Forty Niners Forever

All these years seeing that clip and I just realized that it was after the Niners beat the Colts way back when.

Anyhow, I hate all these teams in the playoffs. Seattle and the Rams are right out. Fuck NE and FUCK Denver.

That being said, I guess I could stomach Denver winning. Mainly because they aren’t in our division, and they don’t have 5 Super Bowl wins, and Bo Nix was pretty fricking outstanding. My wife’s cousin is a huge Broncos fan and she and her husband came out here for the Super Bowl 50 pre-game festivities. It would be pretty fucking weird for Denver to win 2 Super Bowls in the mudflats 10 years apart.

Well, the one coaching hire that means the most to the 49ers of course is once and was our DC Robert Saleh moving on to the Tennessee Tuxedos. That also means we are hiring another DC yet again. In the past 6 seasons, we’ve had:

2020 – Robert Saleh
2021 – DeMeco Ryans
2022 – DeMeco Ryans
2023 – Steve Wilks
2024 – Nick Sorensen
2025 – Robert Saleh
2026 – ?x?x?x?

That’s a lot of different guys, but they all run basically the same 4-man wide-9 rush in cover 2 that emphasizes talent rather than aggressiveness. I think DeMeco Ryans did it best though as he would disguise coverages and blitz by bringing Warner up to the line or one of the other LBs.

I’d think they are gonna go with Gus Bradley, and for the most part I agree. They aren’t gonna hire from the outside like the disasters that Wilks and Sorensen were. I do want a guy that will take more risks though.

Beyond that, this team really needs to figure out their entire training and conditioning methods to get some kind of handle on the injury situation. This has been the case for 7 of the 9 seasons that this has been a major issue.

In what turned out to be a pretty entertaining season ended with a thud. But you really have to tip your cap to the team for overcoming monumental injuries to just about everyone in a uniform. Except for the guy everyone was worried about. Christian McCaffery.

This ragtag bunch of players, and a lot of rookies, weaved their way through what turned into a pretty tough schedule, beating 4 playoff teams, and even managing to knock off the defending Super Bowl champion Eagles before yesterday’s anti-climactic end.

So one of the positives is a lot of rookies got a lot of playing time. Williams, Collins, Stout, and West all played well. And Sigle showed flashes late. But we all know the issues. Besides the injuries. The O line is in bad shape. We are very thin at WR. We could use an RB, or Kyle needs to use who he has. We did pick up a ton of decent LBs as the team went to 4th string guys, but man, they really need to do something different in regards to training and getting guys ready. The injuries are simply killing us just about every season.

Or maybe it’s the fucking EMFs from the PGE power station next door.

All in all, this was a pretty spectacular coaching job on both sides of the ball, but a season that started out so extraordinary going 4-1 with 3 wins over our division rivals, ended with backups and backups to backups all over the field. ANd it sure looks like RObert Saleh will get another shot as HC somewhere soon.

And to add insult to injury, the fucking Rams beat the Bears in OT. Fuck.

Onward and upward to Seattle. Hate to jinx it but I’m feeling better about this game than the last meeting between these two teams. Mainly because of Trent Williams being here, Ricky Pearsall getting some limited action, Juice filling in nicely for the injured Kittle, and most importantly Robert Saleh trusting his linebacking corps being able to support the run more and play up instead of in no-man’s (zone) land.

Beyond that, Sourdough Sam has his own lingering oblique (obtuse?) injury (and BTW how do you get hurt during the bye week?) but anyway, he has the ignominy of his major crash-and-burn in last year’s playoff in Minnesota to deal with. So, as I’ve said a thousand times, when it is 3rd and long, blitz the fuck out of Darnold. Hit him and he’s skittish for the rest of the game.

As usual, stop the run, and get CMC going. I would love to also see two TE sets with Juice in front of CMC. If Seattle is gonna play their nickel to stop our run, we need to bring the beef and hit ’em in the mouth at the line.

Huh, Seattle released their injury report today, and lo & behold, Sourdough Sam is on it with an oblique injury. I’m sure he’s OK and will play, but hey, hit him early. make him think. Make him hurt.

I’ve said it a thousand times, and I’ll say it a thousand more, hit him early and he gets rattled all game.

I feel much more confident about this game than I did two weeks ago, but that and $12.00 will get you a half-decaf double-chocolate frappuccino with whip. Trent Williams made it through the Eagles game. Pearsall and Dee Winters returned to practice. And Saleh showed a lot of different looks in the Eagles game.

At least in the 3rd quarter. I re-watched the game and by the middle of the 4th quarter we had returned to the 4-man line for the most part. But I REALLY like it when we show 6 man fronts and drop into coverage rather than the soft zone we usually run.

Think we take this one 27-17.

Trent here implying the Eagles tanked on purpose to face the 49ers rather than face GB.

Hah!

In the immortal words of Kyle Shanahan, “We embrace the shit out of doing it the hard way.” Yeah, this is true. This weird season just keeps on getting weirder. In the immortal words of Hunter Thompson, “When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.” Well, let’s get weird. Fred Warner has officially been cleared to practice even as the LB corps is gelling into a pretty damn good unit as we have rolled to our 4th MLB with Erik Kendricks manning the green dot and the middle, and the freshly plucked Garret Wallow from Denver doing great things in place of Curtis Robinson.

