San Francisco 49ers Forever

Just heard 49er Hall of Fame cornerback Jimmy Johnson passed away at 86 years old. He was hands-down ont hpof the best cornerbacks in NFL history. Teams would routinely just not throw to the right side ever. I saw him play in 1970 (I think) with casts on both arms and he still picked off a pass that game.

Took him a while to get in, but he was definitely deserving of the honor. He was always facing the #1 WR and he would rarely get chances to make plays, but he always seemed to make them when quarterbacks dared to throw on him.

Started his career as a WR and CB, he ended up excelling at the LCB position. His brother of course was Rafer Johnson, star of the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome.

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I guess the big new is the schedule is gonna be released!!!

May 15th, 5:00 PM PT!!

I’m sure the hype will be subdued and subtle.

The only scheduled game so far is the week 1 game in Brazil. Fucking Brazil!!!

On Friday, Sept. 6 the Eagles play the Packers Corinthians Arena in São Paulo, Brazil.  I guess no market is untappable. I wonder who gets screwed out of a home game. Not sure if we are playing somewhere out of the country, but hopefully it isn’t south of the equator.

Soon Elon Musk will be pimping for a game on the moon. Can’t wait for the pre-season extravaganza next year on the South Pole. I’m sure those penguins would be game for some merch. You know, from making money protecting the southern ice wall.

Not much to do now other than speculate about our draft picks and listen to the blather around BA and his imminent contract signing. Or not.

I do like the Mustapha signing. He looks like the real deal.

• Round 1 (31): WR Ricky Pearsall, Florida
• Round 2 (64): CB Renardo Green, Florida State
• Round 3 (86): G Dominick Puni, Kansas
• Round 4 (124): S Malik Mustapha, Wake Forest
• Round 4 (129): RB Isaac Guerendo, Louisville
• Round 4 (135): WR Jacob Cowing, Arizona
• Round 6 (215): G Jarrett Kingston, USC
• Round 7 (251): LB Tatum Bethune, Florida State

UDFAs

Cody Schrader, RB, Missouri
Drake Nugent, C, Michigan
Evan Anderson, DL, FAU
Mason Pline, TE, Furman
Tanner Mordecai, QB, Wisconsin
Terique Owens, WR, Missouri State

Hey, at least we got Terique Owens out of the 2024 son-of-a HOF-49er draft class. Well, Gore should be in some time soon.

Brenden Rice went to the Chargers in the 7th round
Frank Gore Jr wen to Buffalo as a UDFA

For once a draft went pretty much how I hoped it would. Focussing on the O line, defensive backfield, and grabbed a couple dynamic WRs to boot. Even the obligatory raRB is a speed-burning mismatch for defenses.

The wonks for the most part, minus Mel Kiper’s disembodied helmet-hair-head, liked our draft. Don’t mean shit, but there you have it. Your 2024 49ers draft class.

Well, after all my bitching and prevaricating about their 1st round pick, the 49ers pretty much did what I wanted in these first 3 rounds. Get offensive line help, corner help, and WR help.

They just didn’t do it in the order I preferred. Pearsall sounds like a solid WR, Green seems to be a guy who has improved markedly every year he plays, and Dominick Puni gave up 0 sacks in over 700 snaps in college. Sweet.

Really like the Puni pick. Trent Williams is great but we need a backup. Puni looks like the real deal. These draft grades are not worth the vapor they are printed on but this looks good to me so far. We have 6 picks today, and since this is when the team usually drafts well, got to wonder what they hit on in these later rounds.

Hmmmmm. Consensus is all over the board on this Rickey Pearsall pick. The guy sounds very good, he played against Purdy in HS, Brandon Aiyuk loved the pick, and he immediately jumps to the 2A WR option. Obviously this is bad news for Danny (the) Grey (ghost), our speed guy who has done nothing in his 2 year career. 13 games, 7 targets, 1 catch. So he’s likely on the scrap-heap with Dante Pettis and Jalen Hurd.

My thoughts (stop me if you haven’t heard this 1,000,000 times) are we need offensive line (mainly tackle) depth and cornerback depth. O line, because Trent Williams isn’;’t getting any younger, and Mckivitz is fairly pedestrian. Would have loved trading up to get a guy like OT Tyler Guyton, who went at 29.

