Your daily San Francisco 49ers news for Friday, December 8th, 2023
Kyle Shanahan’s 49ers offense has answers for everything a defense throws at it (paywall)
“The 49ers’ favorite 4-strong (four receivers to one side) concept is a snag concept with a lead blocker for the swing route. They added some window dressing by moving their pieces around. Christian McCaffrey ran the spot route and Deebo Samuel ran the swing route.
The tweak that fooled the Eagles a couple of times in this game was having Brandon Aiyuk run a speed out to the weak side. Aiyuk usually runs a slant on this concept.
The Eagles were concerned with the 49ers’ run game, so they were in their “tite” front with five on the line of scrimmage and ended up rushing both outside linebackers. With five rushing, the Eagles had only three underneath defenders and they were all condensed inside, leaving space for Aiyuk outside. Being able to hit these outbreaking routes consistently is an element that this offense lacked when Jimmy Garoppolo was the quarterback. Defenses now have to defend every blade of grass.”
49ers put Eagles in rearview mirror ahead of Seahawks matchup
“They’re going to get some guys back who were not healthy the last time around,” said Warner, referring mostly to Seattle running back Kenneth Walker.
“We have to make sure we’re dialed and focused. Philly is done and over with. We’re not talking about Philly from here on out. And we’re onto Seattle.”
Also, Seattle quarterback Geno Smith was bothered by a triceps injury when the teams met in Week 12. The Seahawks played back-to-back games on Thursdays, so they come to town with three additional days of rest.”
“But Wilks deserves most of the credit for the defense’s dominant play. Since the bye week, the 49ers defense has given up just 42 points in four games — that’s 10.5 points per game, which is phenomenal.
Suddenly, the 49ers defense is performing better than it ever did under former 49ers defensive coordinators Robert Saleh or DeMeco Ryans. Those two had dominant defenses, but defenses with certain weaknesses.
Wilks’ defense currently has zero weaknesses. And he recently has fixed a problem that has plagued the 49ers for years, and that’s defending mobile quarterbacks. Neither Saleh nor Ryans could keep them in the pocket. Wilks can and does.
This past week, he kept Jalen Hurts in the pocket and exposed him as a quarterback who can’t win from the pocket. Suddenly, mobile quarterbacks don’t hurt the 49ers anymore.”
Silver: Dre Greenlaw is 49ers’ version of Draymond Green. Don’t try to tone him down (paywall)
“To play as physically as our linebackers do, you do have to toe that line,” Pro Bowl fullback Kyle Juszczyk said. “You have to have that mentality for three-and-a-half hours, and if you try to turn it on and off you won’t be as effective. I mean, that’s one of (Greenlaw’s) superpowers — he’s so intense, so physical and reacts so quickly. By being in that heightened state, he’s able to do those things.”
Sometimes, Greenlaw does things that cross the line, such as the helmet-to-helmet hit on Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert that got him tossed from a game last season. Transgressions such as that one, or the unnecessary roughness penalty Greenlaw received for getting in Rams receiver Puka Nacua’s face after a tackle in the September game at SoFi Stadium, inspire calls for him to dial back his aggression.
The thing is, that maniacal mentality is the very reason a relatively undersized (he’s generously listed as 6-foot, 230 pounds) fifth-round draft pick from Arkansas who fought through incredibly challenging circumstances during childhood has emerged as one of the league’s best players at his position.
You can’t have one without the other.
“Right, exactly,” Greenlaw told me. “(Those are) facts. I feel like I wouldn’t be me. I’m gonna keep playing the same way I play.”
Bosa believes 49ers provided Cowboys blueprint to beating Eagles
Coach Kyle Shanahan and defensive coordinator Steve Wilks ask members of the 49ers’ defensive line to focus their pass rushes on collapsing the pocket with straight-forward lines to the quarterback.
Bosa, a master technician with a plethora of pass-rush moves, rarely used anything other than a basic bull rush against Philadelphia right tackle Lane Johnson.
Hurts’ eyes appeared to be following Bosa’s progress. He held onto the ball for long periods of time and seemed to prematurely leave the pocket outside the tackles.
“You definitely get frustrated as pass rushers when the quarterback is holding the ball for that long, no matter what your game plan is,” Bosa said. “But when you look at what we set out to do and what we planned on doing, we did exactly that.”……Bosa went head to head against Johnson, 33, a four-time Pro Bowl selection in his 11th NFL season. Johnson has mastered the art of the kick step that is synched up with the snap of the ball. Offensive tackles in a two-point stance are allowed to adjust their back foot before the snap of the ball, which is why Johnson is not called for false starts due to his early movement.
Bosa said when an offensive tackle takes such an exaggerated kick step, it invites the pass rusher across the line of scrimmage to pick a side to attack.
Bosa resisted the temptation to sell out for the possibility of a sack. He and his teammates on the defensive line remained focused throughout the game on the team aspect and not the stat sheet.
“When you play on a good team like this, a really good team, you have to sometimes give up some of the selfish-type statistics (such as) rushing out of your gap, stuff like that, for the bigger picture,” Bosa said. “And I think we did that great.
“We made Jalen stay in the pocket and escape outside instead of those B gaps, and it paid off.”
How new 49er Logan Ryan went from a Disney cruise back to the NFL
“Ryan and Lynch agreed to reconnect after the cruise ended. But Ryan knew what he was going to do. And he logged hours in the ship’s gym and studied video of every 49ers’ regular-season game to prepare for signing a contract, a transaction which became official Tuesday.”