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SANTA CLARA, Calif. - The San Francisco 49ers expect to be right back competing for a Super Bowl with a new coach following the frustration of a lost year that saw coach Jim Harbaugh depart for Michigan.General manager Trent Baalke believes there are plenty of options to replace Harbaugh and ensure the Niners are contenders again. CEO Jed York wont accept anything less.Its up to us to make sure we compete for and win Super Bowls. Thats our only goal, York said. We dont raise division championships banners. We dont raise NFC championship banners. We raise Super Bowl banners.Under Harbaugh, they came darn close, losing 34-31 to his big brother, John, and the Baltimore Ravens after the 2012 season.Now, theres the daunting task of finding another coach who can produce similar, immediate success.This organization has had to replace some awfully successful head coaches in the past, and Jim is no different - a very successful coach, Baalke said. Are we confident that we can replace him? You always go into that with that strategy. Theres a lot of good football coaches out there. What we need to do is go out and find a coach that can come in here now and lead this football team.No matter who succeeds Harbaugh, there are significant questions surrounding San Francisco going forward. Perhaps none is bigger than getting quarterback Colin Kaepernick to top form again after a disappointing season on the heels of his hefty contract extension last June.He is considering working with a mechanics guru to make some tweaks, which has proven positive for other NFL quarterbacks.The quarterback position is the most important position in all of sports. Period, York said. I think Colin did some things very well this year. And there are things he needs to improve on. And thats something that is very important.Here are some things to take from the Niners 8-8 season:STAR LINEBACKERS: NaVorro Bowman never made it back from that devastating left knee injury in last Januarys NFC championship game at Seattle. Then close friend and fellow star linebacker Patrick Willis didnt play after an Oct. 13 win at St. Louis and needed surgery for a strained muscle in his left big toe.Getting these two back on the field will be paramount for a defence that has been among the NFLs best.Its my career, I want to be sure I do it smart, Willis said.DAVIS DOWN NUMBERS: Vernon Davis followed one of his best NFL seasons with the lowest output since his rookie year of 2006, leaving doubts whether the Niners will bring him back with a year left on his contract.Davis matched his career high with 13 touchdowns in 2013, then became a bit part of the offence. Offensive co-ordinator Greg Roman regularly said he wanted Davis involved and that didnt happen.Davis had only 50 targets, down from 84, and finished with just 26 catches and two TDs.I dont know what the main issue is, Davis said. Everybodys numbers are down, (Michael) Crabtree, Frank (Gore), myself. Were all down. Weve just got to figure it out. Just like any sport, whenever youre part of a team, whether youre a coach or anybody, your goal is to get the key guys involved, the guys who make plays, so they can contribute and help the team win.BIG NAMES, KEY DECISIONS: York and Baalke must decide whether franchise rushing leader Frank Gore returns, along with Crabtree, Davis and left guard Mike Iupati.And thats just a start.Its unclear whether 14-year veteran defensive end Justin Smith will play another season before retirement.I tell him I dont care if he gets away all the way until before the first week of the season next year and he comes back then, Willis said. Im going to talk to his little boys, he has three young boys now, see if they can run him a little ragged and give him back.WHAT HOME-FIELD ADVANTAGE? The 49ers finished 4-4 in their inaugural season at $1.3 billion Levis Stadium and hardly established the kind of home-field advantage theyd hoped for — not even close to what Seattle offers at CenturyLink Field.York apologized via Twitter on Thanksgiving night, when the 49ers lost the first of two games to rival Seattle in an 18-day span. He said Monday fans who chose to spend their holiday in the stands deserved more.We didnt give you enough to cheer for this year. But that didnt stop you from coming out even in the last two games, where we really didnt have anything to play for, he said in opening his Monday news conference. We werent playing for a playoff contention and you guys brought it.SECONDARY CONCERNS: The Niners are weak at cornerback and could see Perrish Cox and Chris Culliver leave, so thats a spot to be addressed through free agency and the draft.___AP NFL website: www.pro32.ap.org and www.twitter.com/AP_NFL Air Max 97 Canada Sale . -- In the stadium program sold at the Miami Dolphins game on Halloween, Richie Incognito was asked whos the easiest teammate to scare. Air Max 97 Canada Outlet .com) - John Wall supplied 24 points and 11 assists in leading the Washington Wizards to a 102-91 win over the New York Knicks on Christmas Day. http://www.airmax97canada.com/ . Manager Alex Ferguson says the injury was sustained while the player tried to hit a volley toward the end of training on Tuesday. Cheap Air Max 97 . Canada Day is here and with it comes Free Agent Frenzy as the NHLs 30 teams storm out of the gate for signing season. Air Max 97 Clearance .S. Olympic hockey management team have been making what he called "ghost rosters" since August.TORONTO – On the day he was introduced as the bombastic new president and general manager of the Maple Leafs in November of 2008, Brian Burke declared the Mats Sundin era over in Toronto. “He’s going to go somewhere where he thinks they have a chance to win based on my conversations with him,” Burke said almost six years ago to the day. “I don’t think we profile as a team that he’s going to sign with.” Sundin would ultimately land in Vancouver just a few short weeks later, and from the point of his