Hot Hand Harbaugh tried to toss a bucket of cold water on the roiling, boiling masses Wednesday.

He missed.

In fact, the Great Quarterback Debate just got hotter, because Hot Hand (a.k.a. Jim) upped the ante by throwing every last 49ers fan under the team bus.

Do you have an opinion on which quarterback the 49ers should start Sunday in New Orleans? If so, my friend, you are not a fan. You are Benedict Arnold with a six-pack and a TV remote.

Hot Hand said, "I think most of the people who really want to know (who the starting quarterback will be) don't really care whether we win or lose, to be honest with you."

Harbaugh also said, disdainfully, of all this quarterback chatter, "People are probably drooling over themselves because they have something to talk about."

I was sitting 15 feet from Harbaugh, and I checked the front of my shirt. Sure enough, there was a pool of moisture. But it was warm in the interview tent at 49ers HQ in Santa Clara, so maybe it was perspiration. Or Pepsi.

I made a mental note to wear a bib the rest of the week, just to be safe.

Tony Avelar/Associated Press

By the way, I have the utmost admiration for Harbaugh as a football coach, but there is one thing he seems to be ignoring here. Those droolers who are casting their verbal votes in the Alex Smith vs. Colin Kaepernick debate are paying Hot Hand's salary.

Those droolers are funding, with their hearts and wallets, the new stadium that was rising nearby as Hot Hand spoke Wednesday. You want 49ers' fans and the media to stop arguing and debating over quarterbacks, especially now, here's what you do: Move the team to Los Angeles. Down there, they're too busy worrying about Kobe and Mike D'Antoni to drool over quarterbacks.

Hot Hand was right about one thing. This is a good problem. The 49ers have one quarterback who is playing at an elite level and is a proven winner with this coach and team. They have another quarterback who is suddenly the hottest young gun in the game.

How fat can one team be?

Hot Hand could have put a positive spin on the whole deal, thanking the fans for their intense interest in his team. Instead, he threw a murky pall over the whole lively debate.

By the way, Hot Hand got his nickname Monday night when he swatted away questions about his starting quarterback next Sunday by saying, "Generally, I like to go with the guy with the hot hand."

Really? If there's one thing we know about Harbaugh, it's that he's a one-quarterback man. He gave Andrew Luck the job at Stanford and never waffled. Harbaugh's first move as coach of the 49ers was to anoint Alex Smith as his guy, and to support him at every turn, even after the occasional cool-hand game.

Play the hot hand? How can a guy have a hot hand on the bench?

Hours after Harbaugh's press conference, word leaked out (SI.com) that he told his two quarterbacks he was going with Kaepernick to start Sunday, even if Smith is medically cleared.

Makes sense. This gives Smith's brain one more week to recongeal, and gives Kaepernick experience, in case Smith sprains an ankle between now and the Super Bowl.

So why all the secret stuff, with Harbaugh making no official call? Maybe to throw off the Saints, who had no idea that the 49ers have two quarterbacks?

Or maybe because Harbaugh gets irked when people - fans and media - try to tell him how to do his job.

Still, it was a fun press conference Wednesday. Not really contentious. I'd say Harbaugh was mildly peeved, and grudgingly resigned to the crud-disturbing media and the public preoccupation with the 49ers' quarterback situation.

Harbaugh did rate Kaepernick's Monday performance an "A-plus-plus," an upgrade since Monday night when the coach gave Kaepernick an "A-plus." Maybe Kaepernick got extra credit for picking up his dirty socks after the game.

Alex Smith handled the situation smoothly Wednesday. He said that he knows the drill, he's been in this situation before, and he and Kaepernick are determined to set a tone for the entire team by not letting the public debate seep into the quarterbacks' room and the team locker room. When he spoke to the media, Smith probably had already been told he would rest Sunday, a development he cannot like.

Smith resisted the temptation to say, "Maybe I don't deserve to start. After all, two of my last 27 passes were incomplete."

Smith knows this debate is a like a zombie - it's not going away.

Kaepernick also said the right things, but he clearly was less comfortable in handling the media bull rush. Kaepernick will get used to it. If he wins a couple of Super Bowls, he'll start hearing that he's no Joe Montana.

I don't usually give Harbaugh and his quarterbacks advice, but here's a suggestion to the fellas: Go see "Lincoln," Speilberg's new movie. It's two hours of our nation's House of Representatives in raucous, wonderful debate. That's America, boys!

We're a nation of droolers.