So much for that. Mr. October once again played spectacularly, as the injured and gasping-for-breath 49ers staggered to the bye week with a crushing defeat at the hands of the Denver Broncos. The injury-depleted defense offered little resistance as Denver scored on their first 2 possessions, while the 49ers went 3-and-out (highlighted by yet another drop on what would have been a 20 yard gain by Vernon Davis), missed a FG, and Anquan Boldin, after making a spectacular catch on the 3 by a nifty improve by Colin Kaepernick, dropped an easy peazy TD pass. The Niners settled for a FG there, but all in all, after the Niners drove down and scored a TD seconds before the end of the half, the 21-10 score wasn’t too too onerous.
Especially when the Niners forced a 3-and out to open the 3rd quarter. Unfortunately, Kappy misread a slant (something he seems to do once a week as the short guy was wide open), and threw a pick. Next play? TD Denver. The rout was on. All that was left was watching the DBs get toasted and the O line getting hurt.
Kilgore went down with a broken leg and his replacement Darrin Farrell walked off gingerly with a tweaked knee. Chris cook left with a hammy injury, Culliver left with a hammy strain as well, and the DBs were awful in general. I though getting Brock back would help. It didn’t. Culliver is completely dogshit these days. Love to see Cully go, but I ain’t holding my breath either. Dontae Johnson should be sliding up the depth chart right about now.
All that being said, giving Manning time to throw all night is tantamount to playing in quicksand for the DBs. Hard to generate pressure with all the injuries on defense, but still and all, just a piss-poor day all around. The bye can’t come at a better time. Call it a bad day and move on.
AZ, for all their glory, have the Eagles, Rams, Cowboys, Lions, and Seahawks their next 4 games while we have Rams, Saints, Giants and Redskins (and the bye). An easier task that we need to make hay on. The Niners need to win out and hope that AZ goes 3-2 in that stretch. That would put us at 8-3 and AZ at 8-3. The Seahawks? The Road Worriers? They have the Panthers and Chiefs on the road and the Raiders, Giants, and AZ at home. They go 3-2 and they are 6-4.
These next 4 games are huge for the 49ers. They stand to get healthy and much stronger in the next two weeks, but there’s a lot riding on all these games within our division.
There was also talk of shortening Aldon Smith’s suspension, but I haven’t heard any more. At this point, hopefully they’ll take 2 games off and he can resume playing due to good behavior. Do it. We desperately need reinforcements . . .
San Francisco 49ers Forever 
Not sweating that loss last night. No team finds it easy to win there, and certainly no team missing 5 or 6 starters. “Next man up” is the stupidest phrase in sports. If Barry Bonds goes down and the “next man up” in Gregor Blanco, that’s not supposed to make a difference? Why does one guy make $20M, and the other $1M, if there’s no difference. I’m with Chuck — take two weeks to get sorta healthy, then beat some pretty crappy teams. Kap had a very good first half, and a great one if his receivers got their heads outta their nether regions and didn’t drop 4 balls. I think he’s getting better. The play calling doesn’t seem to be, though. I’m no defensive coordinator. But, when I don’t see any RBs behind Kap, hey, it’s a pass. When there’s a back in the backfield, hey, it’s going to be a handoff off tackle. Roman’s a genius at making me an armchair DC…
Well, yeah there’s a time and place for 5 wide, but going from never seeing that to seeing it a lot is a bit weird. They do seem to be sticking with the 3 WR formations for the most part. Which I think gives them the best chance of mixing things up. Teams are back to loading the box against us though.
I think the red zone calls ARE getting better. Problem lately is the drops.
Like they all say, it ain’t how you start, it’s how you finish.
I wonder if Dennis recovered? He probably yelled his voice out and now is suffering in silence. Lets face it the Niners suck sometimes. At least they’re not the Raiders.
I’m not really sweating last night’s loss but Jesus, they couldn’t play decent enough to keep Manning in for the whole game? That’s always the ultimate degrade for me. He beat your ass so handily that he’s taking the rest of the night off. Pathetic.
But, they were missing a bunch of guys and Aldo might come back a little earlier. God knows they need a pass rush……
Yeah, we got our asses handed to us and even though it’s true we were short players we can’t really use that as an excuse. If nothing else this game should be a wake-up call to reality. I coulda dropped those passes just as well as they did. Anyway, some say a good ass whoopin can make you smarter, stronger, and tougher. If that’s the case I would hate to be the team up next.
One positive for me.
Several rookies got some exposure to a surgeon named Peyton.
The only way to improve your game is to get schooled by someone who does it better.
Rest up, dust off, get focused.
