Tim Kawakami: 49ers will unseat Seahawks this season

Yes, I’m picking the 49ers to win the Super Bowl, even though they’ve spent most of preseason making that February outcome seem beyond the realm of earthly reason.

Meanwhile, the defending champion Seattle Seahawks have looked relatively invincible - it’s only August, but any version of invincibility at any time is something of a positive indicator.

For, you know, future and possibly perpetual invincibility.

And, of course, the 49ers have played well but fallen short in each of the last three seasons under Jim Harbaugh.

I’m still picking the 49ers, though. I have several reasons for this, but the main one involves the pride of that locker room and the sense that the 49ers’ core group has one more run in it and won’t go oh-for-four in their Super Bowl quest.

Even if things look a bit dodgy at present. Right, Patrick Willis?

“The only thing that matters is what we believe in this locker room,” Willis said this week when I asked about the question marks surrounding this team now. “And we believe in each other, we believe in what we have here.

“If it’s easy, we’ll take it. If not, then we’ll earn it. As we always do.”

It won’t be easy. It’s never easy once you get to the playoffs, as the 49ers have learned.

But I’ve decided that the outside fretting and anxiety might make all the counter-intuitive difference for the 49ers this postseason. It might even calm them down.

“I’ve never seen worrying help anyone’s problems or help anyone get better,” quarterback Colin Kaepernick said this week. “So we’re not going to worry.”

Let’s say the 49ers start off a little slowly, which isn’t much of a stretch.

I’m saying that the 49ers will address their troubles, make the adjustments, eventually get their best injured or absent players back, and then, to use some of Harbaugh’s parlance, the 49ers can re-tool, re-group and re-set themselves for a fresh run into deep winter.

By the way, it would also be a huge help for the 49ers if somebody else can knock off Seattle in an early round of the playoffs.

And that’s exactly the fate I’m predicting for Seattle, given the recent quick-exit history of past Super Bowl champions in their follow-up year.

It’s just tough to remain invincible for that long.

So – again, if you eliminate Seattle – it’s realistically down to New Orleans, Green Bay or the 49ers.

And I’m picking the team with the best defensive players and the quarterback with the most room to grow and offensive weaponry stacked all around him.

I’m picking the 49ers, who understand the significance of this season, after the last three playoff defeats.

If they don’t do it now, the core 49ers know that they may never do it. That’s a pretty good motivation, no?