Throw in the fact that Trent Williams is healthy for this game cracks open the window to victory a little bit. Plus, there’s the added factoid that Brock Purdy has never lost in Seattle, going 4-0 there, and 6-2 overall vs the Seachix.

What does it all mean? Nothing really. My hope is we do what we did in the 2nd half of the Philly game and show a lot more 5-6 man fronts and not give up so many easy runs. I’m sure they will try to burn us deep, but Saleh just has to swallow that bitter pill and somehow generate pressure. The D didn’t allow a lot of point that last game, but they did control the ball for 2/3 of the game. Even the Philly game was 35/25 Eagles.

Speaking of hope, they need to get the run game going somehow. And I would really like to see the occasional slant and some quick passes rather than the constant diet of sideline fades.

In that vein, Ricky Pearsall is limited in walkthroughs today. At least he’s out there. Tomorrow will tell a lot about his status for fucking Saturday. Nice to see the NFL throwing more adversity at us.

Well, this improbable season got even more improbable as the out-manned 49ers overcame a tough Philly defense, Saquan running all over us, Kittle being lost for what looks like a long time, and two flat awful picks by Purdy.

CMC had proved his worth 2x his weight in gold as he caught 2 passes, one an absolute stud play on the Jennings flea flicker that stunned the Philly crowd. The run game wasn’t there, but they did enough late to keep the chains moving.

Purdy? Well, losing all your weapons, and not having Kittle for most of it, proved to be tough. His picks were simply poor throws. The line actually played fairly well, and gave him time. But in the end he made the throws, Robinson had his best game as a Niner, Jennings had his one big 45 yard play, and an absolute dime thrown to CMC, and the offense started out on fire with a couple huge gainers to take the early lead.

It was a little hard for me to enjoy this as the 1st half went on seeing the soft zone give up 3rd downs. Yet another 3rd and 15 was given up. Well 14 yards and a tush push, but Saleh adjusted, putting 5 on the line in the 3rd and slowed the run game. Nick Sirianni obliged by trying to run against our adjustment and we slowed them down through most of the 2nd half, outscoring them 13-6.

Stick a feather in Shanahan’s cap for overcoming a 1st half deficit, and overcoming a 16-10 Philly lead in the 4th quarter.

Back we go to Seattle. Gonna be a dogfight.

Here we are, once again meeting Philly in the playoffs. Last time of course saw the mercurial rise and devastating crash of Brock Purdy in his rookie season as he came from running the scout team to leading the 49ers into the NFC Championship game.

That ended badly of course as Purdy didn’t get through his second possession. Now? Well, it’s all about the defense. The Eagles defense is about as far away from the Seahawks defense as Seattle is from Philly. They don’t defend the run particularly well, but they don’t allow a lot of points. And with Trent Williams back, the hope is CMC can break off some nice chunk yard runs.

Ricky Pearsall is another matter. He’s a game-time decision. What diff he would have made last week is hard to guess as Purdy had about 0.75 seconds to get his passes off. Why Shanny didn’t adjust to the relentless rush by running slants and quick passes baffles me no end. And all y’all screming about getting 2 TE sets in there is also a valid beef. Then again, how many times can I rail against the soft zone on 3rd down?

Hard to be confident in this game. At least for me. Despite the trials and tribulations overcome this season with all the (once again) injuries and BA turmoil, unexpected wins and crushing losses, I just don’t think we can get over the hump. Then again, this team has zigged a lot this year when I thought they would zag. As they say, one game at a time.

Maybe leave this one up to the football gods. Shanahan certainly doesn’t have the greatest record vs Vic (remember me?) Fangio.

As Kyke Juicechick said, “why should we make it easy on ourselves? We’ve been struggling with shit all season.” Or something to that effect.

Hell of a scrappy effort by the team this season to be one win from the #1 seed and be so absolutely decimated by injury. If anything it proves that there are a lot of mediocre teams out there. And we couldn’t beat some of them. But that is ture of every team. This year is wide open and no one has a distinct advantage. Which is fucking infuriating because if we were even remotely healthy, we’d be in position to win it all.

But no, we limp into Philly with our standout backup to Fred Warner out, Trent Williams and Ricky Papearsall haven’t practiced, and we have the usual list of walking wounded:

– Trent Williams (hamstring)
– WR Ricky Pearsall (knee)
– Dee Winters (ankle)
– Keion White (hamstring)

Let’s hope some of these guys come back. I have no illusions about this game. I just don’t think we can overcome this amount of injuries. Unless CMC runs for 150.

Well, Tatum Bethune is out for the Philly game with a torn groin, and any other subsequent game should it come to that. So we are down to Erik Kendricks as the starting middle linebacker.

Yay. Crystal Todd Pearsall is our latest elf on the shelf, and we are not sure if he will be out there. Trent Williams? Another question mark heading into this roadie in Philly next Sunday.

Both lines looked about as terrible as they could have last Saturday. Short week? Unprepared? Out-coached? Yes to all. Saleh has really developed a major flaw in his 3rd down defense. Time and time again last week, Seattle was able to keep drives going on 3rd down conversions. They punted once. Their issue, which may be a huge problem against better teams, is their own misadventures getting into the end zone. 18 pts vs Indy? Please. 13 points against our wasted defense? The Bears put up 38 on us.

But enough about Seattle. Philly’s defense, while not nearly as tough as Seattle’s, still has a decent pass rush but they are 28th overall. We should be able to run on them. If we can do that, I think we can keep their middling offense out of the end zone.

I hope.