Forty Niners Forever

Well, the Rams certainly have balls. They are going all in yet again for a new QB. The one they gave away is the ont they spent a ton of draft capital to get in the first place in Jared (don’t call me Jared) Goff. TWO first round picks, TWO second round picks, and TWO third round picks to Tennessee to get the services of Goff, the guy they just traded to the Lions for TWO first round picks and a third round pick to acquire Matthew Stafford.

Balls they have. But brains? Hard to say. They went all in last season with their mid-season trade for Jalen Ramsey, thus losing the only 1st round pick they have sniffed since trading up for Goff in 2016, and they won’t see one till 2024 with this new deal.

So, the Rams either cash in quick, stay on top for a year or two, or fade from the scene in a slow agonizing death. Frankly, I think they are fucked. It’s hard enough just to get through this division, let alone run the playoff gauntlet. They have mortgaged their future in a big way. They already gave away this year’s first round pick for Jalen Ramsey. Someone who didn’t really help in the end as we sure proved, and Green Bay as well, that if you can control Aaron Donald to reasonable output, you can beat them. Ramsey had a nice season, but in the end didn’t tip the balance.

So, what does that mean for us? Well, it means the price tag for DeShaun Watson is now stratospheric (catastrophic?). Out if this world. Far out. Across the universe. Shit, even looking at what the Rams gave up to trade up with Tennessee to get Goff in the first place is utter insanity. So, that leaves us in a pickle. This team has recently been burned by trading picks (see Dee Ford), and got kinda burned by Beater McBeatHard, and Jimmy G is looking like a slow-moving train wreck.

I hate to say it, but this doesn’t look like out year already. I don’t think the Niners can afford to trade up OR trade for DSW. We take a shot with our 2nd pick with Mac Jones (if he’s around) or Fla’s Kyle Trask. GIve Jimmy G one last shot, and see if he stays upright. If not, we’ll be back near the top of the draft and we can go for Sam Howell or Tyler Shough.

No way in hell did I think Tom Brady would take the Buccos to a Super Bowl. Brady is the pre-emptive MVP with his 4600 yard, 40 TD, 12 pick effort. This will be his 10th Super Bowl. Criminy. Nearly 20% of the Super Bowls involve him. 6 Super Bowl wins. Yadda yadda yadda.

I’ve come here not to praise Brady but to bury him. Sure, he’s from my home town and went to my high school. Meh. Sure, he’s had a phenomenal career and has won a ton of games, but the luck around his success cannot be understated. The Tuck Rule. The INT on the 1 yard line. Dee Ford lining up offsides. Atlanta hacking up a huge lead (thanks, Kyle).

On and on. 3 of his Super Bowls were solid performances. 6 not so much. But, hey, he got there yet again, so color me surprised. He also gets to be the first quarterback to play in his home stadium. The 49ers and Stanford stadium (their home after the earthquake) notwithstanding.

Anyhow, the adage has always been don’t bet against Brady in the playoffs. Well, fuck that. I don’t know. I think KC wins this, but I’ve been wrong about Brady before.

If Brady wins, it will further cement him as the GOAT. Again, meh. Where’s his touchdown to Clark in the NFC Championship game? Where’s his 95 yard drive leading up to the TD to John Taylor with time running out? When Montana got there (as well as Steve Young) he either dominated or hit a big play at a crucial time.

Game on the line and I get one QB? Montana all the way. Sure, I’m blinded by Joe. But then again, so were all the DBs he faced.

Well, here we are at the penultimate weekend of football. We get the NFC oldsters vs the AFC youngsters. What used to be fondly referred to as the Bay of Pigs games back when both teams sucked the bone in the 80s, we have 43 year old Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Bucs against relative puppy 37 year old Aaron (I coulda been a Niner) Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers.

Brady of course left the safety of his cozy relationship with Bill Belichick to strike out on his own in Florida. Sure, it’s easy to call Brady the winner in this deal of system over player, as the Pats went 7-9 and missed out on the playoffs while Tom terrific has taken the Bucs to the edge of another Super Bowl. Crazy shit if you ask me. I thought the Bucs would be a WC that maybe got one win and gracefully crashed and burned. And it isn’t as if he lifted the team onto his shoulders and threw his way to victory. But still I’m a little more than impressed that he has gotten them this far.

He has a lot of weapons at his disposal in Tampa, and he has used them well. But, I don’t think they get past Green Bay. Should be a fun one though.

Green Bay gives up 3.5 points, but I think they cover and win. The prevailing sentiment out there is never bet against Brady in the playoffs. Well, fuck that, Green Bay wins 24-17.

