Happy New Year, 49ers fans! The San Francisco 49ers will face off against the Seattle Seahawks, and for the third straight season, there are heavy rumors that the head coach is on his way out the door. Two years ago, Jim Harbaugh was rumored to be heading to Michigan, and shortly after the game, the team announced the two sides had “mutually parted ways.” Last year, Jim Tomsula’s reign as head coach was more or less a wasted year, and he was fired shortly after the team’s season finale. This year, Adam Schefter is reporting head coach Chip Kelly and GM Trent Baalke are both expected to be fired.
MMQB editor Peter King offered up this factoid about the 49ers potential decision to fire Kelly.
For the record, per NFL Record&Fact Book, no NFL team in the last 30 years has fired coaches after one season two years in a row.
— Peter King (@SI_PeterKing) January 1, 2017
49ers beat writer Matt Barrows replied to him with this bit of information:
@SI_PeterKing Last team to do it was SF #49ers in 1977 and 1978. Hired some guy named "Walsh" in 1979.
— Matt Barrows (@mattbarrows) January 1, 2017
I am not holding my breath for the 49ers to begin their next dynasty in a similar vein, but it is at least moderately interesting. And one heck of a way for my New Years to go down. Thankfully Jennifer Chan was around to get the breaking news. I was literally sitting down for dinner when she texted me asking if I had the Schefter news. A quick Twitter search later, and she was able to take care of it. But that’s certainly one way to ring out the year.
And so, for the third straight season, we head into the final game of the year expecting the head coach to be fired. The 49ers are in a tailspin as a football organization. They have no direction, and it is hard to see much in the way of leadership from the front office. Maybe they pull a rabbit out of the hat, and find a great football mind to run everything. Or, maybe things continue down the path we have seen for most of the Yorks tenure. They hit a home run with Jim Harbaugh, but have mostly struck out the rest of the time. It is hard to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Jed York is expected to meet with the media once the season ends, and if they fire Kelly and Baalke after Sunday’s game, I imagine the press conference happens in the middle of the coming week. We’ll hear more from York about how they’re going to find the right hire, and it will be more of the usual BS. I would hope he won’t play the “hold me accountable” card because thus far that’s been proven to be mostly nonsense. And so, we’ll wait and see how the organization decides to fill the football operations and coaching staff side of things. They don’t get they benefit of the doubt, and so we are left to just wait and see what happens.