Forty Niners Forever

The football Gods have smiled on me. A friend of my wife is a huge Niner fan and has two extra tickets for the game tomorrow. I’ll be going with a friend of mine, and she is flying up from LA with a friend of hers Suhnday morning. Her friend knows one of the coaches, so these tickets have VIP access to the field before the game, and whatever pre-game activities there are. She has never been to a game before so she is psyched.

I’m pretty psyched myself to be able to get on the field, but the pregame stuff should be fun too. I’m just hoping against hope this team gets their collective shit together and plays a good game. The very good news is that Dre Greenlaw and Azeez Al-AShaair are both back on defense. And of course just about everyone else is back as well. No AA, but this is as healthy as we have been in quite a while.

These guys have to prove sooner or later that they are actual contenders this year and not just pretenders.

Let me start this by saying I feel bad for the city of San Diego. They had an absolutely dedicated fan base and a team that was mercurial to say the least. Through their entire existence they have been an exciting team From the get-go in 1960 and the high flying AFL days of Sid Gillman, John Hadl, Tobin Rote (who won them their one and only championship in 1963), Dan Fouts and Air Coryell, and one of my favorite WRs in the game ever, Lance (Bambi) Alworth, the Chargers were always pushing the limit of offensive firepower. Even up to the Drew Brees/Philip Rivers era they always scored and scored a lot.

But they seem to always fuck up. A more snake-bit team you can’t find. They have lost more games in weird ways while STILL winning a ton of games. The most infamous being the 2006 playoffs against The Pats when, on 4th and 5, Brady threw a pick to Marlon McGree with 6 minutes left and the Chargers up 21-13. Instead of just laying there and sealing the win, or even dropping the ball as it is 4th down, McGree gets up, gains 2 yards and promptly fumbles the ball. Brady gets the pats int the end zone, converts the 2-pts, and SD eventually loses 24-21.

The Chargers lost a game when Philip Rivers was trying to spike the ball and kick the winning FG, and instead fumbled the snap, KC recovered, and kicked THEIR game winning FG 20 seconds later. The Chargers lost a game to the Broncos when they were up 24-0 at the half and turned the ball over on 5 out of 6 2nd half possessions, losing 35-24. Blowing a 4th and 29 against the Ravens, on and on.

Now? Same shit different era. The Chargers are always competitive, but lose close games all the time. With Justin Herbert, they are once again an offensive powerhouse but the same weird luck still dogs them.

Now of course they have a head coach hell-bent on losing games for his team. Brandon Staley single-handedly kept the Chargers out of the playoffs last year with multiple ludicrous 4th down failures. Down the stretch they lost to the Raiders and Chiefs in games they should have won.

The Raider game had the infamous timeout called by Staley at the end of OT. The Raiders were going to let the clock run out as they had the ball at mid-field and the tie would have put both the Raiders and the Chargers into the playoffs. Instead, Staley calls a timeout. The Raiders decide to go for the win and get it with a FG. The Chargers fall 0ut of the playoffs.

Derp. This year of course, Staley has revretted and punted late in games where he should have gone for it.

I just hope we keep the streak going. The Chargers ALWAYS play hard and they always play close, but they somehow pull bad juju out of thin air.

Is the glass half full? Is the glass half empty? Is there whiskey in the glass? We have reached the midway point of the season at the middle of the glass. The good news for our 4-4 record is that we are only 1.5 games behind Seattle. Yeah, fucking Seattle. The team that won’t go away. Say what you will about their old coach, their shitty defense, and their journeyman quarterback, they are winning games and have the lead.

The good news is we are 3-0 in the division and already have a win against them. The other good news is that we are getting our playmakers back in Deebo, Elijah, and Juice to go along with the newly acquired Christian McCaffery. So, the glass appears to be half-full of some excellent 25 year old small-batch whiskey. A nice Angel’s Envy.

