As we enter Day 10 of the Lance Kiffin hostage situation. ...

Ending a few days of speculation, it was announced that as expected, Mike Nolan will once again be prowling the sidelines in his spiffy suit as head coach of your San Francisco 49ers. He will, however, no longer be the Head Cheese as Scot McCloughan will take over in that role. Personally, we think the Yorks did this all backwards as they should have hired the personnel type guy first instead of the coach-- especially as the coach was somebody with absolutely no experience in doing either-- but what do we know? We're only bloggers....

Here's todays sports news...

Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start: when Alex Smith got injured, there was some back-and-forth about whether or not he was healthy. While this was going on, Nolan made the occasional subtle and not-so-subtle dig at Smith for not being sufficiently tough. Cue speculation and rumormongering approaching Brangelina levels. The Merc apparently had heard some other Niners joining in on the Smith dog pile and asked Alex about it. Alex went a wee bit on the ballistic side and accused Nolan of trying to turn the team against him, making him play when he wasn't healthy, and for generally being a big poopy-head. This all hit the press sometime yesterday and, well, hello hullabaloo. Naturally, the two parties met and issued statements talking about how their relationship is all :) and not :( ...

Here's todays sports news...

-With tonight's 108-82 win against the running joke that is the New York Knicks (seriously, what does it take to get fired in that organization?), the Warriors have now won three in a row and are one game from totaling the amount of wins our local football teams have. The Beard led the way with 31 points, seven assists and six rebounds and Stephen Jackson got 23 points. For the Knicks, Starbury played his first game of the season showing that blackmail does work ...

If there's anybody in the city taking more heat than Mike Nolan, it's his quarterback, Alex Smith. Smith stands accused by the Faithful of not very being good. The evidence? Overthrowing Receivers. Underthrowing Receivers. Not seeing open Receivers. The numbers back up the evidence-- he has a preposterously low QB rating (57.2) and completion percentage (48.7). He is also 11-19 as a starting QB. In the games we've watched, Smith looked like the same QB he was when he first started-- skittish and inaccurate-- so much so, the Faithful are muttering that Smith, as a #1 draft pick, has been a bust of Lucy Pinder-like proportions (sort of NSFW-y). ...

With the Niners sinking like John McCain's Presidential campaign, the inevitable finger pointing has begun. After all, the team has not gotten better, but actually regressed from last year and you could argue that the team has regressed even farther to 2004-2005 levels of suckitude. So the question being asked is who the heck is to blame. The inevitable target? Mike Nolan. ...

-- Girls soccer coach suspended after mooning (i.e.., "exposing his buttocks to" [hee]) his opponents. [SFGate] -- Niners' Nolan stands by his QB, Alex Smith. Aw. Also, "at least the Niners didn't get shutout." (Dude. Ouch.) [Examiner, SJ Merc] -- Increasing lack of loyalty over at Yahoo. [ValleyWag] -- Neither heavy nor metal, Metallica went acoustic/funk at the Bridge School Benefit. [SJ Merc] -- 1 dead, 2 hospitalized after shootings in the city of......

Here's a few sports stories to get you through the bleakness of the Rox/Sox World Series...

Here's todays sports news...

For those of you who don't care what happens to Pam and Jim: -- 49ers Fan Night: Biggest 49ers fan ever, Bevan Dufty, invites you to celebrate football. In the Castro. 49ers alumni stars will be present, and Gold Rush cheerleaders will be on hand to sign calendars. In the Castro. Sounds like a homerun kind of night! Goes from 7 p.m.-9 p.m. at Mix, 4086 - 18th Street (at Castro); free. -- Circle,......

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Here's todays sports news...

Today the National Football League's 2007 schedule was let out to the general public. After last year's marked strides on the field, what does the oncoming season hold for the San Francisco 49ers?...

