Was it really just a few weeks ago when this space called the Raiders the most dysfunctional pro football team in Northern California?

Breathe easy, over there in The Black Hole. The title's moved back across the Bay.

No doubt Mike Nolan's job performance in San Francisco was worse than that of your 401(k), although I strongly doubt your financial adviser would have asked for a review of a field goal.

Yes, I believe 49ers management when they say the decision to fire Nolan had already been made before Monday's announcement, and I believe it's the right decision.

But even then, they didn't seem to handle it right.

Can you picture the scene in the York family's inner sanctum at the 49ers headquarters in Santa Clara? "Well, it's been leaked ... we'd better go ahead and do it anyway."

There's no doubt here Mike Singletary will be a fine NFL head coach. Yet, he deserves better than the lump of coal that's been handed to him along the shores of Candlestick Point, and deserves more than nine games to right the Good Ship Niner.

He also deserves better talent than he's getting from management. Much better.

Yes, the Yorks say they want a winner. But do they really expect it to happen with a quarterback tandem of career journeymen J.T. O'Sullivan and Shaun Hill? (Alex Smith? I expect him to have his ticket punched for elsewhere next season).

It's especially appalling given the tradition of great quarterbacks in San Francisco, from Frankie Albert and Y.A. Tittle to Joe Montana and Steve Young.

I've heard the fans' cry for the return of Eddie DeBartolo to the team, as if that alone would return the team to the glory of the '80s and '90s.

One thing wrong with that, though. All Eddie D. did was write the checks. It was Bill Walsh and Carmen Policy who decided who was on the payroll.

Walsh has gone on to his reward and Policy is out of football, but there is a lesson to be learned: The best pro football owner lets the football people make the decisions.

Is someone like that currently in the employ of the 49ers? The record speaks for itself.

Meanwhile, more thoughts worth that second cup of coffee while we ponder the wonders of televised sports, where one waits out a rain delay in the World Series by watching Penn State-Ohio State:

• Lemoore's Lance Brown writes to say he's the new head coach of the American Indoor Football Association's New Mexico Wildcats, based in Albuquerque, for the 2009 season.

Brown spent 2008 season as offensive line coach for the Arizona Adrenaline. He says he's to be inducted to the 2008 minor league football hall of fame on Dec. 5 in Mesquite, Nev.

• Memo to Paul Loeffler, newly anointed Voice of the Bulldogs on KMJ: Please spare us the on-air messages to the wife and kids, as well as telling us what you had for breakfast and what the sermon was at Sunday services. Do tell us the first and last names of the players and borrow a technique from the Giants' Jon Miller as well, no matter what sport you're broadcasting - buy a three-minute egg timer, and every time the sand runs out, turn it over and give the score.

• Memo to Bill Woodward, outgoing Voice of the Bulldogs on KMJ: Enjoy life after Bulldog sports ... but will I ever miss those pipes!

Richard de Give is The Sentinel's sports editor. Reach him at 583-2430 or at rdegive@HanfordSentinel.com. Richard's Fearful Football Forecast runs weekly at www.hanfordsentinel.com/blogs.

(Oct. 26, 2008)