exit, the city of Toronto has been obsessed with figuring out who would fill that void for the Leafs. Tyler Bozak has been the guy at the centre of the debate for the past five years. “If he’s not a no. 1 centre, who is?” Joffrey Lupul questioned. “We don’t have a Ryan Getzlaf so he’s the no. 1 centre. We don’t have Jamie Benn or Ryan Getzlaf or [Sidney] Crosby or [Evgeni] Malkin, but the majority of teams don’t so yeah, he’s our no. 1 centre and we certainly don’t undervalue any of the things he does.” Amongst the top-25 scorers in the league at this moment, and on pace for career-highs in most offensive categories, Bozak is in the midst of his finest season as a Leaf. His booming production though is directly tied to a surge on the power-play, one that’s unlikely to be sustainable for the remainder of the year. Bozak has scored more than half of his 11 goals on the power-play (adding another two shorthanded), quietly navigating into “soft spots” between attention-drawers, Phil Kessel and James van Riemsdyk. That was precisely the case over the weekend when he found an opening between Capital forwards, Joel Ward and Jason Chimera, confidently flipping a Kessel feed over an overmatched Braden Holtby. “Obviously when you’ve got guys out there like James, Phil, Naz, and Dion, a lot of attention is going to be on them so I just try and slip under the radar and get to spots where guys aren’t,” he said afterward. But this kind of production isn’t likely to last as triumphantly as it has. Consider that the 28-year-old, tied for second in the league at this point, is currently on pace for 21 power-play goals -- or more than he’s ever scored in a single season. Also remember that Alex Ovechkin led the NHL with 24 power-play goals a year ago. Bozak has already matched (through 23 games mind you) a career-high with the six markers on the man advantage. He’s scored on 33 per cent of the 18 shots he’s fired with a 5-on-4 advantage, a trend that will likely right itself over time. Consider that last season he shot just 10 per cent in such situations. The 28-year-old is shooting the puck more often in all situations, though. He’s on pace for nearly 200 shots this year or nearly 80 more than his previous career-high. “I used to look at him as more of a passer when Phil and I played with him, but now you can see he’s a little more comfortable shooting the puck and has a little bit more confidence as far as goal-scoring goes,” Lupul said, citing that increase in confidence as the likely factor behind such a shift. “I think initially he would probably always look to get the puck to Phil and now he’s starting to realize that he can score goals and you can see him getting a little more comfortable going hard to the front of the net and ggetting some goals there.dddddddddddd” “Obviously when you play with guys like Phil and James and when I was playing with Joffrey, you want to get them the puck as much as you can in scoring positions, but I think I’ve learned to take a few more shots,” Bozak added. “And I think I’ve also learned just to find the better areas on the ice where if the puck does come to me I’ll be in a better position to have a good chance of it going in.” Bozak is a historically efficient shooter – career 17.1 per cent – something he says is by design, a recognition of where he figures he’ll be most able to score. “I don’t really take too many shots from the outside in areas where I don’t think I’ll be able to score,” he explained. “I try and limit my shots to the grade-A scoring areas and give myself a good chance to score every time I shoot.” The Leafs are generating more shots with Bozak on the ice this year than a year ago. And they’re also giving up a bit less too. Part of that stems from an increase in offensive zone starts – less time subsequently in the defensive zone – and less time matching up with opposing top lines, but also from what the team believes is defensive improvement on Bozak’s part. “It’s the work he does away from the puck to defend,” Leafs assistant Steve Spott said glowingly. After the worst season his career in the faceoff circle last season – which he attributes to injury troubles – Bozak is also surging there again this year. He’s up to 57 per cent, good for sixth-best in the NHL. The power-play boom does inflate Bozak’s overall production though. Nazem Kadri, whom many are dubbing a disappointment this year, has the same number of even-strength points as Bozak – 11 each through 23 games. That’s outside the top-30 for NHL centremen. All of which reverts back to the argument against Bozak as a bona-fide first line centre, an argument which also hinges around his dependency on Kessel and on his smallish frame – generously listed at 6-foot-1 and nearly 200 pounds. Bozak would be in the lower echelon of top centres in the Eastern Conference alone, comparable with the likes of Derek Stepan and Kyle Turris. Albeit under mostly different management, the Leafs haven’t made it a secret that they’d love to improve in that spot, but as Lupul wisely pointed out, the Getzlafs of the world are found only in the draft (or in restricted free agency where few teams opts to stray). Given the dearth of high-end centres available both now and in the future, it’s likely that Bozak remains there with Toronto, inked for three more years at more than $4 million. “There’s been people saying that the whole time I’ve been here so I’m used to it now,” Bozak said of the no. 1 centre debate. “I don’t really look into too much. I’ve had a couple coaches and a couple GMs here that have had the opportunity to put me in a different role if they wanted to and I’ve stayed where I’ve been for the most part.” “He’s really emerging as a no. 1 centre in this league now, not only offensively as we’ve seen lately but defensively,” Spott said. “I think he’s a highly underrated centreman. He’s great on both sides of the puck and he’s finding that offensive touch now that you want from a no. 1 centre.” The debate continues. ' ' '