I’m not a football fan, and I don’t really care where the 49ers play, Candlestick or Cancun. But this whole stadium story is just a gift that keeps on giving.

Today a team spokesman, reacting to the city’s proposal for a Candlestick project that would rival Disney World, featuring housing, shopping malls, a hotel and, oh yeah, a football stadium, said the whole thing was a non-starter. Why? Because of the prospect of being “terrified.”

Just what is it that the team is sure will strike terror into the heart of their fans?
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In today’s Chronicle, columnists Matier and Ross suggest that a 49ers football stadium in Hunters Point might interest team owner John York.

The photograph running with the piece makes it all too clear, but just in case you need a geography lesson, the map above shows a little problem with this idea: the stadium would be utterly impossible to get to. You think Candlestick is hard to access? Try Hunters Point.

Quite a day for Bay Area sports. As Mark Pritchard posted earlier, the A’s are moving to Fremont. Now the San Francisco 49ers say they’re moving to Santa Clara. San Francisco will not give them what they want, so they’re moving. They don’t seem to realize that it’s a two-way street and that perhaps if they won more games the city might take their demands more seriously.

So since Santa Clara is practically San Jose in geographic terms, will the name have to change? Might I suggest something that reflects the area’s origin the way the name “forty-niners” honors San Francisco’s history? Like, say, the Silicon Valley Microchips? Yeah, I think it’s ridiculous too. It’s like K-Fed filing divorce against Britney (instead of the other way around).

I’ve heard the NY Jets/NY Giants thing mentioned several times already, about how the stadium is in a “completely different state” (ABC 7, 6:00pm newscast). Seriously, East Rutherford, NJ is really not that far from NYC at all. It’s like a 20 minute drive. Santa Clara is nearly an hour. States on the east coast are much smaller than they are on the west coast. You can drive through 3 or 4 of them in under 4 hours.

This morning I had to get down to the new Adidas by 6:30 am to help build a cage that Joe Montana & Gavin Newsom could throw footballs into on Market St. I woulda taken pictures of this photo op for ya’ll but I left my camera in the bar I had skiddaddled out of an hour before I had to be assembling their stage. There’s nothing like shaking off a buzz while watching Gavin Newsom and his very shiny waxy hair helmet wander around in his stocking feet admiring various sneakers. Gavin & Joe both had their feet “scanned” by some new fangled Adidas technology hooked up to plasma monitors, and apparently the red dot in Gavin’s sole imprint shows he puts a lot of pressure into his step . At some point an Adidas store rep got the mayor fitted into some custom kicks ( retail value approx $250).

Gavin was earlier quoted by KRON TV as saying of the new mall

“Shopping centers represent an energy, a vitality. They represent a sense of community beyond just the experience of shopping.”

Tell that to the crowd of freeloaders who stole a palate of 1000 commemorative umbrellas from under the noses of overwhelmed Bloomingdales staffers…

Meanwhile, while Joe & Gavin yukked it up for the media, I perused the scone selection at the Adidas hospitality table, and after an hour or so of painfully forced smiling & mingling Joe & Gavin split. As the former 49er QB passed through the crush of the velvet ropes, a middle aged woman in the horde got all pissy that Joe didn’t hang out & say Hi to her personally.

I said

“Well he actually signed a lot of autographs & was here for over an hour, what do you expect, after all it’s just a publicity stunt…

She said

” Well I think it’s lousy”

Last week the same sort of strange promotional forces somehow plopped me into the middle of a different surreal encounter with hundreds of BORAT fans at The Metreon, and an encounter with the film’s controversial star …
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Um, sure! Did you know last night was the first 49ers game of the preseason? I found that out yesterday afternoon when I was offered free tickets to the game. So I’d thought I’d pass on this little tidbit of information.

Friend: Hey, you want to go to the 49ers game tonight? I have a free ticket.
Me: Sure! … Wait, it’s football season in August?

This was my first time to Candlestick/Monster Park. I at least knew about it because I was watching the World Series on TV with my dad back during the Loma Prieta earthquake. Being there, the biggest issue I had with the place is that you can’t hear a thing! We had pretty good seats, and we still couldn’t make out the music, let alone the announcers. Get a better sound system, please.

Being girls, there was much discussion about the uniforms (they were very shiny) and whether we could totally dance better than the 36-DoubleDers, I mean, Goldrush cheerleaders (we could).

Oh, I guess I should mention the outcome of the game, huh? The 49ers won! They beat the Bears 28-14, I think. But don’t quote me on that.