Ask him about injuries? He doesn't like that. He cuts those off, quick.
Ask him if so-and-so stunk last night? You'll get some version of "those are your words, not mine, and I strongly disagree with them, the mistakes were a combination of things..."
Ask him if all the defensive starters he didn't re-sign could be interpreted as some kind of house-cleaning? Oh, that got a rise out of him.
Ask him to compare this player to that player? He doesn't like to do comparisons.
Ask him who's winning a position battle in camp? Good luck with that. He won't tell you, because to say someone is "winning" means that, by the transitive property, someone else must be "losing" and Jim Harbaugh will not have any losers on his football team. He won't diminish any player, past or present.
You'd think an innocuous question about player rotations for the upcoming preseason game would get a straight answer out of him. What's the harm in letting people know which people will play which quarters? The game doesn't count.
Well, last Sunday, in a conference call with reporters, Harbaugh said that the team would ramp up as the preseason went along, so he'd treat the fourth one as the most important, not the third. As you're probably aware, that would be highly unusual. Teams typically treat the third game as the "dress rehearsal for the regular season, with starters playing the entire first half and maybe even a series or two in the third quarter, before giving way to the backups. Conversely, the final preseason game is complete unwatchable dreck. No starters play, ever, and the entire exercise is an excuse to sell beer and hot dogs, and decide MAYBE a roster spot or two for guys who will never play in the regular season unless there's an injury epidemic at their position.
The cliche is that last game helps decide 4-5 roster spots, but it's more like 1-2, and you know it's a blatant farce in that regard because the league deadline for making final roster cuts comes usually 24 hours after the preseason finale, offering practically no time for coaches to even evaluate the tape where they would supposedly basing their decisions on.
So yeah, like I said, it certainly sounded unusual when Harbaugh said he'd treat the fourth game as the most important one in his conference call. Was he really going to play his starters for a half against San Diego's third-stringers? How embarrassing would that be if the 49ers guys didn't dominate in that situation? How much criticism would he get if a guy like Patrick Willis or Vernon Davis got hurt in that game (knocks on wood)?
On Tuesday, Harbaugh backtracked and said he'd treat the third game the same way everyone else does. Alright, order was restored. Maybe he just misunderstood the question during the conference call. Maybe he slept on it and realized the folly of his ways. Whatever the case may be, normalcy was at hand.
Until Thursday, that is. When asked if Alex Smith will play the whole half, here was Harbaugh's response:
“No, I don’t think that’s the way it’s going to go. I think [QB] Colin [Kaepernick] will get in fairly early, and I’d like to see Colin play with some of the ones after two series. We’ll see how it goes. Sometimes you have to see how long was the first series, how long was the second series? But fairly early into the game. The idea of playing some of our twos and threes more in this game is also the way that we’re leaning going into this ball game, not so much the traditional way of playing the starters for three quarters like has been historically done in the third preseason game. And the reason for that is there are guys that are fighting for their life, their football life, and we want them to have the ability to play in the game, but also to see them against other starters, see them against the Texans starters. So we’ll make some evaluations based on that in this ball game, and then we’ve done that in practice this week, more of an emphasis to get our key backups in a roll where they can compete.”
Harbaugh said his main concern in these games is player evaluation, in terms of who's going to make the team, so he wants to give the bubble guys extensive time here, even against the Texans starters, to really see how they measure up. That's all well and good, coach, but it's something you should've done last week against Oakland.
Because the offense had such long drives in the first half against the Raiders, the starters wound up playing the whole half. As a result, the second string played almost the entire second half, with a sprinkling of third-stringers here and there. That's how this third game was supposed to go.
Instead, Harbaugh probably realized he hasn't given his young guys and practice squad hopefuls nearly as much time as he should've, and now he's pressing. He's not lying when he says he needs to evaluate them, and you can only tell so much from the practice field.
However, his plan is problematic for two reasons:
1) The ultimate goal still has to be preparing the guys you're gonna rely on to win you games in 2011 -- your starters. You had no off-season thanks to the lockout, no minicamps, half your starting defense introduced themselves to one another about eight minutes ago, and all three units of your team are trying to absorb all new playbooks. Oh, and your offense has a new center and a new receiver, two positions that kind of take a wall to ingratiate themselves to the quarterback.