I get the uncertainty around BA, but I’m still in the mode that they aren’t trading either Deebo (a giant cap hit if traded this year), or BA (a cap savings if extended this year), so they possibly could have gotten a guy like Cooper DeJean or Koolaide McKinstry, and traded up in day 2 for Pearsall.

I’m pretty sure we trade up today. We NEED a solid CB and we need one today. Day One saw all the top linemen go, so I don’;’t know what they have on their radar. I’m kinda certain they would have taken Guyton had he fallen to us.

4:00 PM PST – ABC / ESPN

Sign Aiyuk

Draft O line help

Draft DB depth

DO IT!!!

5:00 PM PT on ABC / ESPN

Gunny, the closer we get to the draft, the less and less the pronostispewers go away from the 49ers drafting an offensive tackle. a few sites have us even taking a DE. This after spending the free agency period addressing the defense, the defense, and the defense. They also seem to think we are weak at safety as the Niners were supposedly ‘disappointed’ in Hufanga’s play before he got hurt, and rookie Brown’s after. But sure, depth would be nice.

However, they did mention the CB position and how bad things got by the playoffs. That IS a concern as we were down to a journeyman . Mooney is a stud, Lenoir is a very solid guy, Thomas is decent, but we need to be stronger at CB. Depth is key.

But we still need to (I think) trade up for one of the better tackles. I know the team does so well with lower picks, and they traditionally do this kind of low-level sleeper lineman pick all the time, but the time to invest in the line with some top-grade talent is now.

Well, there is this. Brock Purdy apparently saved a newscaster and her dog from getting attacked by a coyote in the Bernal Heights neighborhood where Purdy was filming (surprise) a John Deere commercial.

“We’re shooting this commercial on a hill on the outside of the city,” Purdy said. “I see this thing trotting by that has a big tail. I was like, ‘That looks like a mini wolf.’ No one else was gonna scream, so I screamed, ‘Yo, there’s a coyote!’ That thing went running off. It could’ve been an ugly day on the shoot, but we saved her.”

Turns out it was CBS News Bay Area anchor Sara Donchey.

“I was walking my dog when this happened,” Donchey said back in February. “I was watching from Bernal Heights Park when I suddenly heard Brock scream, ‘Coyote!’ I turned around and saw the biggest coyote I’ve ever seen sneaking up behind me and my dog. When I walked down the hill, one of the film crew guys said, ‘Hey, Brock Purdy saved your life.’ Not exactly, but it’s a good story to tell next season.”

Hey, it’s fucking slow now.

Draft O linemen.

Well, nothing. Fuck OJ.

Word on the street is we are looking to extend the contract of . . .

Deommodore Lenoir!!

Aiyuk? Well, still negotiating I suppose. At least the chatter has slowed. Just get the shit done.

Anyhow, hearing reports that the Niners might ‘surprise’ the league and trade up for a tackle.

REALLY?!?

No shit, guys? The weakest part of this team is pass protection. Do something about it. I’d be happy if they drafted 5 linemen with their 11 picks. Anyhow, just wanted to get OJ’s mug off the blog. Have fun in hell, Juice. We shall meet soon!

OJ Simpson died yesterday at the age of 76. Dead of cancer. The feel-good story out of Potrero Hill and CCSF who became a Hall of Fame running back for Buffalo, the first back to rush for over 2,000 yards (in a 14 game season no less), the first black spokesman for a major US company (Hertz), had a pretty strong acting career (Capricorn One, Roots, Towering Inferno), and hit comedy highs with Leslie Nielsen and the Naked Gun series then became a pariah for getting away with murder and ultimately doing time for the armed robbery of what used to be his memorabilia left a crazy legacy as a spectacular athlete, a great friend, a wonderful guy, and ultimately a deeply flawed human being.

Stripped of his Heisman and pretty much shunned by most of the friends he had made over the years, the guy was a phenomenal running back. By the time he came to the 49ers, he was a broken shell of himself. The only good thing he did for the 49ers was convince Joe Thomas to install grass back at Candlestick Park to help his ailing knees.

The car chase, the threatened suicide, and his subsequent trial and acquittal became a spectacle for the ages.