No biggee, right? The announcement of Mike Singletary as the 49ers’ new non-interim head coach after Sunday’s victory was expected, if quicker than some thought.

But the person who officially made the announcement to the media was just as significant. And he will turn out to be more so, as the years pass.

Before kickoff Sunday, Jed York was promoted to the job of team president by his parents, owners John York and Denise DeBartolo York. Then the team went out and beat Washington, 27-24.
“I don’t think we could’ve written up a script any better than how it happened,’’ York said in his remarks, praising the intensity Singletary has brought to the team over the past 10 weeks.

“As I said to the players earlier today,” York continued, “this is the last time our season ends in December.”

It was the first bit of win-or-else swagger we have heard from the 49er ownership group in a long while. Kind of welcome, don’t you think?

We’ll need to get used to it. According to the press release, Jed will “oversee the team’s day to day operations in all aspects of the organization” while his mother and father will deal with the NFL commissioner’s office on league matters.

The implication is clear: The two most important people for the 49ers for the immediate future will be Jed York and Singletary. Jed has been in Singletary’s corner from the start. And I don’t think Singletary would have signed up for four more years if he didn’t think Jed was going to help create a better winning atmosphere.

More than once in his own postgame remarks, Singletary spoke about everybody in the organization being “on the same page.” So I asked him to outline the first paragraph on that page.

Here was his answer:

“The first paragraph,’’ Singletary said, “is this: What do we do to have this team be in the playhoffs? Once we’re in the playoffs, anything is possible. That’s the first paragraph.”

Sounds simple, yes? But it’s amazing how complicated the 49ers have made things over the past six years, as they have too often dissolved into weird internal machinations that often worked against winning football games.

Jed York deserves to show that he can bring more clarity and success to the 49ers. I was an early adaptor to the notion that he was the top option for the franchise to escape from the losing swamp of the last six years.

Will Jed make mistakes? Sure. But he’s smart and a quick learner. And consider this:

Under Jed York as team president Sunday, the 49ers were 1-0. The Dallas Cowboys, under an older and more experienced Jerry Jones, were 0-1.

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Even stranger, they did it quickly.

When was the last time you could say that?

Perhaps never in the Yorks’ tenure. Until Sunday.

The 49ers wasted no time. They did no dithering. They didn’t outthink themselves. They named Mike Singletary head coach within minutes of the end of the 2008 regular season.

A season which, by the way, ended with a win, bringing Singletary’s record to 5-4 and giving him a running start on 2009.

“I don’t think we could have written up a script any better than how it happened,” newly appointed team president Jed York said in announcing the hiring.

Well, sure they could have. The 49ers could have fired Mike Nolan a year ago, rather than wasting the first seven games of this season. A true fairy tale script would have had Singletary’s team clinching a playoff berth with Sunday’s win, rather than missing the playoffs for the sixth straight year.

But we digress. And if you had been on the field at Candlestick when Singletary walked off - after a come-from-behind victory over Washington – you would have thought the team had made the playoffs. The stadium was rocking and the new coach was treated as the utlimate rock star. It’s been a long time since there’s been that kind of excitement in the old concrete dump.

In ten weeks, Singletary has completely changed the vibe around the 49ers.

“It’s the right choice,” said Bryant Young, who retired from the moribund team a year ago but was on hand for Sunday’s big announcement. “This is what the team needs right now.”

Are there concerns about Singletary? About hiring another rookie defensive-minded head coach? Sure there are. But Singletary is a special person, a better candidate than the Yorks could ever have stumbled upon by themselves. And whatever concerns are lingering about him are mitigated by the force of his presence and the depth of his football intellect.

“He’s born for this,” said the person who knows him best, his wife Kim. “He’s such a leader. Such a presence.”

In the postgame press conference announcing the hiring, half the attendees were his family. For the first time since he’s been the head coach, all of Singletary’s children were on hand: Kristen, 22, Matt, 20, Jill, 18, Jackie, 15, Brooke, 14, Becky, 12 and John, 10.

When he retired from playing after the 1992 season, Singletary didn’t pursue a coaching career, in order to be home while his children were small.

