Hats Off

With a little more than seven minutes remaining in Super Bowl LIV, Patrick Mahomes dropped back to pass on a third-and fifteen from his own 35-yard line, and, as it had been all evening, the San Francisco 49er pass rush descended upon him. Nick Bosa was essentially tackled on his direct path to the QB, but DeForrest Buckner looped around and crashed into Mahomes just as he launched what looked, for all the world, like a last-ditch desperation downfield heave.

Freeze that frame for a moment. With seven minutes to play in the Super Bowl, the 49ers had indeed "kept Mahomes from taking over the game." In fact, they had gone a long way toward taking him out of the game. Kansas City had not scored a touchdown since the first quarter. At the moment he threw that pass, Mahomes had fewer passing yards than had Jimmy Garoppolo. He had been intercepted twice, sacked three times, and had not thrown one touchdown pass. The 49ers had indeed "compressed" the Chiefs' possession time to less than 23 minutes. And they held a 20-10 lead; "close,"certainly, but in control. There had been missteps along the way, but at the time it looked as though Kyle Shanahan's team would get by with them. A few moments prior, the officials had ruled, correctly, that Tyreek Hill trapped what had looked like a first-down catch in 49er territory. The challenge by coach Shanahan had just been upheld. It is not a stretch to say the Chiefs, at that moment, were in, or at least near, the final extremity, the point at which a game can become irrevocably lost.

And then, as we all know, Hill, whose track-star speed and that of his teammates had not yet been a factor in the game, suddenly made it so. He blew past three defenders and was so wide open he was able to wait for Mahomes' mortar lob to land in his hands, and he still had time to make a spin move and gain more yards, which he would have save for a solid tackle by Jimmy Ward, the man beaten on the play.  That's how quick he is, that's how quickly it happened, and that's how quickly this game turned.

It wasn't a done deal by any means at that point, but it was a different game, and a different Chiefs offense that lined up at the 49er 21-yard line on the next snap. Mahomes tried for the end zone and missed, he then tried for the quick slant but short-armed it into the turf. On third down he went over the middle to Travis Kelce in the end zone and Tarvarius Moore broke it up. There was minimal contact but Moore face-guarded Kelce with his back to the ball, and drew the flag. Mahomes, who had scored on a one-yard keeper in the first quarter, rolled right and found Kelce for the touchdown and it was a 20-17 game-- and it was also a new game, one that would turn for the first time on the fortunes of the 49er offense, not their defense.

The first crucible for that offense began with six minutes left and a three-point lead. The most belligerent and effective rushing offense in football had  80 yards, three timeouts, and plenty of clock to compress the game down to a mite. Raheem Mostert, who had 36 rushing yards to his name after gaining 220 against Green Bay, punched right up the middle for five. Thirty seconds later it was fourth down and the 49ers hadn't gained a centimeter, two Garoppolo passes, to the overcrowded right side, having fallen incomplete. It was the first three-and-out of the game for the Niners, and they could not have picked a worse time for it.

Kansas City's next possession, starting at that familiar 35, was essentially one big play again, but there was nothing desperate about this one. Mahomes sailed a beautiful rainbow pass to the fleet Sammy Watkins, who easily outran Richard Sherman and made a perfect over-the-shoulder catch. Only the sideline limited him to 38 yards. From the 49er 10, Mahomes made one of his few planned runs to pick up six, taking a hard hit in the process, and then Damien Williams, one of the Chiefs' unsung heroes of the game, took a short pass to the corner pylon. Maybe he scored, maybe he was out of bounds; in any case the touchdown call stood, and in any case it did not decide the outcome. The Chiefs had the lead, 24-20, but the 49ers, again, had the ball, the clock, and the best running game in the NFL, which the Chiefs had not been able to stop.

The second crucible, with 2:39 remaining, saw Mostert break right through that soft run defense for 17 big yards. Jimmy G followed with two razor-sharp passes to George Kittle and Kendrick Bourne, and with 1:49 remaining and a first down on the KC 49, the game was in the 49ers' hands. One more rushing play, and Andy Reid would begin burning timeouts. A few more rushing plays, and Jimmy G would be in the red zone, with his chance to "pull a Montana" and win or lose the game on his and his coach's terms.