The not-so-good news? Well, it’s not really news, it’s more of a question as to how the drivers of this offense continue this season. The inconsistency of Jimmy and Kyle cannot be understated. Sure, some of this is due to the myriad injuries and backups all over the place, but the penalties, interceptions, fumbles, and self-inflicted mistakes has cost the team 3 games. The questionable play-calling down the stretch of close games is also a big concern. So, the glass may be half-full of Old Crow out of a plastic jug.

Me? I’m mildly optimistic that this team can get on a roll. Shanny has a new toy in CMC and we are getting healthier with this bye. Can we go 7-2 to finish the season? Sure. If the team doesn’t make dumb mistakes and play their usual inconsistent brand of football. There are NO scary teams in the NFL this season, except for Buffalo, and even KC. Stupid thing about KC is we were in that game late and should have been way ahead but for multiple failures in the red zone early.

Shit, even going 5-4 would likely keep the 49ers in the 7th spot, barring some other team getting hot. Playoffs shouldn’t be a big concern with this team. Playing consistent football week to week is. Our schedule is fairly tame, but it is the same for the rest of the league. Beat Seattle again, and the west should be ours.

Thew biggest stumbling block may very well turn out to be the Cardinals. A shitty team that has Shanny’s number much as we have McVay’s.

These bye weeks are just a little bit bluer, but hey, the team needs this break. It comes at a great time where attrition is the name of the game in the NFL and we have a boatload of players on the IR.

The good news is Deebo Samuel, Elijah Mitchell, and Kyle Juicechick will be back for the Chargers game. Trent Williams is getting a much-needed break to healthy up, and Colton McKivitz is ready to step in and replace an inconsistent Mike McGlinchey. The big surprise on the line as of now is the play of Aaron Banks, He has blocked well for the run and has not given up a sack. Kudos to him.

Can’t seem to find anything recent on Greenlaw and Armstead, but getting those 2 guys back will be huge. The defense has struggled mightily on screen passes and delays without Greenlaw’s speed, and Armstead’s presence in the interior cannot be understated. Jason Verrett should be healthy (?!?) and if he is, it’ll be a good thing. Emanuel Moseley isn’t coming back, so it would be nice to have Verrett playing well. That, of course is a long-shot, but we will see.

The D did a great job of adjusting their game plan last week at half time vs the Rams when the LBs played up closer to the line, and Ryans blitzed to rattle Stafford. They took Kupp out of the game and shut out the Rams in the 2nd half. And hey, we scored in the 4th quarter!! Kudos to Kyle for using the new weapon and closing a game the right way.

As far as the game go, the most important ones are of course the Seahawks @ Cardinals, and the Rams @ Tampa Bay.

A win by Pete Carroll’s crew would put the 49ers 1.5 game back from Seattle, and the Cards would be a distant 3-6. The oppo of course would simply tighten up an already tight division. We’d be 0.5 back, and AZ would be 0.5 behind us.

Then there’s the Rams @ Tampa Bay. Both teams are struggling mightily. Brady has never been 3-5, at least not that I can remember, but whoever loses is really behind the 8 ball in reaching the playoffs.

Other than those games, the morning game to watch (hello Streameast) is Robert Saleh’s upstart Jets taking on the high flying Bills. Despite the 5-3 record, there is rumbling around the Meadowlands that Zack Wilson is not quite making it as the elite guy he’s supposed to be.

Wilson:

If Trey Lance had put up these numbers this season (we will never know but you’d think he’d do better than that), the howling would be incessant. And this is Wilson’s 2nd year.

These numbers are pretty awful no matter how you slice it. To add a little more fuel to the fire, Robert Saleh demoted Joe Flacco and promoted Mike White to the #2 QB for the rest of the season to give him “the opportunity there” according to Saleh.