“That was my nightmare,” Kim said with a smile.

But she wasn’t kidding. She tells the story of how, with four small children, Singletary had one house built. Then built another across the street, because “he likes to see things being built.”

“He has so much creative energy,” Kim said. “He had the kids unloading the dishwasher with intensity. That didn’t work so well at home. “

Singletary finally got into coaching six years ago, as an assistant in Baltimore. He was hired by Nolan as an assistant head coach and for four years watched as the 49ers struggled in mediocrity.

“He had to keep himself under wraps,” Kim said. “He was very respectful of Mike Nolan, but he had stuff bursting to come out.”

“There was so much of him that was squelched.”

Singletary kept himself busy by taking notes, and talking to anyone who could help him learn more: referees, former coaches. He revamped the 49ers playbook for himself – throwing out what he didn’t think worked and keeping what he thought did. He compiled eight industrial size binders at home.

“We own Kinkos,” Kim said.

“It was his way of dealing with the frustration,” she added.

And on Oct. 21, after Nolan was fired, Singletary finally had a platform to let it all come out. He had a few early missteps – like his rant after the first game and the revelation that he had dropped his pants at halftime – but wasn’t discouraged.

“It wasn’t embarrassing,” Kim said. “It was more like ‘Note to self: don’t do that again.’”

And when he apologized to the fans as he walked off the field for the first game, it was genuine.

“I think that was pent up for the last few years,” Kim said.

There’s been so much losing, so much frustration, so little direction or passion around the 49ers for so many years. Then Singletary fell into the Yorks lap, through no grand plan or scheme or football insight of their own. And – in nine weeks – things feel totally different.

Like his wife said, the man likes to build things. And you can already see the new building taking shape.

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I know it did for me. Had to get the Singletary-related stuff up. Hope there are a few people still checking in on this site, though it’s getting late.

But it is a time-honored and Bud-demanded tradition of this year-old blog for the host to answer good questions at the end of a long day.

So here I go, starting with one GOOD NUGGET from Ann Killion, who chatted with Singletary’s agent, Bob LaMonte, after the news conference. You see, LaMonte represents a ton of coaches, including Mike Martz.

Gee, would Martz fit in with the Raiders potential opening, Bob?

“I think that would be a match made in heaven,” LaMonte said. The agent added that Jon Gruden–a key LaMonte client–has always said that Al Davis will get you talent, and LaMonte pointed out that Martz could fit nicely in the head-coach-coaches-offense style of the Raiders.

On to your comments/questions and my responses…

* The Real Rathman offered this advice to Jed York and Mike Singletary: Keep Martz as the off-coor, since the RR fears a return to “a pre-historic Mike Nolan offense.”

—-My response: Interesting point. I agree that you never know what you’re going to get out of an off-coor hire and Martz is definitely a proven commodity with the Xs and Os, all the way down to today’s game. I do admire the way he adjusted his scheme to fit Shaun Hill’s strengths and away from JTO’s thing.

But I just don’t think Martz’s twitchy personality ever fits a long-term coaching plan. His whole thing is edginess and instability–makes for some good offense, makes for some sketchy moments for his whole team.

I think Scot McCloughan and Singletary may have come to a meeting of the minds on Martz. They want a sturdier, more physical offense. So it’s time to move on.

Let’s see what Singletary can come up with–he says he has total authority on hiring his own staff.

* Niners figured that Jed York appointing himself as team president was just the Yorks going cheap again–why not go after a big gun (like Bill Parcells) to rebuild the 49ers’ infrastructure?

—--My response: Not a terrible point, but I never thought the York family ever had any interest on bringing in a strong hand over McCloughan, Lal Heneghan, Paraag Marathe, Andy Dolich and maybe challenge Jed on the big stuff.

Jed has basically been the team president for a couple years now. Now he has the title. But really, he’s President+… he’s the owner who also runs the day-to-day operations, and he’s not bringing in anybody who could possibly be bigger than him.