It didn't happen. It didn't happen for Kyle Shanahan three Super Bowls ago in Atlanta, and it didn't happen for him here. With Mahomes where he needed to be, on the sideline, with Reid and his reputation for indifferent clock management defending a slim lead against the clock as well as the opponent, the 49ers called four successive pass plays and not only didn't gain yardage, they lost yardage-- and lost time. The first two pass attempts were well-defended. On third and ten Emmanuel Sanders was wide, wide open over the middle, open enough to take it 49 yards to the Lombardi Trophy. Frank Clark, who could have been the Super Bowl MVP, got in Garoppolo's face. The pass sailed yards over Sanders' reach. On fourth down, Clark sacked Jimmy G; the Chiefs' only sack of the game reverberated far more loudly than the 49ers' three. It was over.

And so, on the biggest stage of their lives, with the game on the line and their team trailing late in the fourth quarter, the fortunes of the two quarterbacks diverged. Mahomes was asked to win the game, and he obliged, with yet another stirring comeback performance that belies his tepid 78.1 passer rating. He showed the poise of a veteran, shrugging off the first three quarters, the pressure of the best defense he'd ever faced, and the pressure of tremendous expectation. He may not be unstoppable, but he's unsinkable, and our hats, as promised, are off to him. He made the plays. He's the best in the game.

Jimmy Garoppolo also was asked to win the game, and it's fair to ask whether that was necessary. The 49ers rushed 22 times in the game, against 31 pass attempts. Jimmy G's numbers after three quarters were 17-of-20, 183 yards, one TD, one interception. But they look like this in the fourth: 3-for-11, 36 yards, one sack, another interception. Even if you discount the last two throws in garbage time, it's pretty bad.  On the two most important drives of his life, he was 2-for-7 plus a sack.  He didn't make the plays. But should he have needed to make so many of them? On those "drives," out of nine plays, the 49ers ran twice. Twice. For 22 yards. 11 yards per attempt. The best rushing attack in football was not asked to win the game-- or even to help win the game.

The final minute was a desultory reminder of the Atlanta fiasco; Williams, running to the edge on second down and working to stay in bounds, found himself all alone down the left side for a gimme touchdown. Garoppolo's second interception and the obligatory kneeldowns followed, and the Kansas City Chiefs, after fifty years of waiting, hoisted their first Vince Lombardi Trophy. (The trophy did not exist in 1969, when they won the fourth "World Championship of Professional Football," still informally called the "Super Bowl" and unencumbered by Roman numerals.)  Do they deserve their fourth league championship? You bet they do. They're the better team.

And so we move on, waiting 'til next year, and all that.



Deebo Samuel, whom we thought might end up the 'Bowl MVP, did his part, with three carries on the 49ers' version of the "Jet Sweep" for 53 yards as well as five catches for 39. We would expect Steve Spagnuolo is awfully relieved Number 19 wasn't called upon more often in the second half.

The 49er pass rush lived up to its reputation, and the most startling development of the game, even acknowledging his winning heroics, was Mahomes' scattered, frustrated play for most of the evening. Constantly pressured, he couldn't stand in the pocket nor had he time to look deep over the middle, his sweet spot. Again and again he was flushed out and obliged to scramble, Russell Wilson-style, and make late throws to the sideline. That simply is not the Chiefs' game, and during the third quarter we were saying things like, "We're making these guys play like Seattle! Even if they win, we've taken them completely out of their game!"  Ultimately, the final seven minutes proved that would not be the case, but  regardless, Nick Bosa and DeForrest Buckner, who got the big third-quarter sacks, as well as Arik Armstead, Sheldon Day, Dee Ford, and Solomon Thomas, all did their part. 

We can say the same for Fred Warner, who was in perfect position to intercept Mahomes' ill-advised third-quarter pass. It immediately followed Bosa's sack and a recovered fumble, and was thrown hastily  under heavy pressure. Warner also made one of the game's best solo tackles, throwing Mecole Hardman for a six-yard loss and killing a Kansas City drive at the 49er 46 two minutes before halftime.  And at the time it seemed Tarvarius Moore's heads-up interception on a deflected pass, eight short minutes after Warner's pickoff, might have been the play that decided the game.  Keep in mind Mahomes threw five interceptions all season and none in the AFC playoffs.

