Ed Lee: 49ers Bound for Super Bowl — and Santa Clara

It's a good year for the San Francisco 49ers -- and for Santa Clara, in the opinion of San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee.

The 10-2 49ers are playoff-bound for the first time since 2002 and are headed to the Super Bowl for sure, according to the mayor. They're also, more than likely, headed to Santa Clara, the mayor told the San Francisco Chronicle.

It's not "110 percent done" yet, in the words of the mayor, but the city of Santa Clara has secured about $850 million of the necessary financing to build the stadium, the cost of which is now pegged at close to $1.1 billion, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. That means that that field is much closer to reality than dreams -- which is the current state of a stadium-sharing plan with the Raiders.

San Francisco's only hope, a Hunter's Point stadium to be shared with the Oakland Raiders, appears less and less likely, even as a secret architectural firm announced it has secured up to $600 million to build a 70,000-person arena with a retractable roof there.

Pushers of keeping the San Francisco 49ers in San Francisco are flogging this possibility, but Ed Lee appears to be a pragmatist.

"It's a business decision that's being made here," said the mayor, who will meet with 49ers owner Jed York on Thursday nonetheless. "If someone's got hundreds of millions of dollars lying around,we haven't seen it."