San Jose Mercury

Brash, aggressive personality isn't the worst thing for 49ers
 
 
February 13, 2003
 
By Tim Kawakami
Mercury News Staff Columnist

Don't get stuck on the way it happened, no matter the tactical misfires and sludgy rhetoric involved. If you want to divine the 49ers' future, focus on what happened.

The 49ers switched coaches, Dennis Erickson for Steve Mariucci. Switched coaches, just like Tampa Bay and the Raiders did last off-season, without obvious humiliation.

The 49ers haven't lost a game since Jan. 15, the day Mariucci was erased from the team directory. They haven't renounced the Bill Walsh Commandments to embrace the Wayne Fontes Way or melted down five Lombardi trophies to provide collars for John York's pets.

They haven't aimed lower, cheaper, blander. They aren't fending off power plays or muttering about conservative game plans. They're at peace, and they expect victories to follow.

They're talking about winning the Super Bowl, not in the hazy future, but the next one. This isn't daffiness, it's confidence, bordering on arrogant zeal. Which is, I say from experience, something to appreciate.

Win big with Erickson in 2003 or else?

``We'll be judged that way,'' York, the team director, said Wednesday, without blinking or being struck by lightning for his blasphemy.

They introduced Erickson at a San Francisco soiree, an implied answer to one burning question: Do the ends justify being mean to Mariucci?

Maybe Mooch will lead Detroit to glory and Erickson will self-combust. But it will not be an error of timidity, and I don't think it's an error at all.

What if Mariucci had left for Detroit of his own volition and within days been replaced by Erickson? No different from the way it turned out, really: Erickson for Mariucci, and you can bet that York and Donahue are happy with that trade.

Mariucci is the guy who sat on the ball with almost a minute left in the first half at Tampa Bay, down 28-6, fearing something worse occurring rather than attempting something special.

Donahue and Erickson want to push past caution and see what happens. Maybe it goes all right, maybe it goes all wrong.

``I believe in our players,'' Donahue said. ``I think that the league is so even that we have as good a chance as anybody to win it. And we should feel like that.''

With Erickson so closely tied to Donahue, there's less panic about the impending Terrell Owens contract talks or potential lack thereof. If Owens, who is signed through 2003, doesn't get a new deal and squawks, what then?

That sort of issue used to drive Mariucci bonkers.

Erickson and Donahue can deal with it and get the most out of their best player (which the team clearly believes Mariucci did not), and if that means throwing it his way 25 times a game, they'll do it.

Then, once the 2004 free-agency period dawns, they'll let the Atlanta Falcons or someone else pay Owens the same kind of eight-year, $75 million deal that Minnesota gave Randy Moss. They'll draft or sign another receiver or two, and move on. With confidence.

It is fascinating that Erickson and Owens were on the same flight from Portland on Tuesday, which gave them time to chat and size each other up.

Remember, it was Donahue who was the aggressive roster-shedder the past few years of salary-cap crisis, and it was Mariucci who fought to keep a few veterans.

So it'll be no surprise if J.J. Stokes, Derek Smith, Dana Stubblefield and several others are evaluated more skeptically today than they were Jan. 14.

Garcia, who'll be 33 next season, is an interesting issue. Does he have the arm strength for the deep strikes that Erickson favors? Donahue pointed out that Joe Montana and Steve Young went deep when the situation was right, and that Garcia's arm is on par with those two legends.

Still, don't be shocked to see a quarterback drafted or acquired in the near future. ``He wants to be aggressive all around,'' Garcia said of Erickson. ``When you look at the knocks on this team, aggressiveness was sometimes a question mark. Not within the team, but from outside.''

Aggressive, aggressive . . . that's the mantra. The 49ers want to be aggressive on offense and attacking the quarterback on defense.

Of course, sometimes Erickson's Miami and Oregon State teams seemed to go over the line, from aggressive to out of control to highly embarrassing.

``He doesn't see it that way,'' York said. ``He sees that they were aggressive and that they played hard and that he's always gotten the most out of his players. And the bottom line is that he's won.''

The bottom-line, aggressive attitude was on full display when York volunteered a little jab at Seahawks Coach Mike Holmgren, the 49ers' first choice who was contracturally unavailable.

``He had exactly the same record at Seattle that Mike Holmgren did,'' York said of Erickson. ``Right now, they're on even ground. So when they play next year, we'll see which one's the better coach.''

And, York did not have to add, there will be a greater showdown at some point in the 2003 season, when the 49ers host a team from Detroit, coached by somebody they know.

I'm assuming there will be some aggression on display then, too.


Tell us what you think on the new 49ers Clubhouse message board.
....