George Kittle had a quiet day by his standards. But it's the play he didn't make that everyone will remember,  With a minute left in the first half, the ball on the 20 and the score tied 10-10, coach Shanahan, aware the 49ers would receive the second-half kickoff, decided to let the clock run down to 20 seconds, perhaps intending to ensure Mahomes would not get another chance before the long halftime break. Reid at first obliged, but then he called timeout with third down coming. Jimmy G promptly zipped a perfect pass over the middle to backup halfback Jeff Wilson for a first down at the 45. Shanahan then finally called a timeout, and with 14 seconds left Garoppolo made him look like a bloomin' genius with perhaps his best pass of the night, a deep sideline shot that Kittle grabbed before going out of bounds at the Kansas City 13. Safety Daniel Sorensen had grabbed at Kittle as George turned downfield, Kittle pushed back, then pushed back again. He was flagged for offensive pass interference, killing the play and a certain score. Any hope of "let 'em play" or "the defender initiated contact" this time went by the board. But bad call or not, it was a generally well-officiated game, and it's worth noting Kittle himself didn't complain about it afterward. For his part, Shanahan was a lot more incensed over a non-call on a sideline hit on Garoppolo later in the game than he was about this one.

The idea of "deferring" after winning the coin toss is for a team to come out in the second half, march down the field, and score. That choice paid off beautifully for San Francisco. Not only did the 49ers hold Mahomes & Co. to three-and-out on the game's opening possession, their five-and-a-half-minute drive to open the third-quarter may have been their best of the game. Jimmy G was 5-for-5, Deebo Samuel broke a 14-yard run, and Robbie Gould gave the 49ers the lead they'd hold for the next 20 minutes.  On their two scoring drives in that glorious third period, Garoppolo was 8-of-9 for 94 yards, and his best completion of the night was a 26-yard over-the-middle beauty to Kendrick Bourne. Their second-quarter touchdown drive was a portrait in balanced offense, too: four rushes for 38 yards and three passes, all complete, for 42 yards and the touchdown to Kyle Juszczyk.  We suppose coach had these drives in mind during the game's final five minutes, but we also know he knows his situational football. Well, that's enough of that.

Indeed, much has been made about how Kyle Shanahan and Jimmy Garoppolo will deal with this, losing a game that not only seemed eminently winnable but was, even after the Chiefs' offense found itself. And more will be made about the 49ers' chances of coming back to the Super Bowl next year and winning it, or whether they'll endure a season of disappointment and near-misses, as did the Rams in 2019. That's not our thing and we won't dwell on it. 

But we've always liked the Kansas City Chiefs, ever since that great win over Minnesota in the fourth Super Bowl, and we have no problem congratulating a great organization, a great team, a great coach, a great fan base, and the game's greatest quarterback. Enjoy the spotlight, Chiefs; it's been a long time coming, and it's well deserved. See you next season.


 

  

February Rush

"A pass rush in the fourth quarter is the key to winning NFL football."
                  Bill Walsh

"(W)ith 9:38 showing on the clock their passing attack was over, finito. The team that uses the pass to set up the run went Big Ten. No more passes, not one. Seven straight running plays."
                  Paul Zimmerman on Super Bowl XVI

 "We didn't know what to expect, given the mentality of their coach. Plus, he had that extra week to prepare them." 
                  Reggie Williams of the Cincinnati Bengals after Super Bowl XVI

"Our four linemen are going to have to do it without help... Oh, we'll mix in a stunt or a blitz, just to keep from being static... But out front four guys are going to have to have the game of their lives."
                   Coach Bill McPherson, the night before Super Bowl XIX



Rush the football and rush the quarterback. Will that formula, properly executed, be enough for the 49ers to beat the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LIV on Sunday? It had better be.

We've seen it played out time and again. When a game is hyped as "the unstoppable force meets the immovable object," look to the other side of the equation for the keys to victory.

Patrick Mahomes is the "unstoppable force." The game's most gifted and prolific quarterback leads an offense that can score at any time, in any situation, whether on a long, dispiriting drive or a sudden quick strike downfield. They will face the "immovable object," the game's most dominating and consistent defense, a defense that is back at the full strength that made it the talk of NFL early this season while Mahomes was dealing with a dislocated kneecap. Something's got to give, right?

Likely both will give. Mahomes will make plays, probably a few plays no one else can make, and his offense will score points. The 49er defense will make plays, probably more pressure than Mahomes has seen all year, and some hits in the secondary that will make his receivers long for the defenses of Tennessee and Houston. 

But it says here the game will be decided by what happens when Mahomes is on the sideline and the team in white has the ball. Will Jimmy Garoppolo pilot the 49ers to victory with another Bob Griese impersonation? Or will Jimmy G and his receivers uncork those big plays, often immediately following a sack or a penalty, that broke the backs of good defenses in New Orleans and LA?  Will Raheem Mostert, or Matt Breida, or a recovered Tevin Coleman charge through lanes wide enough to admit EZ-Pass customers, to the point that the KC defense reaches the brink of despair? Or will George Kittle break Jerry Rice's Super Bowl game receiving records in a ferocious display of skill and will, leaving would-be tacklers strewn across the field like dominoes? Can the 49ers hold the ball on offense for 35, even 40, minutes? Will the last half of the fourth quarter see a relentless pass rush, one that Mahomes has handled all day, suddenly overwhelm him, as the realities of too many yards and points to gain plus not enough clock left suddenly break the game decisively our way?  For goodness' sake, will it go into overtime and will Jimmy G then "pull a Brady" and win the game with an unanswerable TD drive, as happened to Mahomes and the Chiefs a year ago?