Is that being cheap? Maybe. Mostly it’s being the rising son. What does this mean for the Cast of 1,000 VPs? I don’t know, but with Jed in place, it probably doesn’t mean the slicing off of 500 or so of them.

* Charles wonders about Jon Gruden saying those nice things about Al Davis leading up to today’s game. Could it mean a Gruden return to Oakland?

—–My response: Interesting that you’d say that Charles… I don’t think Gruden would ever return to the Raiders (he’s not insane), but he might be pining about a franchise that will stop at nothing to add talent when possible.

Maybe he’s recommending the potentially open Raiders job to his friends in the coaching fraternity. Or, if not recommending it, saying: Hey, it’s not THAT horrible to be there. Al tests you, but you can also win there if you’re prepared for the madness.

* Moweejm defended Jed because, since he has taken over, the 49ers have hired Singletary as an interim, let him alone to coach, then hired him permanently. “So far he’s batting 1.000!”

—–My response: That’s a point well taken. I can be and often am as critical of the Yorks as anybody on earth, but the way Jed handled the Singletary situation has been at a high level. Now, there still other moments of high weirdness, but Jed isn’t going anywhere.

And he has done right by moving to put Singletary in over Nolan (10 months too late) and watching him succeed.

* Barfighter adds that Jed is in a similar spot that his uncle was back in the day, and implied that there are similarities between Eddie D. and Bill Walsh and Jed and Singletary.

—–My response: I wouldn’t go that far. Walsh created a dynasty and unleashed an offensive system that is still beating people now, decades and decades after he came to the 49ers. Don’t think Singletary will be doing any of THAT.

But he deserves his full run at this job–or any job in the NFL–no question. Makes you wonder: Why didn’t anybody hire Singletary before this as a permanent coach?

* Bill Jackson suggests: “Mike Singletary should eventually get a group of investors” for a hostile takover of the 49ers/Yorks.

Very amusing. I wonder what would be happening with that Santa Clara/SF stadium situation if Singletary glared at a developer and/or bank officer and said: “Can’t work with that pricetag. Won’t do it!”

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(There was more Singletary Q & A, but I couldn’t hear all of it on the tape and wanted to get this up on the blog faster.)

——JED YORK/

We’re here to announce to the public the hiring of Coach Mike Singletary. We’re very, very excited about this. I don’t think we could’ve written up a script any better than how it happened.

I think when we started this nine weeks ago with Coach Singletary and Mark asked the question about what we lacked and I think I said “intensity” at that point. I think you’ve seen that throughout the season.

You saw it today where we were up, we were down and we came back and we fought through adversity. And that’s what Coach Singletary’s really done for us.

I said to the players earlier today, this is the last time our season ends in December. And I think that’s going to be a big result of our General Manager Scot McCloughan and our new head coach Mike Singletary.

So I’m going to turn it over to Scot and he’ll introduce Mike.

—–SCOT McCLOUGHAN/

I’m going to echo a lot of the same sentiments Jed just said. Mike came in, was asked to do a very difficult task, stepped up. I think people have seen in the past with the winning percentages with an interim head coach. Not a lot of success has taken place.

He did an excellent job of keeping the players together right from the get-go. There was a change, but he was able to adjust to the change, step right in, and not really skip a beat.

The players around him stepped up, the coaches around him stepped up as well. And we’re very… we’re happy to see the situation the way it is. Again, we wish we were still playing. With the record we’re sitting at, we ended up strong but it’s not close to where we need to get to.

With Coach Singletary, we feel that’s not going to be an issue. We have to get better from the standpoint of the personnel. We can better from the standpoint of the coaches. We’re always going to step forward. Whatever we can do, whatever I can do to help out, I’m gonna.

I’m very proud of this organization and we’re very lucky to have a guy like Mike Singletary to be able to lead us down the path. So I’d like to introduce Coach Mike Singletary.

—–MIKE SINGLETARY/

First of all, I want to thank God for the opportunity to stand before you. I want to thank my family, my wife Kim and all of my kids.

I guess for me the best thing that I can say is… it’s really interesting when you’re in a situation where you’re surrounded by a lot of guys that want to win and coaches that want to win. There’s a lot of pride and you have ownership that wants to win.

