San Francisco 49ers Forever

If you haven’t heard yet, Reuben Foster was charged with felony domestic violence for inflicting ‘great bodily harm’ on his girlfriend and for various weapons charges. He’s looking at possibly 11 years in jail. And the Niners track record of drafting pass rushers who run foul of the law continues. We all saw the Aldon Smith re-re-re-arrest the other day as he posted a 0.40 BAC on his ankle monitor. That’s enough to get 3 normal people wasted, 2 heavy drinkers fucked up, and one maniac thrown in jail.

Not sure why these guys are hell-bent to sabotage themselves, but really. Is it that hard to stay out of trouble? I guess it could have turned out like the Aaron Hernandez case of murder. Shit, even Ray Lewis was tied to a shooting in Atlanta, but beating women up? Really? How dumb do you have to be to throw away a career worth 10s of millions of dollars just to smack your girl around? Gangbanging and hood type shit is one thing, but beating up your girl is lame as fuck.

The rumors are flying around fast and thick around all of the QBs available, and the teams that need them. Miami apparently wants to trade up desperately to get Josh Rosen. The Bills also want to crack the top 5 for a shot at one of the available guys. Shit, even New England, you know, the team that gave us Jimmy G for a song, is looking to trade up for a replacement for Tom Terrifffffffphhhht.  The Browns, Giants, Jets, and Broncos all desperately need a QB. Would that mean that these 4 teams take (in no particular order) Josh Rosen, Sam Darnold, Baker Mayfield, and Josh Allen?

Since the Browns have 2 of those picks (1 and 4), they should be able to get Saquon Barkley AND a stud QB. Not a bad haul for a team that hired the services of Scott McLoughan. One of the best draft minds out there in football-land. Why he keeps moving around the league remains a mystery, but as of now he’s running the Browns, and I think he will bulky up that team with some great players. What they do with them is another matter for Hue Jackson to figure out, but that’s why they play the games.

As for the Niners, everyone knows what we need. Edge rusher, Guard, Corner, WR. Due to all the insanity around those 4 QBs and who gets them, and where, I still think our choice will come down to the BPA. With a caveat. The best pass rusher, or best guard available at 9. Shit, Lamar Jackson or Mason Rudolph could fly up the board into the top 5, thus making Bradley Chubb or Quentin Nelson available to us, and say, the Colts trade out or get tired of Andrew (un) Luck (y) missing huge chunks of seasons and they draft a QB as well. Will we get one of those two? Highly doubtful, but it is within the realm of possibility. Is Minkah Fitzpatrick worth the pick? At the cost of trading down for more bounty, and the services of Will Hernandez? This scenario looks more and more like the course I’d take if Fitzpatrick, Nelson, and Chubb are gone.

Needless to say, this is gonna be one of the wildest drafts in a loooong time.

And the draft has come a loooooong way as well . . .

Still think it’s bullshit though. Two 1st round picks for a guy who will likely get hurt and miss 6 games? Pass. He brings a lot of talent to the table, but he also brings a shit-ton of garbage.  News to me is the fact that Seattle is in the race to get him, and they are, according to Jason LaCanfora.

Shanny has already said that he doesn’t need a ‘Julio Jones type’ guy, but everyone in the league seems to think ODB’s a perfect fit here. I get it, I just don’t think he’s worth what he thinks he is. Or what the Giants think he’s worth.

My only thought is that John Lynch is trying to drive up the asking price for the Rams and Seahawks. I like Lynch being aggressive, but this one isn’t a good thing. I’d rather draft a guy than go after Ol’ Dirty Beckham.

Got to wonder if the 49ers are secretly in the hunt for Odell Beckham Jr. Not that they’ve even given even a tiny little hint of a possibility of trading for him, but the possibilities would be fairly awesome given the way Jimmy G made Marquise Goodwin look.

We have a lot of picks, but I don’t think he’s worth two 1’s, or whatever the Giants are asking for, but I’d think we could work out some kind of deal. Or not. John Lynch is a bit of a wild man himself, and I could see him pulling something like this off. Beckham here would be something that would elevate the offense to great heights, one would think, and would keep Ol’ Dirty Beckham out of the hands of the Rams. Just a thought, as all the talk of ODB seems to BE around the Rams. While that is all well and good, it makes you wonder what that locker room would look like with Marcus Peters, Aquib Talib, Suh, AND OBD in there? Talk about the inmates running the asylum. that would be a hard ship to steer.

Other than this imaginary scenario, I’d think the Giants would be retarded for trading him. Crazy or no, he’s a great talent. The Giants need a QB more than anything at this point.

Sorry, these are the times that try football fans’ souls.  Nothing but idle speculation is going on as ESPN prepares to dig up Mel Kiper out of his underground hyperbaric chamber, and shine up his bulletproof helmet of hair. Oh, the humanity.