Kyle Shanahan has had two weeks to prepare for this game, and the execution of his game plan by  his offense, we say, will decide the outcome. We also say, watch out for a not-so-secret weapon named Deebo Samuel. A few big plays from that multi-talented rookie could go a long way toward bringing a sixth Lombardi Trophy back to San Francisco.


That Was Then, This Is Now

49er fans of a certain age will remember the last time the team faced an all-world record-breaking phenomenon of a young quarterback in the Super Bowl. That was Dan Marino, of course, with his Miami Dolphins and his 55 touchdown passes, reaching Super Bowl XIX while staid NFL stalwarts such as Tom Landry and Chuck Noll positively gushed over Marino like teenyboppers at a Justin Bieber meet-'n'-greet.  As we recall, that one turned out OK; Joe Montana had the game of this life and, even more importantly, the 49er front four turned Marino into a sack-absorbing interception-throwing statue. He completed exatly one deep pass downfield over four quarters, and it took a circus catch by his receiver to haul it in. That play helped keep the game competitive through halftime-- until a brutal three-and-out ending with an emphatic sack opened the third quarter and decided the outcome right then and there.

Times have indeed changed. Some of the many hits Marino endured that longest afternoon of his career would be flagged as "roughing-the-passer" today. Some of the aggressive coverage the 49ers' All-Pro secondary dished out would be flagged as "illegal contact" or, worse, "hit on a defenseless receiver" today.  Andy Reid's offense is not as one-dimensional today as was Don Shula's then (and by necessity, we quickly note; the great coach would have designed a balanced attack if he had the players to do it). Mahomes, as we all saw last weekend, can break out and run for twenty, thirty yards or more when he has to, as Joe Montana himself did that day in 1985. Mahomes is much more a combination of Montana's and Marino's skills and athleticism than he is a carbon copy of Number 13. 

No, the reason for all this blather is simply to deflate the idea that any one player, no matter how great, is unstoppable. What does it mean to "stop" Mahomes? It's unlikely any defense can stop him from gaining yards and scoring touchdowns. But until proven otherwise, we believe there is a defense out there that can keep him from taking over a game, and the only defense left with that capability is the 49ers'. If the San Francisco offense can compress Mahomes' opportunity window to 25 minutes or less, and if the game is close in the fourth quarter, we believe "stop" will be defined in the simplest manner: not allowing him to generate enough points to win the game. 

And if all those things happen and Patrick Mahomes still makes the game-winning plays-- well, then we'll have to rethink this whole "unstoppable" business after we doff our hats.

But unless and until that moment comes, we believe it will be a Niner Boogie on Super Sunday!

Clash of the Titans III

As Aaron Rodgers dropped back to pass for the last time in the 49ers' NFC Championship win over Green Bay, with offensive linemen falling like trees around him and red shirts closing in from all directions, we were somehow reminded of the valiant but doomed leadership of General Robert E. Lee, leading his bedraggled, beaten army of 8000 or so away from the wreckage at Sailor's Creek and toward an encampment of over 100,000 enemy soldiers. He wasn't ready to quit, not yet, and neither was Rodgers, despite having been sacked for the third time two plays earlier, despite no timeouts, despite a 17-point deficit. Rodgers ignored the pressure and heaved a beautiful rainbow pass downfield, but it was off-target and Richard Sherman made the easy interception that turned a contest into a celebration. The San Francisco 49ers are back in the Super Bowl!

And so are the Kansas City Chiefs, and as people who know us well have heard many a time, the Chiefs are our second-favorite team and our favorite from the old AFL of our childhood. And it was as an AFL team, the last one standing in fact, that the Chiefs last played for the world championship, in the fourth "NFL-AFL World Championship of Pro Football," as it was called then, concluding the 1969 season and the storied history of their league with a shockingly (to some, that is) one-sided victory over the NFL's best, the Minnesota Vikings. It's been fifty years for Kansas City, and only seven for the 49ers, but is there any doubt the Big Game will, this time, feature the NFL's two best?

