San Francisco 49ers Forever

These are the doldrums of the football season. OTAs and mini camps didn’t generate much. Other than the hyperbole around who our QB is, or how we will be trading for Chase Young. Right. We don’t have enough defensive linemen so we will trade for another one? Doubtful. Brock Purdy is apparently cruising along in his rehab and is a little ahead of schedule, so there’s that. The quarterback controversy may not happen after all. But I am glad we have a couple options, seeing as our QB situation is always a bit fluid.

And yeah, the 49ers bought an English soccer team. I guess we really need that kicker pipeline?

Sure, whatevs. I guess they really want to try out the Ted Lasso thing for reals. The team is Leeds United, a team that was recently relegated out of the Premier League to whatever the 2nd tier is. This sounds just like the premise for Ted Lasso. Would we get a comp pick if we send out special teams coach to England?

The only thing I really know about Leeds is of course the Who’s spectacular live album done there.

Well, for what it’s worth (and thank God, BTW), the powers that be have named Trey Lance as quarterbacko numero uno. At least he’s getting the starting QB reps. In OTAs. In May. Zzzzzzzz.

So, yeah, whatever. Funny how the world is suddenly in tune with Lance being the savior of the team now rather than the guy the team wanted to kick out the door a month ago.

But, hey, it’s still May, and we are slowly grinding toward the start of the season when camp opens in July. Much like Trey Lance’s reincarnation though, the Giants have provided a spark to the summer as they brought up some young guns of their own and are starting to actually play interesting baseball. They’ve blown past the Padres and have their sights set on the D-Backs.

Fun fun!

How this latest QB deal shakes out, I have no idea. But I mean really, what if Lance comes in guns a-blazin’ and puts up early Kaepernick numbers? What if he blows away the world in his first few games? Will he even get a shot?

We don’t even know, seeing as all reports are that Purdy will start throwing next week, and that his scheduled recovery is on schedule. Strange days indeed. There is a long time before all this is hammered out, but it still makes me excited about this upcoming season. This team is poised at the pinnacle of success, and have only themselves to stop them.

Party on!!

Yippie. I guess. Last time they did this it was on Market St. 6 blocks from where I worked. When I was working in an office. Crazy security. You could count up to 10 guys stationed on top of the buildings going down market to the Ferry building. nd it was only 40 miles away from the stadium.

Odd.

But whatevs. For all the stink Santa Clara raised about the stadium, they’ll gladly take all that NFL money to the bank. Wonder how the package deals work out, though. Do they stay in SF up until game day? It may be since all the pregame BS in up there. Shit, I just hope we are one of the teams playing.

Anyhow, the story line of “everyone in the building hates Trey Lance” seems to have morphed into “Trey Lance has made huge strides practicing with Patrick Mahomes.” Yeah, and I have land on the moon for sale. We used to hear how great Alex Smith was at throwing deep passes every fucking offseason yet neither Nolan, Singletary, or Harbaugh ever tried.

Thing is, all signs are pointing to Purdy being on schedule with his rehab. I guess. I really want the powers that be to slow-roll Purdy’s recovery. Mainly to give Lance a real shot at running the team. Passing, I mean. None of this RPO shit that will get him killed. Said it before and I’ll say it again. Pete Carroll played it right with Russell Wilson. He made him a pocket passer that could escape trouble and use his speed to elude pass rushers and get big chunks of yards. Because his WRs were on mid to deep routes ALL THE TIME. This opened up the flats and the edges of the defense and gave the 49ers fits for 10 years.

This is how Shanahan HAS to play it. End of story. Sure, he can have a check-down in CMC, or even Kittle at times, but the offense NEEDS to be built around a strong passing game. Not the RPO crowd-the-line bullshit. Open this up and let Lance do his thing.

Jim Brown, one of football’s, and humanity’s, greatest passed away at the age of 87. Beyond the punishing power and speed of his football abilities, he was one of the original social justice warriors who never backed down from a fight. He was one of the first mega football stars as he drove the popularity of the sport on TV in the early 60s with his relentless running style. In his short 9 year career he shattered rushing and TD records across the league.

At the height of his career he retired to pursue acting. He did a great turn in the Dirty Dozen, 100 Rifles opposite Raquel Welch, and a bunch of blaxploitation films, including the parody I’m Gonna Git You, Sucka! Great stuff. His inner-city causes spanned decades, and raised millions upon millions.

Rushing for 1,863 s a great season by today’s standards. Brown did it in 14 games.
Brown also rushed for 1,538 in 12 games in 1963.

