Deep thoughts, cheap shots & bon mots ...

I don’t want to tell 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan how to do his job, but I kinda do. Or at least make a suggestion: simplify the playbook. If it takes at least two years for a smart quarterback to gain a good working grasp of Shanahan’s system, maybe that’s too long, unless you have a genius quarterback and a couple of seasons to burn. Right now, the 49ers have neither.

Can we lose the phrase “Failure is not an option”? Failure is always an option. That’s the whole point of life.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee will allow peaceful protests by athletes at the Olympic Trials. Translation: We would like to field a U.S. Olympic team this year.

Kate Scott and Amelia Schimmel didn’t just bust down some barriers last week, they shattered any notion that they were simply tools of tokenism or wokeness. Scott did radio playbyplay on a Warriors’ game, with sharpness and and elegance. Schimmel made her livecrowd debut as the A’s Coliseum PA announcer, and brought sparkle and power to the party. These women are both, as a Bay Area legend might say, too legit to quit.

New idea nominated for instant oblivion: Farhan Zaidi’s support for the concept of making all MLB games seven innings. The Giants’ president of baseball operations pitched the idea in an interview on KNBR. That’s the worst solution to a problem since the bleach “cure” for coronavirus.

At Disneyland, long lines are a problem, but the solution is not to close the park two hours earlier. Going to seveninning games would be admitting defeat in the war against the snails.

The readers add to my recent list of petty gripes: People who say a team is “clicking on all cylinders.” Says Jon Gashor, “If a cylinder is clicking, the engine is dead and the thing isn’t going anywhere.” ... Henry (no last name) hates the misuse of “fullcourt press” by the nonsports media. As in, Teachers have launched a fullcourt press to get bourbon in

their classrooms. Henry: “Fullcourt press is a defensive maneuver. You’re trying to stop something.”

A’s starter Jesus Luzardo has a new gimmick pitch, a 65 mph curveball that his minorleague friend Brian Howard nicknamed the Turkey Sub. Cute, as long as it doesn’t turn into a grand salami.

A nickname for Warriors’ backup guard Nico Mannion, born in Italy and pale as a glacier: Italian Ice. (Blame or praise my son Gabriel).

Recent news item: Stephen Curry and Draymond Green are among the 57 finalists for the U.S. Olympic basketball team roster. Really?