49ers Slide Has No End in Sight

Whither the San Francisco 49ers? This franchise, once the gold standard of the NFL, is terribly tarnished. Once they were the king Niners; now they are just pathetic also-rans. Are they going to be the Santa Clara 49ers? Possibly. Are they going to the playoffs? Not anytime soon. Are they going to raise ticket prices? Heck, yeah, they already did. To the chagrin of generations of 49ers fans—for many of them do not even recognize this outfit anymore. In the 1990s, I spent a lot of time in Stalag 49, the bunker/complex down in Santa Clara, where if you tripped you'd fall on a Pro Bowler. I was on the field for a number of unforgettable 49ers playoff victories at Candlestick Park. The 49ers even had a parade down Market Street in 1995, yeah, that was memorable, too. So how did they get to the cellar of the league so quickly? A lot of Niners faithful reflexively lay all the blame at the feet of the Yorks—Denise DeBartolo York and her husband John. That's fair; ... (link)