-In a GAME THAT MATTERED, the A's lost their opening game, 4-0 to the Mariners. It's too easy to make much out of the first game of the season, but it should be noted that the A's took 17 out of 19 games against the Mariners last season and the Mariners just halved that. What happened yesterday could basically be summed up by this: great pitching. Mariner’s wunderkind Felix Hernandez, all of 20 years old,......

-Warriors road woes continue as they get rolled by the Milwaukee Bucks, 122-101. Are the nails being placed in the coffin? Tim Kawakami moves past the standard "will the Warriors make the playoffs" story to give the eulogy for another Warriors season that bites the dust. ...

This morning, ESPN's Len Pasquarelli is reporting that "sources" say that the 49ers' prized offensive coordinator Norv Turner will be the new coach of the San Diego Chargers, to which we say noooooo....

The past two seasons for the 49ers have ended in quixotic wins off of big Joe Nedney's left foot. Yet the 2006 season-ending upset over the Denver Broncos meant so much more the Niners: it revealed a team that believes in themselves. And believes in their coach's plan for the future....

-The Warriors beat up on an Allen Iverson-less 76ers last night, 116-97 as Matt Barnes led the way with seven three-pointers and twenty-five points. Monta Ellis, meanwhile, isn't as injured as everyone thought he was. And the next run of seven games looks pretty good for the Warriors. ...

-Baron Davis leads the way to another Warriors road win, this time against the Orlando Magic. Davis had thirty-eight points and nine assists as the Warriors held off a furious Magic rally to win. ...

-Sharks lose to the Dallas Stars 3-0. Not really a surprise considering the Stars were looking to open up a can of whoop-as and the Sharkies were coming off a four-game break. It's the Sharks second loss to the Stars and the third time they've been blanked in the past fourteen games. ...

Sharks beat high-scoring Ducks, 4-3, with a tipped pass by Joe Thorton in the late, late third period. The victory snapped the Ducks five game winning streak and was only their fourth regulation loss of the season. Is their still room on the Sharks bandwagon?...

Holy fancy baby Jesus on a Kaiser roll, the 49ers beat the Seahawks? In storm conditions in Seattle?! Wow. This was unforeseen. That's a sweep of the division series on the year, keeping the Niners' tiiiny window of playoff chance alive. How could this have happened? Here's how:...

-Baron Davis leads the way to a win over the Sacramento Kings. Apparently, he's not too happy over him being mentioned in all the Iverson rumors. But is even trading for AI a good idea?...

-Sharks shut out the Phoenix Coyotes 4-0. -Practice not making perfect for the Raiders. And could their only hope be their defensive coordinator? Cause it sure as hell ain't going to be their wide receiver. -Why is everyone picking on poor Alex Smith? -Baron Davis: not disgruntled yet. And the Warriors won't say if they want AI or not. -Could the Giants be after another Barry? If they are, would anybody believe it? -Stanford talking......

Packers 30 49ers 19: In retrospect, this was an obvious game to foresee. The Packers were completely embarrassed the week before and their coach used to be a coach for the Niners. So what you got was a team looking take their frustrations out on another team, coached by someone who probably knows that team a little too well. Either way, the Niners have now lost three in a row after winning three in a row and that's been kind of how every team in the NFL is going this year. Regardless, the Niners giddy dreams of the playoffs are probably dead right now as this game shows the Niners aren't ready for Prime Time yet...

Week Twelve of the National Football Season's regular season is here, post-Thanksgiving. Grab some leftovers and plunk down on the couch, here comes this weekend's set of Bay Area American football entertainment....

We can't really confess to have been paying a lot of attention to this game but we noticed this weird thing during the first half of the game where every time we looked up, the Niners were either scoring a TD or making a big play or even getting a safety. Then we'd look up at the score and notice that they were getting throttled by the Chargers. The game was 35-19 at half time and was pretty much doing what they will with the 49ers, but still, the Niners always seemed to be doing something big....

It's Week Three of the National Football League's 2006 regular season. Here's what happening with your Niners and Raiders. ...