49ers GM John McVay passed away at 91. He of course came to the 49ers as VP, along with Bill Walsh, and built the team of the 80s. He and Walsh also directed that first draft where Walsh wanted a QB in the 3rd round. Walsh was leaning toward Steve Dils, whom Walsh had coached at Stanford the previous season. But both wondered about Montana. McVay talked to Notre Dame’s RB coach Jim Gruden (John’s father), Gruden said “Take him. Please just take him. You’ll be glad you did.”

When the 3rd round rolled around, Joe was still there, and the rest was history. The list of Hall of Fame players drafted by the pair is unmatched in NFL history. He pulled off trades for Fred Dean and Steve Young among a bunch of others that kept the 49ers near the top of the NFL for 20+ years. Always deflecting accolades and praising those around him. Got a pic somewhere around 1984 of my wife with Montana when she worked at the Hilton and he was doing a speaking engagement. McVay is there next to him. He’s in the 49ers Hall of Fame, but should be in Canton as well. RIP, John.

Well, Shanny continues his mastery over Sean McVay. McVay is becoming a real annoying sideline presence has he runs around like a chicken with his head cut off yelling and dancing around and glad-handing his players at every photo opp. But enough about weasel-boy, the 49ers actually looked like a decent team as THEY were the ones to adjust to a Ram team that was killing the Niners defense and negating our pass rush by dinks and dunks.

The Rams had 2 touchdown drives of 9 minutes and 6 minutes in the 1st half. Run,Pass, and Throw CMC had his 34 yard TD pass to Brandon Aiyuk sandwiched between the TDs. And wow, the Niners looked like a team having fun. Their next drive came up short and resulted in a FG, but they did have the possession arrow for the start of the 2nd half.

Lo, and behold. The FORTY NINERS were the team to make halftime adjustments. After watching teams decimate their leads and win games that they were losing, the 49ers ratcheted up the pressure on Stafford and played tighter to the line to take away all the short passes that were so effective. Cooper Kupp had 7 catches in the 1st half, and 1 in the 2nd. During garbage time. and He got injured for it. Which is why even before that I was screaming to get CMC OUT of there.

Offensively they rode the coattails of McCaffery. He ran for 94, caught for 55 and threw for 34. And scored all three ways as well. Jimmy was decent enough, throwing his own dinks and dunks. He did hit a nice deep ball to Dwelley, who was open as open can be. He underthrew a pass to McCloud that should have been a TD, and threw a near pick right to Bobby Wagner where he faked a blitz and faded back to Kittle but couldn’t hang on.

Still and all, a clean day by the offense. No turnovers, although CMC did fumble twice. The first half was a bit choppy as the Niners had 2 penalties on 3rd and goal to extend the Rams 2nd TD drive, and didn’t look able to stop the Rams through that first half, but they did get 2 scores of their own. And shut down and shut out LA in the second half.

So, we are one game behind Seattle, but more importantly, 3-0 in the division. The team gets a needed bye as they can healthy up for the stretch run, and they really don’t have a very tough schedule. But, as we all know, this team can play up or down to the level of their opponents.

Get healthy. Find consistency.

Deebo, Greenlaw, AA, and Juice are all out for the Ram game. Jennings and Verrett are questionable. I guess this means that are gonna play 2nd round pick Danny Gray. Too bad he runs faster than Jimmy can throw, but that’s a different tale. Didn’t even know Deebo was hurting but he pulled a hammy somewhere along the KC game. Juice of course dislocated a finger in the game, and he was on the sideline getting the finger straightened. Funny, when Iwas a kid, this happened to me a lot, and as long as I could find someone to yank it back straight, we went right on playing. But, whatevs.

Ward, Ebukan, and Williams are all full participants. Mooney Ward isn’t on the list so I guess that means he’s good to go? I don’t know.

The Rams on the other hand have guys out due to the dreaded ‘person matter’. Disgruntled RB Cam Akers is out, as well as linebacker Terrell Lewis. Don’t know what it will take to get them gruntled again but they didn’t practice.