Nothing forthcoming from the Reuben Foster case either as the deadline to file charges came and went on March 12th, but that doesn’t really mean anything as new things can come to light to re-open the case. Nada as of now though.

Trades? Mmmmmm, nope. Power rankings? Probably.

NJ’s position-by-position news? God,  I sure hope so!

. . . the ones that don’t happen. As in the ‘Klay Thompson for Kevin Love trade’ that never happened, the ‘trade Steph Curry instead of Monte Ellis’ talk, or even *gasp* ‘keep Joe over Steve’ talk of the early 90s (too soon to reopen this wound?). The Niners faced their crossroads in late October last year when they garnered the services of Jimmy Garoppolo. This was a fairly risky trade, a high 2nd round pick for a guy who was pretty untested. Beyond that, the head coach’s feelings were VERY obvious in that Shanahan seriously wanted Kirk Cousins.

Well, as we all know so well, Jimmy G came in and laid the Cousins talk to rest. He went 5-0, and beat 3 playoff  teams (well, 2.5 as the Rams weren’t playing for anything), and the reason for the wins can be placed at Garoppolo’s feet. Shanahan was reportedly very sad that he wouldn’t be reunited with his QB, and John Lynch said the following:

“Jimmy, we made the trade, but then there were some days that Kyle Shanahan was like in mourning, because I think everybody knows his master plan was to have Kirk Cousins come in eventually. I was proud of Kyle, because I think he knew that this was the right thing for our franchise. And he didn’t hesitate. But then, even then, Jimmy had to really prove himself. Kyle, I think was really smart. He didn’t play him right away.”

As it was, the team was set to move on from Garoppolo if the season went south-er than it had already gone, but Shanahan saw the stellar play and went with the flow. It may sound patently obvious, but plenty of coaches have tripped over their own hubris at the cost of a favorite player. Shanny said the following regarding the decision to stick with Jimmy:

“I would tell you that Jimmy really impressed Kyle to the point that he said, ‘this is our guy. ‘We’re excited in that. He really didn’t have a thorough understanding of what we were asking him to do. He kind of piece mailed game plans that we were putting together. So our thought process is, if he can go in through a complete offseason and really master the system, it can get even better. So we gotta keep adding talent about him and we’re really excited about his future.”

You really have to like the fact that the team is now fully engaged in the process of building a team. 2 years ago at the draft combines, there was little to no 49er presence at the site. These last 2 combines, you couldn’t go anywhere without seeing a Niner coach or front office guy either helping to run drills or merely watching the action.

For all the shit that Young Sir Jed gets, and rightly so, he’s certainly got the team pointed in the right direction. He should be getting a little love from the fan base.

. . . the less we know. I figured that after the free agent signing period, we would get a better feel for what we do with our #1 pick, but it remains cloudy with a chance of snow. The big free agent move was, of course, Richard Sherman, but the Niners also addressed the center spot by dealing Daniel Kilgore and signing Weston Richberg from the Giants, Jerry Attachou, DE/OLB/pass rusher from the Chargers, and Jerick McKinnon, a fast RB from the Vikings.

So, they addressed the glaring holes at CB, O line, and pass rusher, and addressed the departure of Carlos Hyde with the McKinnon signing in free agency.  This of course doesn’t answer the problem of depth, but that is what the draft is for.

And with that, what do we do? The options are many and have been addressed by everyone.  Denzel Ward seems to be a lot of people’s picks. And I get it because Richard Sherman is coming off an achilles tear and may not be full strength this season. With all the quarterback frenzy now going on, the draft looks to have 4 QB, maybe even 5, go before the Niners pick, so that could leave a highly coveted guy still available.

Bradley Chubb? No. Saquon Barkley? No. Quentin Nelson? No. Those guys will most likely be gone, but if they are there, we WILL pick one of them. Another interesting name is Derwin James, the safety out of Fla State. With Eric Reid’s likely departure, they may go in that direction despite Tartt, Colbert, McColl, and Jimmie Ward all being available.

There’s also the thought that we could parlay that pick into more by trading down. We could trade down with Cincy at 21 and get ourselves Will Hernandez, the highly rated guard from UTEP. If we could get Cincy’s 1st and a 2nd for our trouble, I’d pull the trigger. Sound good?

A topic on the last thread was the amount of turnover in a very short period from the Trent Baalke/Chip Kelly regime to the current one. Amazingly, from the day Baalke was canned, there are only 11 players remaining on the roster. That’s a hell of a lot of turnover in 14 months and change. To go along with that, even the players we have gotten so far in free agency, Richberg, McKinnon, and the in-house guys Garoppolo, Marsh, Coyle, and Gilliam, are all on the short side of 30. Only Kilgore and Sherman (soon to be 30) are 30+.