The 49ers picked up another UDFA. This guy, FB Jack Colleto, 6’3″, 240 lb, plays all over the field on offense and defense, was the Paul Hornung winner, and seems to be the kind of guy Shanahan drools over.

In 43 games with Oregon State, Colletto rushed for 401 yards and 22 touchdowns, caught four passes for 37 yards and a touchdown, passed for 254 yards, and had 51 tackles and an interception on defense.

Not sure he’ll get much LB time, but the guy was unstoppable in short yardage. Remember short yardage? The bane of Kyle Shanahan’s existence? Most teams don’t have one fullback. Now we have 2. Hey if he can get that 3rd and 1 or 2nd and goal, I’m all for it.

https://sports.yahoo.com/oregon-states-jack-colletto-signs-053705250.html

Jacob’s Ladder? Highway to Hell? We will see, but this sched looks fairly beefy. The good news is the first 4 games aren’t of the hellacious type, so if our QB situation isn’t ironed out, we have a good month to settle in.

The givens should be Pitt, Cle, Rams x2, Jax, TB, and AZ x2. The rest are playoff teams and Seattle, always a thorn. Then again, one season’s turd is next seasons darling.

Fun fact, we play on both Thanksgiving day and Christmas day. And we have SIX trips to the east. And for some reason we have TWO fucking Thursday games. Fuck you very much, Roger.

FWIW, and yeah, this shit is total shit because you really can’t tell how a draft goes for a good 3-4 seasons have gone by, but that doesn’t stop the talking wonks from shitting all over a given team’s draft. I mean who can forget the glowing accounts of the first draft done by the new regime in 2017? It was pretty much unanimous As across the board.

We all know how that turned out. Solly Thomas was a solid 3rd round pick, not a #3 overall. Reuben Foster did his best Aldon Smith impersonation, Joe Williams never got on the field, etc. Kittle was the steal of that draft.

This draft? Pretty much Cs to Fs from the prognosticators. Why? Who knows? Brown at Safety was a pick for need. Antonio Gipson is 33 and was solid, but getting a younger stud guy there fits our need. Moody? Sure, using a 3rd round pick on him might be seen at a little high, but 2 things.

1. It was a comp pick, so you can call it a 4th round pick
2. He’s a starter. Unless something goes horribly wrong, he’s the starting kicker. Getting a starter in the 4th round is usually thought of as a good thing.

Latu? A reach? Maybe, but he’s a guy in the mold of Kittle who didn’t have huge numbers, but did enough things (blocking, route running, being a nuisance) well enough to take a shot on. Beal seems to be a bona fide playmaker who has something that jumps off the tape, and that’s his first step to the QB. The rest are what they are. Until they get into camp and train, all this is pure guess work.

And, given the track record of the success this front office has with day 2 and 3 guys, I’d give them the benefit of the doubt. For now.

And a shout out to Ronnie Lott, celebrating his 64th birthday. The man was a joy to watch and I saw countless games at the Stick where he was throwing himself around with reckless abandon.

For funzies, let’s take a look at last year’s draft.

Round 2 (No. 61 overall) – Drake Jackson, LB/DE, USC
Round 3 (93) – Ty Davis-Price, RB, LSU
Round 3 (105, special compensatory) – Danny Gray, WR, SMU
Round 4 (134) – Spencer Burford, OT, Texas-San Antonio
Round 5 (172) – Samuel Womack, CB, Toledo
Round 6 (187, from Broncos) – Nick Zakelj, OT, Fordham
Round 6 (220, compensatory) – Kalia Davis, DT, UCF
Round 6 (221, compensatory) – Tariq Castro-Fields, CB, Penn State
Round 7 (262, compensatory) – Brock Purdy, QB, Iowa State

Jackson? Meh. Showed flashes at times. But D linemen not named Nick Bosa usually take a year or 2 to get comfortable in the NFL so he’s not toast. Yet.
Davis-Price? Another useless 3rd round waste RB pick that will do little to nothing.
Gray? A doghouse denizen. No idea what he brings.
Burford? Turned into a bona fide starter.
Womack played fine for where he was drafted. Special teams standout.
Davis and Zakelj are still on the team.
Brock Purdy? Gee, not sure about him.

But stop me if you heard this before. Top picks bad. Bottom picks good. And the very bottom turned out pretty good, eh?