Other than that, they are healthy. Of course. We invariably lead the league in injuries year in and year out, so naturally the people in charge simply ignore this fact.

Oh well. I guess we are due to play a good game? Since we are the love rollercoaster team of destiny. I don’t fucking know anymore. It’s a home game of sorts so there’s that. It’s fairly easy now to just let these games slide by as I still have absolutely no faith in Jimmy or Shanahan to put together a complete game anymore. They’ve blown 3 games they should have won, and now they have to play a few tough teams now.

Woo hoo! Go team! And take the coach with you!

Can you? Can you? It’s a pretty depressing thought when you think about how this season has unfolded. Fucking Matt Eberflus of the Bears out-coached Shanny in his FIRST NFL GAME as head coach. Then Shanahan proceeds to get his future quarterback killed running him on draw plays the next week. It is beyond baffling to me how this team full of talented stars is mired in quicksand. Everyone said at the time that the team was better off with Jimmy at the helm. Really? I didn’t buy it at the time, and I sure don’t buy it now. I certainly don’t think Lance would fumble this much or take near as many sacks. Would that tip the scales? Hard to say, but we had leads in all these games that were pissed away by mistakes.

Would Lance throw more picks? Possibly, but 4 in 5.5 games is nothing to write home about. So I get that 50% of the problems with this team stem from Jimmy Garoppolo and his inability to learn from his mistakes. But that 50% that Shanahan is responsible for is also holding this team back. Shanahan has NO IDEA how to change on the fly. The Atlanta game was a perfect example of that. With 10 minutes remaining, down two TDs and on the 12 yards line (penalty of course), Shanahan goes on a methodical slow drive and eat 8 minutes of clock, and then faces the dreaded 3rd and 1.

You know the rest. Where’s the no-huddle? I sit there and scream at the TV “WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?!?!?!?”

Still and all has there ever been a pair of guys who routinely fuck up and face no consequences? I really wish the media would call out Shanahan harder on why the team, 5 years into his tenure, is still making basic errors like false starts, illegal formations, and offsides. I wish the media would ask Jimmy “why do you constantly throw into triple coverage when the prudent move would be to throw the ball away?” If Lance was making these mistakes, the outcry would be deafening.

It already happened. Lance was labelled a bust after playing a shakey game in week one in a hurricane in Chicago. Jimmy plays an equally shitty game in Denver the next week, and the excuse machine went from 0 to surely you can’t be serious in 10 seconds.

The inconsistency is absolutely insane. Shanahan does his goddamn pressers after the game mumbling about the execution and gee we got to clean up those pesky penalties. Gee, Kyle, I think the league has caught on to the fact you run on 3rd and 1 about 99% of the time. Or how you abjectly refuse to use plays that work. Kylke put the Jet Sweep on the map, and ever since the 1st half of the (FUUUUUUCK!!) Super Bowl has simply refused to run that play. Deebo up the middle? Sure. Fuck me sideways.

Now we have the Rams. We look to be in the same spot we were last season. 3-5 and searching for answers. I don’t know, man. It seriously bums me out that the team is cratering before our eyes here and the media and fans are simply accepting it. The team is leaderless and rudderless.

Can they turn it around like last year? No clue. Even at this rate we still may crawl into the playoffs. The league is full of .500 teams so there’s that. I just see this team continuing the same pattern of hihghs and lows and ultimate failure.

Where’s Bluto when you need him?

Is KC that good, or are we that bad? I think the answer is yes. This season is unfolding (unravelling?) a lot like last year’s season. High expectations smacked down into the dirt as the team flails around stumbling, bumbling, and fumbling victories away like farts in a hurricane. Injuries are a problem yet again, and since we are back under the shakey hand of Jimmy Garoppolo, we are the gang that can’t shoot straight, or play good football for more than a span of, oh, two games?

