Firing Mike Singletary Is a Huge Mistake for San Francisco 49ers

The Yorks’ effort to see the San Francisco 49ers remain in the cellar continues.

There is no doubt the 2010 season is an extremely disappointing one for the 49ers, but firing head coach Mike Singletary was not the way to improve heading into 2011. All the team has done by parting ways with Singletary is ensure at least one more losing season as the team gets acclimated to a new head coach.

Singletary brings to the job exactly what the job requires — he demands the respect of his players just by entering the room, isn’t afraid to make the tough call, and is able to relate to the guys he’s coaching and make them better.

Say what you want, but he’s done just that.

He’s taken guys like Michael Crabtree and Vernon Davis who were nothing but whiny malcontents and turned them into players. Even a guy like Alex Smith is playing better under Singletary than he ever had before sans one year with Norv Turner as his offensive coordinator.

The problem with Singletary was that he felt he could go another season without getting a quarterback. Smith shows such potential that head coaches fall in love and then regret it once they’re on the street looking for work. It happened to Mike Nolan, and now it happened to Singletary.

Once Singletary really started accepting that Smith was not the answer, it was too late. He was already on the hot seat. The team had already dropped its first five games and nothing but a playoff berth was going to save Singletary’s job.

But what the York family fails to realize is that most coaches will have bad seasons. This was Singletary’s. What no one seems to understand is that he had them overachieving last season and the bar was set high because of it. But they came into this season with two rookies starting on the offensive line, a quarterback who has proven he’s nothing more than a high-quality backup, and a defense with several weak points.

If given the time, I truly believe Singletary could have done something with that team. The way he got a guy like Davis turned around and on track as one of the best at his position simply by challenging him and doing what a head coach is there to do tells me that the guy could do great things with the right guys.

But unfortunately in today’s NFL, there is simply no time for a guy like Singletary to come in and win over the locker room one at a time and get them to buy what he’s selling. He was taking over a bad team and bringing it back to respectability. That takes time, but despite the early losing it looked like he was getting the Niners back where they had to be.

That early losing streak included a three-point loss to the New Orleans Saints, a two-point loss to the Atlanta Falcons, and a three-point loss to the Philadelphia Eagles.

Ask anyone who the cream of the crop is in the NFC, and you’ll hear those three teams mentioned.

Those close games are won and lost by your quarterback. Singletary didn’t have one. If he was allowed to go out and find his guy during this offseason, I would not have hesitated to pick the Niners to win the NFC West next season. But instead the team will have to suffer through what will likely be another awful hiring (Dennis Erickson, anyone?) and another season in the cellar.