"Clash of the Titans" is the nickname we bestowed upon Super Bowl XIII between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Dallas Cowboys, the two best teams of the 1970s, who met to decide which one would be the first team ever to win three Super Bowls.  Five years later the Los Angeles Raiders and the defending Super Bowl champion Washington Redskins were so dominant in their conferences during the regular season that their meeting in Super Bowl XVIII had an air of inevitability. The same could be said for the 49ers-Miami matchup a year later.  And now we have, for those with a fondness for legends, Joe Montana's first team against Joe Montana's second team. We missed out on "Joe versus Steve" in 1994, but in 2020, as Joe himself said the other day, "I guarantee my team will win this game!"

So we're not about to work up any animosity here for our opponent, a team that for awhile seemed to be a "rest home" for former 49er quarterbacks. Joe, Steve DeBerg before him, Steve Bono and Elvis Grbac after him-- all of them led Kansas City into the playoffs. Years later Alex Smith did the same. Whoever wins this game will deserve it-- as long as it isn't decided on a call or non-call, that is. Banish that thought!

It could be argued-- it is being argued-- that neither of these Super Bowl teams defeated their conference's best opponent to get here. The 49ers played the Packers and the Vikings, not the Seahawks and the Saints, while KC avoided the omnipresent Patriots and the top-dog Ravens. But that's missing the point. Both these teams were the most exciting, complete, and dynamic teams in their conferences all year long. The Kansas City defense hit a slump mid-season, but emerged as one of the strongest units in football down the stretch. The 49er defense likewise dropped off after a sensational start-- but after their first bye in 14 weeks, the unit came roaring back well-rested at full strength, as the Vikings and Packers will sadly testify. A year ago, "everyone" wanted to see the Los Angeles Rams and the Chiefs reprise their incredible 54-51 Monday night epic in the Super Bowl; "everyone" was disappointed. We're not aware of anyone who expects to be bored on February 2.

The contrast here is between the Chiefs' explosive passing offense featuring the amazing Patrick Mahomes, and the 49ers' unstoppable run game featuring Raheem Mostert-- unless it's Matt Breida or Tevin Coleman, that is. Mahomes certainly showed his matchless ability to turn a  game around in a manner of minutes; he did it in back-to-back weeks, erasing 24- and 10-point deficits like a six-foot sixth-grader after spotting his classmates a lead in a game of "Horse." The 49ers' great offensive front-- we're talking Laken Tomlinson, Mike Person and Ben Garland as well as tackles Joe Staley and Mike McGlinchey, plus the twin hammers of Kyle Jusczyk and George Kittle-- pounded one very good defense and another good defense into submission before halftime in each playoff game.

As we've said before, when the focus is on one side of the ball, look to the other side for the keys to victory. That's going to be  a little harder to do here, so we'll push it out to next week.

Bright moments:

Mostert, obviously, taking over the game as the premier ballcarrier of the weekend, doing a "Derrick Henry" on the Packers. That may be a tad unfair to Henry; last Sunday he didn't have lanes through which to run as Mostert did. But the point is, the "journeyman" back ran through those lanes on the way to his record four-touchdown game and a place in the record books behind only the Hall of Famer Eric Dickerson.

Kittle caught one ball. It was the biggest catch of the night, a 19-yard gain on first down with eight minutes to play and the Packers having cut the  lead to 14. Green Bay had thrown everything they had on defense into stopping the run in the fourth quarter, and they had been successful, forcing a critical three-and-out on three running plays after their failed onside kick. At the time, Jimmy Garoppolo-- hey, we finally mentioned his name!-- had not thrown a pass since the second quarter. This one let the air out of the Packers' tires, and three minutes later Robbie Gould's third field goal with 3:36 left made it 37-20 and turned Rodgers into General Lee, full of fight but out of time.

Robbie Gould! The ageless one still hasn't missed a field goal or extra point in the postseason, and he capped three drives that totaled 11 minutes with nine critical points, including the clincher.

DeForrest Buckner diving onto Rodgers' fumble at the 49er 25, late in the second quarter. Green Bay  had just put their first drive together, running the ball 4 times for 27 yards after Rodgers hit on a beautiful downfield pass.  Knowing who was at quarterback for the Packers, not a few of us were already mentally preparing for a 17-7 game. 60 yards and four minutes after the turnover, it was 20-0 instead, and then...

Emmanuel Moseley, who didn't even start a week ago, anticipating Rodgers' pass and beating Geronimo Allison to the ball on the interception that rendered the game un-competitive for the next 20 minutes. It was 27-0 at the half and 34-7 after three.