• Green Bay vs Tampa Bay – 12:05 pm on Fox

The AFC Championship pits the wobbly Patrick Mahomes against the newly awesome Josh Allen. This one could get interesting if Buffalo can get in Mahomes’ face. He has his concussion he suffered last week, along with a toe injury he suffered before that. His hip is wonky as well. So, this one may not be as in-the-bag as one might think. Both teams were scoring machines in the regular season but have cooled off a bit on the playoffs.

Buffalo is coming off two grind-it-out playoff games against the Colts and the Ravens. Definitely a rough road to get here. With Mahomes beat up, I think the Bills get another chance at their first Super Bowl win. They give 3.5 points themselves. But this should be another cover by the victors. Buffalo wins 24-13.

• Kansas City vs Buffalo – 3:40 pm on CBS

Much as i hate to admit it, the new playoff format is pretty cool. 6 games on weekend 1 and 4 weekend 2 rocks.

Today we have:

• Rams at the Packers at 1:35 and Ravens at the Bills at 5:15.

Tomorrow is:

• Browns at Chiefs at 12:05 and Bucs at Saints at 3:40

I got Packers, Chiefs, Bills, and Bucs. Saints somehow fuck this up again.

Yes, it is time to dig up Mel Kiper Jr. and plant his head behind a desk to watch him bloviate about something that no one ever gets right. The draft. Ask 100 people to guess the first round, and you will get 100 different answers. None of which are remotely close to reality beyond the top 5 picks.

So, just for funzies, here are the 49ers nine picks in the upcoming draft in April:

• 1st round, No. 12 overall
• 2nd round, No. 43 overall
• 4th round, No. 108 overall
• 5th round, No. 139 overall
• 5th round, No. 157 overall (from NO)
• 5th round compensatory pick for Emmanuel Sanders
• 6th round, No. 170 overall
• 7th round, No. 194 overall (from NYJ)
• 7th round, No. 204 overall

Since we have no idea what the front office is thinking, we get to guess like all the other talking heads. Based on the talk we should draft a quarterback. No, a cornerback. No we need to bolster the offensive line. No, we need a bookend for Nick Bosa. No, we need linebacker help.

Needless to say, you can pretty much make a case for all of these suggestions. The curious non-attention paid to the cornerback position in last year’s draft was at times very costly, and at other times, not so bad. Bruce Allen cost the 49ers the Miami game by giving up 7 passes, 153 yards, 3 TDs, and 2 PI penalties in a matter of 20 minutes on the field. A field that he will never tread upon again. then again, Jamar Taylor came out of nowhere to shut down Cooper Kupp and the Rams. We have a lot of bodies that are decent. And nobody signed.

Jason Verrett may be costly, but he has at least put out there that he was very thankful of the opportunity given to him by the 49ers. Same with Kerry Hyder, another scrap-heap signing that paid off in dividends but is looking for a payday. Emmanuel Moseley is a guy who has been solid. Sherm? Nice knowing you. Great on-field and locker room leader, but your time is over. Then there’s Ahkello Witherspoon. His mercurial season and strong finish at least warrants a long talk with the team about his committment level.

The rest? Dontae Johnson needs to go.

Lots of fun games today.

Indy and Buffalo
Rams as Seattle
TB at Washington

Josh Allen gets his first taste of playoff action and oldsters Alex Smith and Philip Rivers get their last (maybe) hurrah.

i wrote this yesterday, ad despite Smith not playing, and Goff did, my picks for yesterday were spot on. Heineken played an inspired game but came up short.

Today I’m thinking Balt, Saints, and Pittsburgh.

Say what you will about this season, but the team, despite a gigantic injury list, managed to keep its focus and drive as their backup QBs stumbled, bumbled, and fumbled their way to a shitload of losses. It would be nice to think that with a fully healthy team, the offense would have clicked along nicely and won at least 4 more games.

Pretty easy to contemplate, but that first loss was with a healthy Jimmy G. His numbers weren’t terrible, but they weren’t great either. But of course COVID gave all the teams no preseason games and little practice time. We pretty much couldn’t contain Murray when we needed to and lost in the end. By the time the team had had warmed up, the entire roster was hurt. Our trip to New Jersey proved fatal as Bosaand many others went down.

No need to rehash the rest. The positives, few as they were, were the emergence of Brandon Aiyuk as a bona fide threat to score whenever he touches the ball. Fred Warner on the defensive side also proved himself to be a major stud. The rest of our stars from last year were battling injuries. Mostert, Jimmy, Kittle, Deebo, and Wilson all spent lengthy amounts of time on the IR. To the detriment of the team.

Defensively, Ford played 3 downs, the entire defensive backfield was hurt at one time or another. Even our backups got wasted by injury. CB Jamar Taylor, who came in from the cold and stifled Cooper Kupp, was lost to a knee injury. As were backup linemen Dion Jordan and Jordan Willis. Even shrivel-dick Nick ended up on the IR with an elbow injury.

