San Francisco 49ers president Jed York discussed various stadium issues during a conference call Wednesday.

Stadium issues tend to be boring, except that they affect the game-day experience and, indirectly, football operations. This website put together by the 49ers provides full-screen views of what a new stadium in Santa Clara could look like.

I asked York how the 49ers' efforts to build a stadium could affect their cash flow in the coming years, and how that could affect football operations. York gave the expected answer.

"I think they are two very separate pieces," York said. "Trying to win on the field and trying to build a new stadium are not the same. It’s a different budget. We have a budget for what our player compensation is going to be and I think we’ve shown we want to make sure we extend our younger players. We want to make sure we go out and add the right free agents and we are going to continue to do that. Playing at Candlestick hasn’t held us back from going out and signing our own players and going out into the free-agent market and bringing in guys that we think can put us over the top and get us back to another Super Bowl."

It's tough to say the 49ers need a new stadium to compete in the current NFL while claiming their old stadium has not and will not hold them back, but the team has indeed reached out to younger players while improving its record. The 49ers' recent aversion to high-priced free agents has been shared throughout the league. It was also a function of their improvement through better drafting. But if the 49ers struggle over the next few seasons, let's not blame it on stadium costs.