And I find myself in the middle of something, feeling very, very fortunate, to be surrounded by all of the good people around me. And now it’s just a matter of continuing to tighten it up, continuing to move forward and keep our eyes on the vision that we have set going forward.

I am very excited, very thankful, very humbled to be the head coach of the 49ers. Very thankful for that.

And as Jed said earlier, this is something I told our players the other day: Why did I give you Christmas day off? Because you won’t have it for a while. Enjoy it. Enjoy it.

Any questions?

-Question: How long is the contract?

-SINGLETARY: Four years.

-Q: The long term?

-SINGLETARY: Right now I just want to talk about one year. I want to talk about this off-season. I just want to take it one step at a time. The most important thing for us as an organization is to make sure that everybody is on the same page. That’s No. 1. That we’re all talking about the same thing, that we’re all working towards the same goal.

And once we do that, I know what that is, that’s taking it to the next level. That is playing today and getting prepared to play next week or the week after that. That is the only thing that is on my mind, doing everything we can this off-season to take us to that next level and then anything possible from there.

-Q: What’s your offensive plan?

-SINGLETARY: I think right now Scot and I are going to sit down and look at our offense as a whole and make the best decision for our team going forward. And what that is, you’ll know soon.

-Q: Will that include Mike Martz?

-SINGLETARY: I do not know. Right now, we’re going to talk about it.

-Q: Will you have final authority over the coaching staff?

-SINGLETARY: Yes I will.

-Q: How did this deal come about?

-SINGLETARY: We talked about it. My agent was in charge of it. And just conversations going forward. For me, it was just go ahead and do whatever you’re doing, let me focus on the game and we’ll go from there.

I think someone asked me earlier today, what have I learned in the nine weeks? I think really in all honestly, the first thing I’ve learned is when you surround yourself with good players, you become a better coach. That’s No. 1.

I think No. 2 is the quicker you can get everybody on the same page, you can move, it may not be as fast as you want it to be, but the quicker you get everybody on the same page, the better chance you have of hitting the goal.

The other thing is, it’s just a matter of how important it is. All of the things that I thought about leadership, all of the things that I thought about being a head coach, it’s so important that you have everything come together and work as one.

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I’ll bet it was a good reaction. Singletary’s family was there in the room, waiting along with us for the big moment. I’d imagine it got plenty emotional.

I left my tape recorder with Ann Killion and will get to putting a transcript up of Singletary’s press conference as soon as the other reporters come back upstairs.

I’m up here all alone right now, after fighting through all the fans who stayed through the end of this game. Is it always like this? I asked the elevator operator after I fought through the traffic jam. Nope, because most of the time in the last few years the stadium has emptied much earlier–as in, the fourth quarter.

Some quick add-ons:

* Good for the Yorks and Scot McCloughan to act swiftly on Singletary. That includes the meeting last Monday that, by all indications, hammered out the agreement.

If the Yorks had dawdled beyond last Monday, that might’ve given Singletary some minor doubts about this situation that easily could’ve bloomed into major qualms.

If Singletary had dawdled beyond today or tomorrow, that might’ve given a different feel to his open-book attitude… Was he trying to position himself for another job or leveraging the 49ers?

Doing it this way, assuming Singletary got a good deal–Fox’s Jay Glazer says five years, which sounds right–cuts out all of those possible problems.

Which is unusual for the 49ers, who almost always set themselves up for future problems by dawdling, hesitating, half-fixing things and hoping things will turn out. And they never do, if they’re only half-fixed.

* Also good for the 49ers that they didn’t trumpet this up too crazily. There was no gaudy announcement at the stadium once the game was over, no carrying Singletary off the field by the players.

Just matter-of-fact: He’s hired, let’s get going on 2009.

Again: That’s not very 49ers-like, at least the old 49ers.

* One thought: Gee, that would’ve been a bit weird if the 49ers had gotten pummeled in this game. They trailed 17-7 at halftime and if not for some inspired defensive play, might’ve easily lost this one.