Here are the OOFDAs

Tay Martin, WR, Oklahoma State – 6’3″/186
Segun Olubi, LB, San Diego State – 6’2″/220
Jason Poe, OL, Mercer
Leon O’Neal, S, Texas A&M – 6’1″/210
Taysir Mack, WR, Pittsburgh – 6’2:/190
Dohnovan West, C, Arizona State – 6’4″/300
Kevin Atkins, DT, Fresno State
Qwuantrezz knight, CB, UCLA
Sam Schlueter, OL, Minnesota
Jeremiah Gemmel, LB, UNC
Taylor Hawkins, DB, San Diego State
Jordan Mason, RB, Georgia Tech

Poe, Hawkins, and Knight are still on the team, Olubi is on the Commanders, O’Neal is in Canada, Mack is out of football, West, Gemmel, and Atkins are in the XFL, Scheluter is on the Jets.

Mason of course was the prize of this OOFDA group. He’s a stud runner who a lot of us were high on. And he flew past TDP on the depth chart.

Hmmm. Liked the guys we got on Friday.
Saturday? Meh. Thought we’d draft O line help and maybe more CBs, but hey, we didn’t draft an RB!

Round 3: 87th-Overall – S Ji’Ayir Brown, Penn State
Round 3: 99th-Overall – K Jake Moody, Michigan
Round 3: 101st-Overall – TE Cameron Latu, Alabama
Round 5: 155th-Overall – CB Darrell Luter Jr., South Alabama
Round 5: 173rd-Overall – DL Robert Beal Jr., Georgia
Round 6: 216th-Overall – LB Dee Winters, TCU
Round 7: 247th-Overall – TE Brayden Willis, Oklahoma
Round 7: 253rd-Overall – WR Ronnie Bell, Michigan
Round 7: 255th-Overall – LB Jalen Graham, Purdue

The UDFAs are:

OL Joey Fisher, Shepherd
OL Ilm Manning, Hawaii
C Corey Luciano, Washington
FB Jack Colletto, Oregon State
RB Ronald Awatt, UTEP
DB D’Shawn Jamison, Texas
DB Avery Young, Rutgers
DL Spencer Waege, North Dakota State
RB Khalan Laborn, Marshall
LB Mariano Sori-Marin, Minnesota
WR Jadakis Bonds, Hampton

We waited till UDFA time for the RB and O line help. Three O linemen, a couple DBs, 3 RBs, and the rest. Here on Gilligan’s Island.

The good news is Mel Kiper gets to detach his head and go back underground for another 51 weeks. He gave the Niners the worst draft report card. Which of course means we nailed it. Since our braintrust seems to thrive on the lower rounds, let’s hope they keep it up. No one knows how these go. 2017 was rated a top draft, and just by looking at it in the moment, sure. Funny thing is, George Kittle was the star of that draft. In the 5 hole. DT DJ Jones was drafted in the 6th round. The rest are either out of football or 3rd stringers. Witherspoon is decent enough at times, Solly Thomas bounced around to the Jets, Reuben Foster is in the USFL, BeatHard is a backup for the Jags, and Joe Williams never made an NFL roster.

Ouch. So, fuck Mel Kiper’s head. Still time to pick up some FA O line help.

For draft day 2 I give the 49ers a solid B. The Niners traded up to 87 to get Ji’Ayir Brown. A highly rated guy who is a ball-hawking safety who can play deep or close to the line. He had 10 picks and 122 tackles his senior year at Penn State. Ferocious hitter who can cover. Like the pick.

A kicker? Hey, better than a throw-away RB. We need someone to replace Robbie Gould, and Moody is the most consistent guy in college, so there’s that. Robbie was also talking to Moody, according to Matt Maiocco:

Jake Moody says he’s been talking a lot with Robbie Gould, and Robbie just texted to him to congratulation him and tell him how great it is with the 49ers.

Here’s what Shanahan said about drafting a kicker. Really:

I still can’t believe we didn’t take a running back.” 

He then said this in a more serious vein. I can live with it:

“You think you’re looking at there’s probably five to six teams who you feel need a kicker. So the whole debate is where to go get that guy, because it’s someone you need to get. And when you look at the history, the majority of kickers go in the fourth round. We didn’t have a fourth round pick. The guy was not going to be there in the fifth round.”

We needed a kicker. We got one. TE Cameron Latu? Good blocker, good route runner, decent enough. Maybe another Kittle in the rough. I expect today to be a lot of beef for the O line. Maybe a flier at CB.

Round 5, Pick 155
Round 5, Pick 173 (via MIA)
Round 6, Pick 216 (Compensatory)
Round 7, Pick 247
Round 7, Pick 253 (Compensatory)
Round 7, Pick 255 (Compensatory)