Our season rides on taking the Division or scrapping for a Wild Card Raffle.
Trade deadline and BYE week align perfectly for us too.
Target number one for me, jettison Culliver if possible.
They had a lot of shit stacked against them. Not in the least was the scheduling. A Monday night road game in St Loo followed by a short week and a road game in the altitude of Denver? Not much fun there.
Throw in a few more injuries and it certainly didn’t feel like we were going to win. Lose big? Ehhh. Shit they just lost Patrick Willis, and Mike Iupati last week to add on to all the others.
You never know these days. Seattle is looking real beatable on the road. AZ has 4 tough games coming up. Dallas is playing great but just wait til they fade in December/playoffs. Philly? Meh.
Denver? They are another team that could fade out. the AFC’s pretty weak though so they should roll. NFC? Why not us? Thing is, we could healthy up in time ffor a stromg playpoff run.
Still a little concerned about the red zone offense, but the problem lately has been drops and mistakes, not bad play calling.
Chuck I’ve always viewed AFC matchups as tune up games.
A time to work on problem areas.
What bothers me most was the loss to Chicago.
Having a leg up on Dallas is looking like a major coup thus far.
Having my doubts about Roman in one sense.
He doesn’t mix and match strategy very fluidly for me.
It seems like we’re working from a chapter and verse model instead of reading and reacting to Defensive tendencies,
Would like to see more focus on breaking a stacked box by passing our way out of it more often.
Perhaps this is on Kaep with pre-snap reads too?
Either way, Kaep looks more comfortable spreading the ball around of late.
Certainly can’t kvetch much about that.
Thought we might add some wrinkles like a screen game by now as well.
They are making an effort to involve Frank and Carlos in the passing game though.
Just seems like everything goes left.
Try leaking them into the middle maybe?
Give them some room to operate.
Yeah, they certainly don’t seem to trust Boone/Martin;s side of the line, and rightly so. With AD back, the hope is we can change up the roll-outs and maybe add in some screens to the right. But teams are back to overloading against the run. We have to figure out a better way of combatting this.
And the adjustment thing has bothered me as well, but that has gotten better in recent games. I mean we came back against KC and the Rams. Philly we simply dominated the whole game. I just don’t like the time it takes to rejigger the O or D when its going south.
I’m happy to see Kaep playing the QB position with some intent to get the ball down the field however Chuck.
Hate seeing him utilized as an extension of the running game.
Nice option to turn a negative play into a positive when needed.
Just don’t need him being exposed in the open field too often.
He’s looking more aware of his receiving options finally.
Great to have Stevie and Bling added to the fray.
The little steps are starting to show progress at least.
Now, can we find a way to get Vernon to use his hands to catch?
He’s been a body-catcher since he arrived.
Hands like feet as they say, ain’t doing us any favors.
Vernon at this stage is what he is sometimes brilliant, sometimes inept but never boring.
Yeah, the throw to Stevie Johnson on the 3 was another in a series of throws not too many guys can make. The pass he seems to be struggling with is the quick-read slant, Either free up the WR in that formation or work on it more in practice. In 2 instances of recent picks, it was the same deal of an outside WR and a trailing slot guy both running similar slant routes. He picked wrong both times and was picked both times.
That INT in the 3rd quarter was a killer. The Niners could have conceivably gotten back into the game at that point if they had scored a TD.
ESPN confirmed that Aldon Smith’s suspension ‘may’ be reduced a game or 2.
We likely won’t find out til next Tuesday though.
BLEEP!
Woot Giants! Man, Bumgarner got hammered. 1 run in 7+, 3 hits, 1 BB, 1 HBP, 5 K’s, ending his record postseason scoreless streak. M V P
Giants are rolling. What I find funny is all the people who constantly disregard the way they play the game. Bochy is head and shoulders (literally and figuratively) above the rest of the managers in the league. The media wonks however, treat him like a backwoods cracker without a clue. Metheny wasted his bullpen in curious moves, and no feel. Matt Williams was schooled. Bochy yet again knows when his guys are good to pitch one more frame, or need to be pulled. He and Righetti work a pitching staff better than any manager in recent memory.
The media has chosen the Royals as their team. In the East no one really knows who these teams are.
ESPN has been quite complimentary; one guy nominated him for the HOF. I was happy when he made Casilla the closer.
Hey Chuck, I was talking with a bunch of friends and we all agree that Kaep needs to dial down the speed of his passes. He seems to over throw deep passes consistantly. He does not need to throw that 89 MPH pass all the time.
At least the Niners can’t lose this weekend. Of course off the field stuff may occur. Ouch!
I’m really sad that we lost…
New thread is up.