On and on. So, turn the page and look to the 2021 season. The 2021 team is going to look a whole lot different. Good or bad. We have 40 (!!!) free agents, so there will be a lot of turnover. Get rid of Mullens and we’d have a lot less turnovers. But I digress. Ford, McKinnon, Coleman, Tartt, Ward, and Sherman are the big-ticket guys who likely go. That will free up some cap space, but no idea how much.

Got to hit the draft.

Coronamadeggon? If hindsight is 2020, I don’t want to look back. This travesty of a season fit snugly into this tragedy of a year. Too much to even think about, let alone document, so we’ll just let this season go.

Yes, this team has a ton of question marks for the future, but we have our closing game with the Beater against the Seahawks. Little hope for us in this one, but then again, I thought the same thing about last week’s game. Robert Saleh’s defense came up huge time and time again as we thwarted, for the time being, their playoff run.

Today? Of course we will be without Trent Williams and Brandon Ayuk, so there’s that. This one will be driven by the defense, but i don’t think we can hold Russell Wilson down for four quarters.

We will likely be somewhere around 10-12 in the draft after the loss. Is that good enough for a QB? The way the draft is shaking out, Trey Lance may be the only one available. Is he worth it? I’d tend to think we will go CB since we ignored it so badly last year, and it bit us in the ass with all the injuries, but we have a lot of time to work that out.

Out with the old, in with the new. 2020 can go take a flying leap, long with the prez. This year started bad and got a shit-ton worse. Starting with the 40er Super Bowl loss (which seems like 10 years ago) to the ruination of the team when they travelled to New Jersey for a couple games, and throwing in the Lakers and Dodgers winning their respective championships, and sports in general, while welcome during these troubling times, ended up sucking hard.

And of course the pandemic. Lost a couple of friends to COVID. One in March and one last week, so this thing is a real bitch. One of my nephews and his wife got it, but both thankfully got through it unscathed. At least there is hope that the vaccine rolls out quick, but I think we are in for more of the same shittiness for a little while yet.

But, hey a new year beckons. I look forward to NJ’s draft prognostications as we all are pretty much on the same page that this team needs a quarterback a cornerback, and O line help in this draft. Who and where remains to be seen, but here we are at week 17, still racked by injuries and still trying our damnedest.

It would be a trip to win this game and end up 4-2 in the division, seeing as this is one of the toughest in the league, and we went 1-3 against the shittiest. Draft be damned, let’s beat those fucking Seahawks. They are actually becoming one of the better teams in the league as their defense, helped immensely by DJ Reed, is coming together at the right time.

Well, not really. Just our division record. Funny thing is, if we beat Seattle next week, we would have a 4-2 record in our division. Sea would be 3-3, and the Rams and Cards both sit at 2-3 so they can’t catch us. As we all know, the west is one of the most competitive divisions in the NFL. No mean feat, but curious nonetheless.

There were a lot of stupid losses this year, up to and including going 1-3 against the woeful NFC East. And, to play the ‘what if’ card, you have to wonder what could have been should Shanahan switched out Mullens for Beater after yet another multiple interception game against Buffalo.

As our soon-to-be-Deetroit head coach showed, the defense is playing insanely well, even with half the roster on IR. The latest example was the throttling of the #3 offense in the NFL, the AZ Cards. Robert Saleh was down our #1 pick in Kinlaw, both starting safeties Ward and Tartt, CB Richard Sherman, and DE Dion Jordan. I mean along with the other injuries.

Ahkello Witherspoon played a strong game after giving up a 40 yard strike to Murray. He sometimes pouts his way to the bench after a bad play, but didn’t this time around, and made a game-saving INT in the 4th quarter and covered well all game. Jason Verrett, a guy I hope we keep, blanketed DeAndre Hopkins, and ‘held’ him to 8 catches for 48 yards. A far cry from the 14-151 performance in week 1.

Despite all the injuries up front, the defensive line held AZ to 45 yards rushing. Sure, Murray got 75 yards himself, but those were scrambles. And the 49ers actually did pretty well keeping him contained, but for the one 30 yard run on 4th and 1.

Fred Warner also had another outstanding game as he knocked down a 4th down pass to go with his 8 tackles. K’Waun Williams had a very disruptive game, blitzing early and often, making tackles in the backfield, and getting a sack.

So, as much as it would have been nice to get a better draft spot, no matter where we end up, we wouldn’t be in the running for Lawrence, Fields, Wilson, or Lance. As I’ve been saying for a while, the guy I want, Zach Wilson, is moving up as high as #2 on some depth charts. So both Trey Lance AND Zach Wilson could be gone.

I’ll give the coaching staff a pretty big set of kudos for keeping this team focussed and steady as this season as imploded around them. Especially Saleh and the defense.