterback…In this league, you don’t have a quarterback, you’re not gonna win a heck of a lot of games. And that’s where they’ve been. They’ve been hurting at the QB position.
And then from late in the 4th quarter:
Thom Brennaman to Chris Spielman: Your brother is a General Manager with the Minnesota Vikings, Rick Spielman, been there a number of years and obviously done an outstanding job. That job right now for Trent Baalke, it’s got to be pretty tenuous, I would assume right now.
Chris Spielman: Well, here’s the thing, and I don't know what their relationship is, but I know for any successful program or team, the GM and the Head Coach have to be on the same page and egos cannot be involved. So whatever that is, they need to get to it.
Charles Davis: Don’t forget, it’s their first year together deciding direction.