That man Deebo! Young Samuel, emerging as a star in this league, running the "Jet Sweep" twice on the same drive for 43 yards. He also caught two passes for 46 yards.

Eight passes. Who does Garoppolo think he is anyway, Bob Griese?



Eli's Going

Eli Manning retired this week after 16 years with the New York Giants. If you'll remember, he was even more heralded coming out of college than was big brother Peyton. Now, having wisely decided to let his legacy speak for him, he walks away with his health intact, and the Hall of Fame debate begins.

To us it's a no-brainer.  As Bill James said regarding qualifications for the baseball Hall of Fame, it's not that there is a player with Eli's qualifications who is in the Hall. It's that there is no player with Eli's qualifications who is not in the Hall of Fame. Yes, Jim Plunkett won two Super Bowls at quarterback, as did Eli, and he is not in. (We hope that will be rectified soon, while Mr Plunkett is still alive.) But only Bart Starr, Terry Bradshaw, Joe Montana, Tom Brady, and... Eli Manning have won multiple Super Bowl MVP awards. There would be no precedent for denying him entry into the Hall of Fame, though it may take a few years before it happens.



The Las Vegas Raiders

Well, they made it official yesterday, and we all may be grateful they didn't bastardize the name to "Vegas Raiders," which sounds like a bad TV movie from the early 1970s.

Laying aside the issue of Roger Goodell's warm embrace of public sports betting at this time-- who knows, he may be on to something, no one could possibly "fix" a game these days without the word getting out, and we trust his penalty for attempts at such would be harsh and merciless--  the move is not nearly as shocking as Al Davis' flight to Los Angeles 37 years ago, though the reasons for it are largely the same.

Oakland is a mess. The city government is a joke, with a mayor who ought to be in federal prison and likely depends on illegal votes to stay in office. The Coliseum Board remains answerable to no one but themselves. There is every chance they will lose the A's, too, though we hope not to an out-of-state location.

The population of the East Bay, with Oakland as its demographic center, is about 2.2 million as of the 2018 census. Greater Las Vegas, one of the fastest-growing cities in America, is about the same. And Las Vegas receives almost one million visitors per week on average. Per week!  Think any of 'em are football fans? Think fans from Green Bay, Boston, Baltimore, and Atlanta won't want to go to Vegas for a weekend and see their favorite team?

For the Oakland faithful, airfare to "Sin City" is about $100, so we're told. Consider that most season tickets are shared by groups these days. It's easy to imagine eight guys or four couples from the East Bay divvying up the eight home games into two weekend trips to Vegas each. And that's without having to sit in the decrepit Coliseum, park in Oakland, or ride BART. We expect the Raider fanbase in Oakland to handle this with enthusiasm. They'll still be the home team.

Sam Wyche

"I love you, man."

It's become a meme, a cliche; a stereotypical bonding moment between two tough guys, two macho men, good for a chuckle on TV commercials and social media.

But perhaps the root of it all was the emotional meeting between two dear friends, Sam Wyche and Bill Walsh, moments after Walsh's 49ers had overcome Wyche's Bengals in the final seconds of Super Bowl XXIII at Miami.  Wyche and his team had done everything in their power to win that game, neutralizing Joe Montana and Walsh's offense for three-plus quarters, abandoning their hurry-up offense in favor of a clock-devouring grind-it-out approach that came within one first down of the championship. And then Sam Wyche had to watch as it all was taken away by players coached by his close friend, his mentor, the man whom he knew, more than anyone, held the keys to the kingdom of fleeting success on a football field. 

Walsh was near collapse as he embraced the younger man at midfield. He'd coached him when Wyche was a quarterback with the Bengals. He'd hired him as his quarterbacks coach almost the moment he took over with the 49ers. He'd groomed him for success and then seen him achieve that success with his old team, Walsh's old team, too. Now he leaned on his friend for support, emotionally exhausted; "I love you," he blurted out. "I love you, too," Sam Wyche whispered, his arms around his coach.  That's the kind of man Sam Wyche was, not just gracious, but noble in defeat.

