Kawakami: Valkyries give Chase Center a soul, Harbaugh's clarity, and more thoughts

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Four bold thoughts, starting with ...

The Tech Lords who buy up the front rows at Warriors games would've been long gone. Almost everybody else would've been rushing to call an Uber or fight their way to the freeways.

But at Chase on Sunday evening, as the Atlanta Dream's blowout victory over the Valkyries wound down, I still saw kids wearing cardboard wings and dancing in the aisles. I felt the rumble when the crowd frantically counted down "3! 2! 1!" as the shot clock elapsed for the home team.

I heard thousands scream for Kate Martin's three-pointer in the final seconds — to close the final deficit to 16 points, the worst home loss in Valkyries history.

Whatever was unleashed when the Valkyries debuted at Chase in May to uproarious, elated sellout crowds ... it's still happening. The Valkyries' loss dropped them to the seventh seed in the WNBA standings, but they're still playing far above expectations, still the winningest expansion team in league history, still racking up sellouts (16 in 16 home dates) and still above the playoff cutline with 10 games to play.

Oh, and this, too: No matter what else happens this season, it's clearer and clearer that it wouldn't have happened like this without Chase, and Chase wouldn't be thrumming like this without these basketball players. Chase doesn't always thrum like this even for the Warriors — the rich guys stay in the suites, make deals, and maybe pay attention to the score and maybe not.

I'm sure there are plenty of rich people at Valkyries games, but my gosh, there are tons of families, too. And they all stay in their seats and yell. A lot.

Of course, the Warriors — who will start their sixth season at Chase in the fall — are the most important team with the most important player who will ever play home games in this arena. But the Stephen Curry era started in Oakland and hit its first and highest emotional peaks there. Chase still feels like the new place for the Warriors, not the most sanctified.

The Valkyries, though, are hitting peaks right now. Obviously, Bay Area women's basketball fans were dying for this. Add in thousands of casual or non-WNBA fans who got curious once they heard the ruckus. And they can get to Valkyries games, with all the amenities and familiar environment, at about half the price.

This Valkyries ground-floor moment — full of Tiffany Hayes drives and Cecilia Zandalasini jumpers — feels specific to a time and place and it feels like it will be remembered like this forever.

Extra note: Due to a quirk of long-ago scheduling (before the Valkyries came into existence, the Laver Cup was booked for Sept. 19-21 at Chase, with many advance days needed for the setup), playoff games could be shifted out of Chase in the first or second rounds.

It'll be different, but there's every reason to expect that the Ballhalla atmosphere will travel to Oakland Arena or, more likely, San Jose's SAP Center, or wherever these games are played and Valkyries fans assemble. And then whenever the first playoff game happens at Chase, there will be an explosion.

Get ready for 10 more seasons of this, 49ers fans. OK, well, at least for all of this season.

But also, probably for many more after that of Jake Moody looking great, Moody looking middling, Moody looking far less than middling, and Kyle Shanahan keeping Moody as the 49ers' kicker through every fluctuation. Probably all in the same game — just like what happened Saturday in Las Vegas, naturally.

Good for Moody that he bounced back from an early miss from 53 yards out and then a near-miss from only 26 with a solid 44-yarder to tie the game late then a majestic 59-yard game winner (probably the best-struck kick of Moody's 49ers career).

All that in a preseason game. Just weeks after the 49ers seemed to be very interested in a true kicking competition — that ended swiftly when they cut Greg Joseph.

Shanahan and Lynch drafted Moody in the third round two years ago so they'd never have to worry about the kicker again. They've had to worry about Moody, but they also worry more about doing worse if they cut him. He's just good enough to keep this going ... for many years.

For 49ers-observer purposes, Mike Sando's annual must-read QB Tiers story last week in The Athletic was a good reminder that Purdy, who dropped a few slots from last year to 14th overall but remained in Tier 2, is still at least a few years from his prime.

Purdy, who won't turn 26 until this December, is the third-youngest QB in the top two tiers, behind only two other Tier 2 guys — Jayden Daniels, who is one year younger, and C.J. Stroud, who is almost two years younger. And Purdy is more than a year younger than Jordan Love, listed one slot above Purdy, at No. 13, in the overall rankings.

There are five QBs in Sando's Tier 1 — two of them are 28 (Lamar Jackson and Joe Burrow), two are 29 (Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen), and one is 38 (Matthew Stafford for the first and probably the last time).

The NCAA hammer came down last week on Michigan football and the very famous, very defiant, very successful man who used to lead it. Big fine. Scathing words about the role Jim Harbaugh, Sherrone Moore, and others played in the sign-stealing scheme, and about the dismissive and disdainful way the entire program dealt with this investigation and others.

And of course, then came the national indignation, much of it directed at Harbaugh, who is starting his second season with the LA Chargers after winning the 2023 national championship with Michigan and now — not that it really matters anymore — essentially is banned from college coaching until 2038. (Chargers vs. 49ers at Levi's Stadium on Saturday, by the way. Should be a lot of Chargers' backup QB Trey Lance.)

I won't type out a defense of Harbaugh here. First, because he and/or his staff broke rules and he was a problematic figure in the investigation. And secondly, Harbaugh and I have known and trusted (and at times battled with) each other back to his Stanford and then 49ers days and still keep in touch. Anything I say about this will sound defensive about someone I've always respected.

Other than this: To me, 90% of this entanglement — and frankly, probably 99% of his career motivation and success — boils down to Harbaugh sometimes rightfully and sometimes self-destructively thumbing his nose at authority, bureaucracy, and anything else that might try to get in his way. And pushing others to line up behind him to strike at those powers.

Yes, I might very much identify with this instinct and with those strikes.

It gets blurry when you read the investigation's report, but Harbaugh does have a sense of right and wrong. It's not anybody else's sense, it's his own. It's definitely not about playing to outsiders' conception of justice or pleading for understanding, Harbaugh, as always, is going all his own way.

If you do that, you can get blasted with sanctions. You can get fired when you've been the 49ers' best coach in decades. You can look silly or hypocritical. You had better win, in the end. And yes, Harbaugh wins. Which is all that matters to him.

Study the cases. This was not a bandit program, certainly not against the backdrop of other major investigations and proven violations. But there were rules that were not taken very seriously. So Harbaugh's reputation will never be pristine. Maybe he has made accusations about others that don't look so good now, but I don't think he cared too much about that even when he was zinging Urban Meyer to me in 2019.

"Urban Meyer's had a winning record. A really phenomenal record everywhere he's been," Harbaugh said. "But also, controversy follows everywhere he's been."

The Meyer part is crucial. Harbaugh didn't want to lose to Ohio State anymore. To Meyer or anybody like Meyer. It was about competition. And Harbaugh was compelled to win. I don't think he'll deny that part. I don't think he can deny it. Denying it would be for those who kiss up to bureaucracy, who "come clean" just for PR's sake, or who aren't willing to make enemies on the way forward.

Harbaugh is just clearer about this than anybody else. You can hate this about Harbaugh. I get it. So does he. But I've always respected that essential part of him and I still do.