In case you forgot, Mr. Harbaugh, your team -- mostly your offense -- played like hot garbage two weeks ago at New Orleans. Yes, you've taken many steps since then and the whole operation looked better from what little we got to see of practice, but whatever success was had against the Raiders has to be tempered by the fact that, let's get serious, they're the Raiders. There's a considerable drop-off in class between New Orleans and Oakland.
My feeling, and that's all it is, is that the starters need considerable more work against other quality starters, to really see where they stand and what they have to work on. You may have heard that the 49ers haven't lit the world on fire these past few years. I hardly think they can afford to rest on their laurels and arrogantly assume everything is hunky dory with the first string. The Texans have 11 sacks through the first two preseason games and they're the first 3-4 defense the Niners will face. They figure to be a considerably sterner challenge for the offensive line than the Raiders were. On the other side of the ball they've got Matt Schaub, Andre Johnson, Arian Foster and Owen Daniels -- an attack as explosive as anybody's -- and you'd think they'd be a good measuring stick for a Niners starting defense that has played very well so far.
I won't presume to guess how Harbaugh truly feels about his second and third string players, but whatever valuable evaluation he hopes to get out of them against Houston's starters will likely be a disappointment for him across the board. I'm not at all sure San Francisco's starters can match-up with Houston's, let alone their backups. Comparing two's against other two's makes more sense and is more practical besides.
2) Does this mean Harbaugh will actually follow through on his earlier stated intention of playing his starters in that fourth preseason game? How pointless would that be? It seems like the ultimate lose-lose situation.
I've already mentioned the possibility of some front-line player getting hurt in that game. Obviously, that's the worst case scenario. But suppose the starters play three series and get out to a 10-3 lead against San Diego's backups. Great. What does that prove? Is such a scenario supposed to inspire confidence in anyone, from the players to the coaches or even the fans? Or, even worse, suppose the starters don't play well against the Chargers' scrubs and are down 7-0 after two series. Then it's panic bells, a whole week of sports-talk radio campaigning for Colin Kaepernick to be named the starter and no momentum whatsoever going into the season opener against Seattle.
All very bad.
So here's what to hope for, outside of the fairytale that everyone -- first string, second string and third string -- will play great against Houston, regardless of who they have on the field:
Hope that Harbaugh was just yanking our chain and that it will be standard operating procedure on Saturday. A half for the starters and then none at all next week. If you haven't seen enough of your bubble guys so far, too bad. Hope you guessed right on whatever evaluations you've made so far. Make the rest off the fourth game. The world won't spin off its axis if you pick Mike Person over Tony Wragge.
Basically, hope for a flip-flop of a flip-flop of a flip-flop.
It would be a bad time for Harbaugh to be on the level with us now.
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Much has been made about the supposed friction between Alex Smith and Michael Crabtree. They took little shots at each other in June (Smith sticking up for Crabtree afterward and saying his own comments came out wrong). On Wednesday Smith seemed to make a sharp contrast between Crabtree and new receiver Braylon Edwards, when he described at length how impressed he was by Edwards' work ethic and dedication and then noting that he hadn't thrown a pass to Crabtree since June.
Well, your ace reporter here would like to point out that Smith and Crabtree were spotted chatting amicably at their lockers for a couple of minutes on Thursday. In fact, I dare say their conversation would've lasted even longer if the ultra-private Crabtree didn't notice us staring at them.
Harbaugh re-arranged the lockers so that there's a defensive player between every two offensive players and vice versa. It's all "kumbaya," hokey, high-school, "Remember The Titans" nonsense, of course. One of Harbaugh's favorite phrases is "The team, the team, the team," and if you believe in the rallying power of that kind of thing, more power to you.
But Harbaugh admitted he's the one who organized how players would be rooming together in camp (example: pairing the aloof Crabtree with the most gregarious guy on the team, tackle Joe Staley) and I'm sure it's no coincidence that Smith and Crabtree's lockers are so close to one-another. They won't be able to avoid each other even if they want to.
Incidentally, the locker separating them belongs to corner Tramaine Brock (who wasn't around during the aforementioned chat). When I mentioned the locker setup on Twitter, one follower responded "A cornerback between Alex Smith and a receiver, how appropriate."
It got a round of laughs in the media trailer, always a mean feat against a bunch of jaded comedy snobs.
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Tonight's song on my iPod that is typically enjoyed by a 13-year-old girl:
"Coin-operated Boy" by The Dresden Dolls.
"This bridge was written/To make you feel smitten/With my sad picture/Of girl getting bitter."
Until next time...
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