This was the year the A’s exited out the side door and Klay Thompson just left altogether. The 49ers began on the brink of glory and ended limping to a sad, failed, broken finish that felt inevitable before Thanksgiving.
There were a few grand moments, to be fair, but both Stephen Curry’s epic Olympic performance (which happened in Paris, representing the USA and not the Warriors) and Blake Snell’s no-hitter for the Giants felt more like appendices than the main story of this Bay Area year.
For only the second time since 2009, none of the region’s major teams won a title, came close to a title, or ever really looked like they could contend for a title. And there’s no guarantee that anything will change soon. Pretty swiftly after the similarly bleak 2020 proceedings, the 49ers went on their run of three straight NFC title-game appearances, and the Warriors won the 2022 title. Given the state of things right now, it’s hard to guess that any of that will happen starting in 2025.
(Note: Included are the Bay Area’s five major professional sports teams, but I’ll add that Stanford women’s basketball team — always major in any sense — also made Final Four trips from 2008-2012 and 2014. The NFL years are listed by when the regular season took place. The NBA years are listed by when the bulk of the regular-season games and all of the playoffs were played.)
Wow, that really was a good run for the Bay Area. But it’s probably mostly over. Some new kinds of things have to happen in 2025 and beyond. And yeah, I had to do the research to make sure I could officially conclude something every sports fan in the Bay Area understands anecdotally and spiritually: 2024 was a year filled with twilights, not highlights. It was a grueling year of transition, after almost 15 years of stability. It will lead to … well, we’ll see.
Did the Warriors’ dynasty come to its unofficial end this year? That seemed very possible after the thumping loss to Sacramento in the play-in game last April, followed in a few months by Klay’s free-agent departure for Dallas, which was more about symbolism than about a basketball problem, but still was a clear sign of this era’s mortality.
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The Warriors and Curry temporarily halted that kind of talk with a 12-3 start this regular season, but the recent downturn has brought it all back, louder and more accurate than ever. The 2024 theme: Nothing lasts forever. Maybe the 2025 theme will be: Cherish what you can while you can.
Has the 49ers’ Kyle Shanahan/John Lynch era run its full course, still short of a championship? Maybe, maybe not. Most of the familiar faces should be back in 2025 to give this another shot. But the 2024 portents have been consistently ominous, from the overtime loss in Super Bowl LVIII, to the very public contract squabbling with Brandon Aiyuk, to the long run of key injuries, to the gunshot wound suffered by Ricky Pearsall, to multiple family tragedies, to the mediocrity displayed all season.
The Giants, Sharks, and Valkyries, meanwhile, launched different kinds of franchise renewals in the later months of this year. In October, after three consecutive non-playoff seasons under Farhan Zaidi, the Giants reached into the past and gave Buster Posey, emblem of three recent championships, total control of the franchise. Will he rebuild the Giants in his own image? Or will he carve them into something new?
The Sharks, after five consecutive bad years, got some lottery luck and ended up with Macklin Celebrini, who, at 18, is already flourishing in the spotlight.
And the Valkryies have built up a lot of financial and word-of-mouth momentum leading up to their debut season. But they need some headline players.
Of course, I saved the worst for last: There is nothing so reliably slapdash as any decision made by John Fisher, who finally moved the A’s out of Oakland. They’ll now play in a minor-league park in Sacramento for three or four years (or who knows how long) as Fisher finalizes a deal to build a new stadium in Las Vegas.
So if I write a 2025 version of this column, it will not include anything done, uttered, or messed up by Fisher. Yippee! I feel for Oakland fans. I feel for the players who must play in that little park, often in broiling heat. But in a year of zero actual Bay Area sporting celebrations and all too much gathering gloom, just getting rid of Fisher is 2024’s singular triumph.