Funny thing is, the rest of the league appears to be suffering the same malaise. Not that I give a fuck about a lot of other teams, but half the teams in the league are at 4-3 or 3-4. Parity? Mediocrity? I don’t know. Carolina fires its head coach, trades away their 2 best offensive players and then beat the living shit out of the Brady-led Bucs. Green bay gets beat by the Heinekie muffler guy and the Washington Generals. The New York football Fucking Giants are 6-1? The Jets are winning?

What in the wide wide world of sports is going on here? The Niners were riding high 2 weeks ago. 3-2 and in sole possession of 1st place in the division. 2 week later? A disastrous loss to the fucking Falcons, and yesterday’s humbling and we are in last.

I guess the point here, in the immortal words of Matt Groening, “Keep your expectations tiny, you‘ll go through life not so whiney.”

I have considerably lowered any expectations for this team as currently constituted. Mainly because I’ve come to the realization Jimmy Garoppolo is not very smart, and Kyle Shanahan doesn’t know what to do about that fact. Every game follows the same script. Fast starts followed by offensive struggles, a big turnover, and a bunch of penalties. The only game the Niners didn’t have a lead in was the Falcons game.

Yeah, I’ll watch. I may even go to a game. But I’m not expecting anything less than fair to poor football at this point. I mean, they are their own worst enemy. Shanahan is 5 years in, and we still make stupid mistakes over and over. False start to get out of FG range? Yep. Have too many WRs in the same place at the same time? Sure. This team is undisciplined and inconsistent to say the least. As is Jimmy. Crucial drops are a forte.

We are too full of talent to be terrible, but at this point I would be surprised to see us make the playoffs. I think we are a 9 win team. Our schedule isn’t even all that hard. I just don’t have hope this team can play consistently enough to matter. I can’t believe Shanahan still has the team behind him. rThen again, I can’t believe Jimmy G is still looked at as the answer. Lose to the Rams and we might as well hit the Brock Purty era.

But boy, it would really suck to fall to the top of the draft and not have any picks. Thanks, Kyle!!!

Jesus. Sure, the defense was terrible. Losing Dre Greenlaw was the death knell for the defense in the 2nd half, but Jesus fucking Christ, Shanahan comes up with the most garbage plays in the red zone. On the pick, which was absolutely God-awful, the 49ers had 3 WRs grouped together on the goal line. It happened later in the game and nearly resulted in another pick.

And, beyond that, on the motherfucking 3rd down pick, CMC was on the sideline.

Such brilliant coaching. Once again, stupid fucking penalties ruled the day. False starts, offsides, illegal formations. These pre-snap penalties are ALL on the coaching staff not getting the players prepared. 10 fucking penalties, and they all seemed to be killers.

People will point to the defense sucking, but losing Greenlaw was the reason so many screens and sweeps worked. And Reid of course adjusted the offense after their relative struggles in the 1st half.

Jimmy and Kyle both comported themselves badly in this game. Jennings had 2 huge stupid penalties, the special teams failed spectacularly on the KO return. The defense gave up a 3rd and 20, 3rd and 11, 3rd and 6, and plenty of other big plays. No pass rush. Not sure why we didn’t scheme up any way to get pressure on Mahomes. He didn’t have to run at all. Just pitch and catch all over the field.

Reid schooled Shanahan big time. Shanahan is absolutely clueless in the red zone. Outcoached and outplayed. Their offense crushed out defense.

Is this a wake-up call? Jimmy had decent numbers, but fucked this game up. The line was OK till it wasn’t. McGlinchey is a glaring piece of shit in pass coverage at RT. The safety? Please. Williams whiffed on his block, and Jimmy just doesn’t know how to throw a ball away. He took 3 needless sacks and fumbled because he’s fucking clueless on how to just get rid of the ball when the pocket is collapsing.

This may be a 6-11 team at this rate. Good teams are killing us. Bad teams are beating us. I have absolutely no confidence in Shanahan or Garoppolo at this point.