What kind of man was Sam Wyche, who passed away yesterday at 74? Consider: a man of accomplishments, a man who coached in and almost won a Super Bowl, a man whose face and voice were known to millions on television as he broadcast NFL games, this same man volunteered as a substitute teacher and assistant-- yes, assistant-- football coach at his local high school in Pickens, S.C., in the 2000s.  Sam Wyche, who nearly broke down when he broke the news to his team that one of their players, fullback Stanley Wilson, had to be suspended (and ultimately was banned from the NFL) for repeated cocaine abuse-- the night before Super Bowl XXIII. Sam Wyche, who on sleepless nights, his mind filled with X's and O's and tendencies, drove through downtown Cincinnati, stopping his car to talk football with the homeless. Sam Wyche, who donated his speaking engagement fees to those same homeless. Sam Wyche, a good old Georgia boy who loved his adopted hometown of Cincinnati and its people so much he passionately edified them, even as he chastised them, in a memorable public rant that will live forever on YouTube.

Bringing it home: Sam Wyche is indelibly associated with Bill Walsh and the rise of the 49ers. As a rookie quarterback he played for QB coach Walsh on Paul Brown's Cincinnati team for three years, as Walsh developed the offensive theories that would make him a legend. After his career had ended, Walsh tapped him to be the 49ers' quarterbacks coach in 1979; thus Sam Wyche was Joe Montana's first NFL position coach. He was relaying plays to Joe from the sideline in that glorious year of 1981, and he was one of Walsh's two top men in Super Bowl XVI as their offense and Chuck Studley's tough defense beat their former team, the Bengals.

He was well-equipped when he took the Cincinnati job three years later, and he built a winner in five. He was an innovator; his use of the "two-minute offense" throughout the game evoked cries of "Cheater!" from a few NFL rivals, comical as that may seem to fans today. Ironically, one of those, Marv Levy of Buffalo, was so offended by the strategy that he stole it for his own use, dubbed it the "K-Gun," and went to four straight Super Bowls with it. And Wyche's tactic of crowding the huddle with extra men to confuse the defense until just before the snap was so effective, the NFL outlawed the practice.  He was never afraid to look foolish in pursuit of his ideas, and he was always ready to give others the credit. We can look to a class act like Boomer Esiason, his quarterback in Cincinnati, for just one example of Sam Wyche's influence on a young man.

The world needs more like Sam Wyche, especially now that we've lost the original.  Prayers to his family and all those mourning with us this morning.

No Reason To Cry

"What we see is, we see the offensive player come in and initiate contact on the defensive player -- nothing that rises to the level of a foul which significantly hinders the defender, nothing that is clear and obvious through visual evidence, which hinders the defender," Riveron said. "The defender then braces himself. And there is contact then by the defender on the receiver. Again, nothing which rises to the level of a foul based on visual evidence."

And so much for all that. The better team won on Sunday night by the barest of margins, completing a goal-line stand for the ages in the face of what looked like an inevitable comeback led by the most relentless quarterback in the NFL, a player of such caliber he looks absolutely capable of doing anything with nothing-- which at times indeed appears to be his job description.   

Yes, Russell Wilson seems eminently capable of leading his, well, unusual team to victory this coming Sunday in Philadelphia, and if he does, the Seattle Seahawks will be right there, once again, in Santa Clara on January 11, for a third and final match against the 49ers.  And all those crybabies plaguing the twitterverse this morning will get their second chance. 

And that's more than enough bandwidth to waste on the hurt feelings of complainers and toadies who would prefer the referees, rather than the players, decide the outcome of games (as long as their passions and prejudices are served, that is).  

Has there ever been a more astonishing photo-finish in an important NFL game?  Jacob Hollister, the tough tight end who had interfered as much as he was interfered with on third down, landed with the ball in his arms and his left shoulder on the goal line on fourth down. But because of Dre Greenlaw's perfect tackle positioning, Hollister did not score, and it was abundantly clear he had not scored, an easy call to confirm from the replay booth as well as the TV screens of America. We've always held Dan Bunz's emphatic body-slam of Charles Alexander in Super Bowl XVI as the textbook example of a goal-line tackle, but young Greenlaw has just provided everyone another example. He couldn't have done it better, and it literally saved the game. 

That stand! A series of remarkable plays by Wilson, a series of desperate moves by a tired 49er defense, and a colossal coaching blunder by Pete Carroll-- who was classy and gracious in his postgame comments-- all served to offer up a 56-second drama that ranks with anything we've ever seen on a football field. As the Seahawks, trailing 26-21 with two minutes to play, began a slow but relentless march toward the goal line, 49er fans as well as game announcers Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth wondered whether coach Kyle Shanahan would begin calling timeouts on defense, hoping to conserve precious seconds for his offense in the event of what looked like an inevitable-- inevitable?-- go-ahead touchdown. That's the watery, helpless feeling Wilson generates in the final moments of close games, which seem to be the only kind of games Seattle can win. And they win a lot of them. And they sure looked like they were going to win this one.

