Bye bye Alex...

...don't let the door hit your ass on your way out!

Ok maybe that's a bit mean, but honestly it's about freaking time. Truthfully Alex Smith (the former 1st round draft pick of the 49ers) isn't actually gone yet, but after ending up on the injured reserve today and already having lost his starting job as QB to JT O'Sullivan, he might as well already be gone. I'm certainly not sorry to see him go (and will quite pissed if he's back again next season).

The Niners have all sorts of issues, but one of the most embarrassing (IMO) is the amount of money they paid to a QB for being nothing more than the 1st pick overall in the 2005 draft. That may be how it's done, but only in professional sports could that be true. Unproven at the professional level leads to a huge amount of uncertainty. Can you imagine if normal jobs were like this? Get out of college into a job paying far more than the average pay, only to keep your job when you still can't perform it after 3 F***ING YEARS! Wouldn't that be great? It was when the 49ers picked up the option on Smith that I really felt bad to be a fan. I couldn't understand how easily the coaching, owners, etc were just "overlooking" the obvious flaws and inabilities in this kid to be a pro.

Now I'm certainly not a football expert (I know far more about baseball than I'll ever know about football), but regardless of the number of OC's he's been through, any other job in the world other than professional sports and he'd have been fired in the first 6 months (if not sooner). The kid has made $30+ million for 4679 yards in 3 years (Alex Smith on Wikipedia); I'd say he made out just fine, though not exactly a stellar career that I'm sure he'd prefer to have had.

Some other team will probably pick him up as a reclamation project and perhaps he'll amount to something. Maybe he'll be able to have some kind of decent NFL career, but honestly, I think the football world would be stunned to see him live up to the #1 spot that he was honored with 3 years ago... (course he wouldn't be the first)