The switch has been pulled on the Kaepernick era

SPORTS COMMENTARY

After weeks of telling the press that Colin Kaepernick is the starting quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, head coach Jim Tomsula has pulled the string and announced Blaine Gabbert will now be replacing Kaepernick under center.

The patience of coach Tomsula and his staff has reached its boiling point, resulting in their need to try a new signal caller as the team sits in the bottom tier of the league at 2-6.

The team has been in free fall since the departure of former head coach Jim Harbaugh this past offseason and the future of the franchise is in jeopardy.

This has become the low point of 49ers owner Jed York’s tenure as CEO of the franchise, exposing his inability to construct a winning team and a positive image for himself in the eyes of fans.

Since the on-field altercation between York and Harbaugh at the end of last season (when the two reached a breaking point in their relationship) contributed to the firing of Harbaugh, the team has been in constant shambles.

On ESPN’s “Mike and Mike,” one of the hosts said, “the 49ers organization deserves this. Their quarterback who he turned into a superstar has now forgot how to play,” Mike Greenberg said. “The organization deserves this because they had one of the two or three best coaches in football in any level and they threw him out as soon as possible. And now they went from being in the Super Bowl to being the worst team in football.”

With this level of fallout, it will be difficult for the 49ers to salvage anything at this point. Nobody in the 49ers front office nor coaching staff knows what to do.

They took one of the smartest coaches in football, who took a team that for years nobody wanted to watch and turned into a perennial contender.

The Niners made the NFC Championship game three out of four years when Harbaugh was the head coach.

After he left, players such as Patrick Willis, Justin Smith and Chris Borland jumped ship.

The mass exodus combined with questionable moves made by the front office, such as not resigning Pro Bowl guard Mike Iupati, had Niner fans shaking their heads.

Adding more salt to the franchise’s wound was Sunday’s 27-6 loss to the division rival St. Louis Rams. It was another dismal performance by the offense that failed to score a touchdown for the second straight week.

“This is a quarterback that this team has lost faith in,” said Adam Schefter on SportsCenter. “This benching effectively ends the tenure of Colin Kaepernick with the 49ers.”

The benching came at an interesting point of Tomsula’s reign as head coach because each week prior to now he assured everyone he had Kaepernick’s back.

The timing of the benching comes one week before the 49ers’ bye week and opens the door for speculation as to whether the team is finished with Kaepernick.

It is worth noting that a part of Kaepernick’s six-year $110 million contract includes an opt-out clause, which allows the Niners to cut him at the end of any season in the contract time.

It should come as no surprise that the Niners are struggling as much as they are.

The team has shown no signs of real leadership. The offense struggles to score points and the defense, which used to be one of the most powerful units in the league, seems unable to stop anyone.

The Niners will look to try and salvage their season this week with their new starting quarterback Gabbert against the Atlanta Falcons.

Check out the full published article in the Spartan Daily

Infographic by Kavin Mistry

Brown people can't play baseball

OPINION

“And the winner, based on his speed and accuracy, is Rinku Singh! He's won $100,000 U.S., a trip to America and a tryout with a Major League Baseball team!” according to an excerpt from the movie “Million Dollar Arm.”

These guys got the opportunity to play baseball without even knowing what a strike or ball was.

Yet here I am, knowing more about baseball that someone probably should and just because I didn’t live in India, I have to fight each day to get a coach to turn his head.

Nobody understands what it’s like to be an Indian baseball player growing up in America. Singh got the opportunity because he was one of the only boys in India to throw a strike.

I have dealt with so much unnecessary criticism being an Indian man trying to play the game of baseball.

I may not have the strength of the white player on my right; I may not have the talent level of the Mexican player to my left and I may not fit the bill of a baseball player in the eyes of the coach, but that doesn’t mean I can’t challenge that player for his spot on the diamond.

Rinku Singh became the first person of Indian descent to play for an American team when he signed to the Pittsburgh Pirates’ minor league team in 2009.

"If I continue to do what I'm doing right now, just believing in myself, believing in my work ethic, believing where I'm going from, it's gonna happen one day," Singh said in a CBS report in 2013.

According to MLB.com, only two Indian people have made it onto a minor league roster in the long history of baseball. The first was in 2009.

I have spoken to many people who said they enjoyed the movie “Million Dollar Arm,” and think it was an inspirational story about bringing Indian players into baseball.

Yet many people fail to understand how difficult it is to be an American-born Indian player attempting to have a career in the game.

I have loved baseball for as long as I can remember. I used to go to San Francisco Giants games as a kid and tell my dad, “I am going to be on that field someday.”

He would say, “I believe that you will be. I have no doubt.”

I stepped away from the game in sixth grade because I couldn’t handle the mocking. I didn’t want to let people tell me whether or not I can play the game I love.

I can’t describe the number of times people have said, “hey! This isn’t a cricket field! Why are you here?” or “there is no way that guy is Indian; he must be black. Indian people don’t play baseball.”

But none of that compared to the worst experience of my baseball career.

I was batting in the last game of the little league season in 2006 against a white pitcher who always told me I didn’t belong in baseball. He hit me in the neck with the first pitch.

I gave up on baseball after that. I thought it wasn’t worth the ridicule I received because I wasn’t like everyone else.

In my sophomore year of high school, I dreaded physical education class. I hated having to run around the track while I watched the baseball team practice on the field next to me.

I decided it was enough and I worked as hard as I could to get my arm back in shape to try out for the team. And I made it.

I went on to play for the varsity team as a junior and senior.

I was still ridiculed by teammates and people on campus, but I knew what I was capable of and what I needed to do to get there.

Unfortunately, my coach didn’t see my dream the same way. I received little to no playing time in the first half of the season.

My first appearance as a pitcher after four years off was with the bases loaded and nobody out.

My coach basically threw me into the fire, but I got out of it without giving up a run.

I told myself that I wasn’t going to get many opportunities to pitch so when I did, I knew I had to force the hand of my coach to let me.

Sometimes in life you need people to tell you can’t do something. Proving them wrong only fuels you.

I continued to grow as a pitcher and a person in my three years of playing in high school. As a senior, other teams thought I was black because they didn’t think Indian people could do what I did.

Coaches and other people told me my career was over after high school, that I had no chance to play at a higher level despite the success I had in my senior year.

I made the team at De Anza College in Cupertino in spite of the backlash I received for even trying out. I spent two years there as a pitcher and now I’m trying out for the team at San Jose State.

Before leaving De Anza, I had an exit meeting with my coach.

After telling him I was headed to SJSU, he said, “hmm … wow, OK. Well, good luck trying to get on that team. It might be hard for someone like you.”

I have lived my life and baseball career by telling myself that it’s not about what people say you can’t do, it’s all about how you can show them they’re wrong.

My dream of making the major leagues is still alive.