Maybe that’s why Singletary seemed so subdued throughout this game. Maybe he knew he had the job, and was just hoping things otherwise turned out OK today.

Not much was on the line–he had the job, things were pointed to 2009–but I could understand a guy like him being worried that his job situation had become a distraction that was tying down the team.

The rally and victory solved that.

* Singletary finished 5-4 on the season, after taking over Mike Nolan’s 2-5 team. Singletary is the first 49ers coach to finish a season with a winning record since Steve Mariucci in 2002.

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As reporters filed into Singletary’s usual post-game interview room, 49ers staffers handed out a press released headlined: “49ers announce that Mike Singletary will remain as head coach.”

No financial terms were announced and they did not indicate the number of years for the new contract. But a Fox TV report indicated that Singletary had agreed to a five-year deal.

“Mike Singletary’s leadership ability has galvanized the players and coaching staff to deliver improved results on the field,” General Manager Scot McCloughan said in the release. “By turning the second half of the season around, he has accmoplished what few interim head coaches have been able to do.”

After taking for Mike Nolan in October, Singletary finished 5-4. The 49ers finished with a 7-9 record.

“After discussions with ownership, we agree that Mike has earned the head coach position,” McCloughan’s statement continued. “I look forward to working with Mike to continue to build on the momentum he has created as we prepare for the 2009 season.”

There was no announcement on the loudspeakers at Candlestick Park as the fans left the stadium. But word had begun to filter out about a half hour after the game.

After Joe Nedney made the 39-yard field goal to win the game, Singletary hugged quarterback Shaun Hill then left the field to roars from the remaining crowd.

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But no Jed. That I can see. I thought he’d be down there. (By the way, Paraag Marathe has been very visible all day in the pressbox before the game and during halftime and on the field pre-game.)

This game is winding down and I’m going to get an early start downstairs for the Singletary post-game news conference and see what’s up with Jed York.

So I’m going to throw out some questions for the upcoming Q & A, and of course nobody is limited by the dumb things I’m saying. Fire away with anything on 49ers/Raiders/Cowboys, whatever…

But a few thoughts:

* Jed York appointed himself team president. Does this mean anything? As a 49ers fan, does this affect you in any way?

Myself, I wonder what this means. Maybe Singletary wanted a direct line reporting to Jed, and this was the way to finagle it on the flow chart?

* If Mike Martz isn’t coming back as off-coor, then who should it be?

Norv Turner might not be available. How about a guy like Norm Chow?

* Is it Singletary’s decision to bypass Martz for 2009 or somebody else’s? You wouldn’t think Singletary would need to tolerate an over-rule at this stage. You’d think he’d have full control over his staff, particularly at that key spot.

But you never know.

* Can the Raiders do better than Tom Cable? Is Al Davis up to finding that guy?

* If you’re the Dallas Cowboys, who would you hire to replace Wade Phillips?

OK, time to get outta here. See ya in about 30-40 minutes hopefully with a quick transcription of the Singletary post-gamer.

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Uh, no, Ron, that is no surprise to anybody — except you. People who have been watching the 49ers cant imagine anybody else with a better rating since Garcia.

Who would that be — Ken Dorsey, Alex Smith, Trent Dilfer?

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They’ll make the dual commitment official by tomorrow or Tuesday at the latest.

However… If I’m Dallas owner Jerry Jones, watching my team get blown to smithereens by Philly in a must-win game, I would think that a call over to Singletary’s agent right now would not be a stupid thing.

In fact, it’d be a very smart thing.

Wade Phillips? I’m not watching the Cowboys, obviously, but I’m not imagining ol’ Wade looking very inspirational on the Dallas sidelines right now.

And that is a talented Cowboys team. You might say, with all the injuries to the NY Giants, that the Cowboys are the most talented team in the NFC.

Yet the Cowboys are not going to make it to the playoffs this season and solidified that nastiness by getting crushed in the last game of the season.

If I’m Jerry Jones, I call Singletary’s agent and check to see if he’s at all interested. I ask him what the 49ers have offered over five years.

And I double it. Maybe I triple it. That would make things a little interesting.

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