Allen Outlines His Game Plan for Improving 49ers’ Fortunes

Faced with a myriad of details and more than a few doubts as he attempts to vitalize football at Cal State Long Beach, George Allen finds even the 49ers uniforms to be frustrating.

“Whoever designed those uniforms and colors (brown and gold) must have got his training in the Soviet Union,” Allen said in an austere, cramped office that did not seem to befit his stature.

From behind his desk, Allen picked up a helmet of the Washington Redskins, a team he once coached. “I designed the Redskins helmet, it’s a beautiful helmet,” he said. “The headdress and three stripes. This one is an inch wide, these are three-quarter inch.”

He next picked up the colorfully decorated helmet of the Chicago Blitz, which he also coached. “I put the Chicago flag on this one,” he said. “Does Long Beach have a flag? I’d like to get one.”

Then he looked with dismay at the plain brown Cal State Long Beach helmet. “I mean at least have a stripe on the goddarn thing,” he said.

The helmets and uniforms, Allen said, will be improved without circumventing the school’s color scheme.

It is too soon, though, for Allen to say if the players who will wear the new uniforms will be improved.

The 49ers were 4-8 in 1989 and have had one winning season in the last five years.

Allen, whose record as a pro coach is 118-54-5, was hired in December, a move that bathed the university in an unfamiliar national spotlight. He immediately showed he had not lost any zest by leading cheers at his introductory press conference.

Now he tries to maintain that level of enthusiasm, despite the often-overwhelming scope of his new job and speculation that this 71-year-old, perceived by some as eccentric, will never coach a game for the 49ers.

Allen insists he will.

“If you want to make a little money, make a bet on that,” he said last week. “If this were an easy job, I wouldn’t have taken it. I took it because the job is the most difficult in Division I.”

The 49ers football program was plagued throughout the 1980s by poor support, low attendance and financial hardship. Allen’s predecessor, Larry Reisbig, had 11 wins and 24 losses in three seasons.

Allen figures that six “game plans” are needed: winning community backing, upgrading facilities, devising fund-raising programs, improving recruiting and selling season tickets are the first five. The sixth, he said, might be the most important: “You can’t let anything discourage you because every day is a surprise of some sort.”

Asked if there have been any discouraging days so far, Allen said, “Well, maybe just one or two, I guess.” He laughed.

The person at Cal State Long Beach most familiar with Allen is Merle Makings, 34, the athletic department’s new marketing director. Makings and Allen worked together with the Arizona Wranglers of the now-defunct United States Football League.

“When (Allen) gets excited, he’s as excited as he was before the USFL championship game in 1984,” said Makings. “He has some temporary setbacks, but that’s because he is getting accustomed to the system here.”

As much as he anticipates his daily runs around the 49ers track, Allen longs for the day this spring when he finally will have his team on the field.

“The easiest part of the job is playing the game, coaching on Saturday,” he said. “It’s all these other things--recruiting, getting support, trying to get someone to get going on a new stadium. Right now there are probably 150 things that I should be doing.

“I haven’t looked at one film (from last season). That’s the least significant thing right now because of these other things.”

He worries especially about the practice field. When he coached the Wranglers, he searched Phoenix’s best country clubs to lure a groundskeeper to take care of his practice field.

“It has to be cut, it has to be lined,” he said. “The sprinklers have to be fixed, the holes filled. We have to keep the golfers off the field so they don’t take divots.”

Allen looked at a list of the 25 players he signed; on it are 16 community college players and nine players who are seniors in high school.

It was called a “typical Long Beach State recruiting class” by Cal-Hi Sports Weekly, a publication that ranks high school and college players. But Dick LaScola, who runs a Fallbrook-based scouting service, said Allen “has nothing to be ashamed of in that first class.”

The last addition to the list was Chris Stetz, a defensive lineman from Allan Hancock College in Santa Maria. “I talked to him about eight times,” Allen said.

He paused and said to Makings, “If there’s any coffee out there, I’d like a shot.”

“You want some more water, coach?” Makings asked.

Allen continued: “If we can’t stop the run, school is out, and from what I can gather they haven’t been able here to stop the run. “This guy (Stetz) is only 19, he’s 270 (pounds), bench presses around 400 pounds and he won’t make mistakes. He’ll be on time. He says, ‘Yes sir, no sir.’ His father graduated from the Air Force Academy.

“I have one (assistant) coach who thinks we’ve got to get a guy who’s faster than this guy. Well, I’ve got to educate this coach. The other guy might be faster but will he be on time? Will he be in the classroom, will he be loyal, will he practice well? Talent alone is not enough.”

Stetz’s name, along with a lot of others, is chalked on a board in Allen’s office.

“I told an intern coach I wanted him to put all these guys up on the board, seniors in orange and juniors in whatever color that is . . . sophomores, frosh, all different colors, then put their size and speed, and put stars on those who didn’t play last year.”

Allen scanned the board and said, “We don’t have a place-kicker.”

It was pointed out by a visitor that there is no experienced quarterback either.

“I know we don’t,” Allen said. “We don’t have defensive linemen, offensive linemen, a quarterback, a kicker, “ Allen said. “Outside of that we’re in great shape.”

He added, “I hope there are some pleasant surprises when we go out to field, that there are some players who are better than I’ve been led to believe.”

The general impression of Allen seems “incredibly good,” said Don Dyer, a Long Beach attorney and longtime 49ers fund-raiser. “I’m a little bit amazed. I thought it would be more wait and see. I know people who have bought tickets who haven’t bought them in the recent past.”

Dyer has heard the talk that Allen, who has a five-year contract at about $100,000 a season, might quit before the opening game at Clemson.

“I think some people just wonder how much George knows about the frustration level,” Dyer said. “Coming from the big time to here is not easy. But I think he’s in it for the duration.”

Jeff Severson, a Long Beach realtor who was a defensive back for Allen at Washington, said Allen “is working his tail off.”

“If he can help us build a stadium and even just be .500 he will have made a major contribution no one else has been able to do,” said Severson, who played at Cal State Long Beach in the late 1960s.

For the time being, the 49ers are stuck with Veterans Stadium, an off-campus relic that seats 12,500.

“I think to fill it you’ve got to win,” Allen said. “It will be hard to fill it if you get wiped out. If you get wiped out, people will say that the team is still the same old team.”

Clemson will be a heavy favorite to wipe out the 49ers in Allen’s inaugural game.

The 49ers are playing that game because of a $250,000 guarantee. In recent seasons they exchanged embarrassing beatings for big guarantees at Michigan, UCLA and Oregon.

“I don’t think you can just play somebody for money,” Allen said. “If your team plays somebody like (Clemson) and gets a shellacking, it’s demoralizing. I think this school is definitely 1-A classification, but I think we have to be realistic. We have to build a program and get a winning attitude, and it has to be a gradual process. By getting a little success in some of the other areas, then if you play schools like that, you can make it competitive. I’m no miracle worker, it’s going to take time.”

Allen said he has been putting in “a 40-hour week by Wednesday.”

This has caused his wife, Etty, to complain.

“Yeah, she knows I’m kind of nutty,” Allen said.

But eccentric?

“I think I know what’s right and how to do it, and I work hard,” Allen said. “I expect everyone to be on time, to be in shape, to be dedicated, to be loyal and to give 110%. That’s eccentric to some people.”

Allen has been motivating players with his “110%” spiel since 1966.

Among the many telephone calls he made on that morning last week was one that went like this: “I’d like to have some workout T-shirts that say ‘49er Football’ at the top and below that, ‘110%’ in at least three-inch letters. Have them make up some samples for me.”

It sounded a little corny, but then it’s always worked before.