And, we have 9 picks in the draft to look forward to. What I really dig about this is the team is now very young. McKinnon is a speedster, as are Williams and Brieda. We could be faster at wideout, but I’m sure we address this in the remaining free agency period as this rolls along. All the injuries to the DBs last year got us the ability to see the young corners and safeties in action. Ahkello Witherspoon emerged as a solid CB and he will only get better. K’Waun Williams and Greg Mabin did solid jobs as well when guys were breaking their arms. At safety, Adrian Colbert shone as a hard-hitting free safety.

With Tartt, Sherman, the emergent Witherspoon, and Jimmie Ward we have a great group of defensive backs in the stable now. With young, proven backups.

Now about that pass rush . . .

Well, the Carlos Hyde dilemma was solved rather quickly in free agency as the NFL saw about 10,000 players switch teams. Hyde went to the Browns, who if nothing else have turned over about 75% this offseason. But enough about them. The 49ers in turn signed the Vikings 2nd string RB in Jerick Jet McKinnon. A guy I don’t know that much about other than he’s fast, catches well out of the backfield, and looks to share time with Joe Williams.

Works for me. Hyde is a good tough back, but he didn’t fit in with this system as it calls for RBs to be pass catchers, and Hyde isn’t as good as he should be. We’ll be getting Jet to the edge and the flat I’m sure to maximize his speed as opposed to slamming him into the line. Hey we made Matt Brieda look pretty good, so this should work out.

In other news, The Vikings got the services of Kirk Cousins to the tune of 3 years, $84 mill. Wow. Seeing as they made the playoffs with the three-headed waiver wire guys last year, they look to be very happy. Shit, KC and the Sunshine Chiefs look like a brand new team as well, what with their backing of Pat Mahomes and the acquisition of Sammy Watkins. These are two playoff teams that look much improved.

Shit, even Green Bay, the antithesis of free agent pickups went out and got Jimmy Graham. The bad news? Well, good for us, the Cardinals signed Sam Bradford to a ridiculous one year/$20 mill deal ($15 mill guaranteed!). Between injuries and so-so play, the guy is middling personified. He’s missed more games than he’s played, and in those games, he’s .500. That gets you the same money as Tom Brady? Wow.

Looks like the Niners and the Rams will be fighting for the NFC West crown this year. Az is fading, and Seattle is imploding their team for a rebuild.  Bring it on!

Given that the gold standard for cover corners played for the 49ers in one Deion Sanders, his early predecessor, Jimmy Johnson, the hardest hitting CB around in Ronnie Lott, and one of the best pure cover guys in Eric Wright, the question today is, are there any real shutdown cornerbacks left in the NFL? Jimmy Johnson was one of the first corners considered a shutdown corner, as he was studiously avoided by just about every head coach in the game back then. Of course, ‘back then’ meant jamming WRs at the line, hand-checking down the field, and grappling with the WR until the ball was in the air.

The culmination of the ‘anything goes’ era of defensive backfield prowess came in the form of Mel Blount. At 6’3, 205 lb, and 4.5 speed he had the power and quickness to take on anyone and everyone the NFL had to offer in the way of WRs. And he won most of the battles. In a 14 year career, he amassed 57 picks and left countless broken WRs in his wake. This led of course to the Mel Blount rule change of not being able to bump or impede the WR after the WR gets 5 yards off the line.

This led to smaller and quicker CBs like Champ Bailey, Darrell Green, Eric Wright, and yes, Neon Deion. Guys who could read and react quickly to WRs adjusting routes, and close fast once the ball was in the air. These guys were not necessarily known as tacklers (Deion? Please! He avoided contact like the plague), but made their bones covering the #1 WR on a given team and taking away half the field available to the opposing QB. Sure there have been outliers, Mike Haynes, Lester Hayes, big guys that got it done, but the trend was these guys to be strictly coverage, and let the safeties clean up the runs. Especially with the even newer rules around covering WRs. The line of engagement is now ONE yard as opposed to 5, so the onus is even higher to cover WRs without incurring a penalty.

Now? Well, Richard Sherman is now the standard to what the prototypical CB should be. Big, strong, and fast. Sherman is (well, was) excellent in run defense, zone coverage, and press coverage. The whole package.  Thing is, he and his Seattle compatriots seemed to get away with grabbing, roughing up, and impeding WRs. Why they got away with this is a different matter, but their success as a whole, and Sharman’s in particular certainly has changed how GMs and scouts look at corners in college. They want rangy, fast, and tough CBs.

It remains to see if we got the real deal here, but Sherman is better than what we had. He may not be a true cover corner, but he’s as close as we can get.