But Shanahan trusted his defense. The Seahawks had first-and-ten from the 49er 12 with 56 seconds left. They had first-and-goal from the 49er 1 with 30 seconds left. They ran eight plays-- one was a spike-- and they did not score. 

From first-and ten at the 12, the defense forced three end-zone incompletions. Wilson, on fourth-and ten with 42 seconds left, smartly went for the first down instead of the TD, and he got it on a perfect pass to rookie tight end John Ursua at the one-yard line. A sure tackle by K'Waun Williams pulled him back from the goal, just as Seattle had denied Kendrick Bourne's attempt to score a two-point 49er conversion in the third quarter. 

The Seahawks thought they had won the game, and so did a few 49ers on the sideline, as they later admitted. With no timeouts left, Seattle got to the line of scrimmage just in time and Wilson spiked the ball to stop the clock with 22 seconds left-- and onto the field came Marshawn Lynch, "Beast Mode" himself. His arrival this past week in Seattle to help out his injury-riddled former teammates had driven the "12th Man" crowd into a frenzy, and it erupted again as he put on his helmet and ran out. 

In the game, Lynch hadn't done much statistically-- Wilson's go-to guy out of the backfield all day was rookie Travis Homer-- but he'd broken off two big third-quarter runs that set up the Seahawks' first TD, and he'd made a sensational one-yard goal-line leap to score their second. 

It's that leap that was on everyone's mind. Was there any doubt Wilson, with 22 seconds, no timeouts, and a yard to gain, would hand it to Lynch to gain that yard and win the game? Was there any doubt coach Carroll would make that call-- remembering  the finale of Super Bowl XLIX and "Unfinished Business?" But Carroll may have outsmarted himself again. To make sure, he called in several players to the sideline, and sent out a "jumbo" offensive formation-- and that took time. Too much time!  The play clock ran out and Seattle was penalized for delay of game-- and the ball moved back to the six-yard-line.

Another Pete Carroll- Marshawn Lynch play-calling mishap! The mind reels. The ball back at the six, Lynch, no longer an option, trotted off the field. Once again it would be up to Russell Wilson to win it. And Kyle Shanahan's defense, the defense he trusted to save the game, did just that. Among the forgotten plays of this game will be Marcell Harris' amazing leap to nearly intercept Wilson's fade pass in the corner of the end zone on second-and goal, the ball and Harris tumbling out of bounds. On third down Hollister ran right into Fred Warner at the goal line. They grappled briefly and Wilson's quick pass zipped through the end zone. No flag was thrown, as Al Riveron has sensibly explained above. And on fourth down "The Longest Yard" became "The Longest Inch." Seconds later, Jimmy Garoppolo plowed ahead for a most meaningful one-yard gain to run out the clock and end the game, and the 49er sideline went wild, players celebrating a most meaningful win that had looked for all the world like a lost cause.  

Now the 49ers, who have been playing for 13 straight weeks, get a most-needed bye. They'll take the field Saturday afternoon, January 11, and we expect to see Wilson and his teammates on the opposition sideline again, though we'd really, really, rather not.

Bright moments:  

Deebo Samuel, his star ascendant, using his tremendous speed to run away from defenders on a beautiful caught-in-stride pass from Garoppolo in the first quarter, a play that temporarily quieted the crowd and set up his own touchdown run on the next play, a reverse, Kyle Juszczyk leveling Shaquill Griffin with the sweetest downfield block you'll ever see;

Jimmy G doing his Tom Brady impersonation throughout the game, absolutely unflappable, seemingly disregarding the shrieking crowd, the pressure of an increasingly close game, and a defense that supplied plenty of its own pressure with two sacks, finishing with 18-of-22 for 285 yards and, perhaps most importantly, leading two quick, emphatic touchdown drives to counter Seattle touchdowns; 

Raheem Mostert following a swath of blockers on a 13-yard fourth-quarter touchdown run, a thing of beauty and his second score of the game, putting the 49ers up 26-14; 

Juszczyk breaking wide open on a big downfield pass play that set up the 49ers' most crucial answer-back score of the game, Mostert's third-quarter run to make the score 19-7; 

Half the 49er defense stuffing Lynch on fourth-and-one from the San Francisco 30 late in the second quarter and ensuring Seattle would be held scoreless at halftime;

The overall team speed of this ballclub, the fastest group of 46 men on any football field today.


We've had the Baltimore game, the New Orleans game, the Atlanta game, and the second Rams game. Now this.  Our team has become its own NFL "Fantastic Finishes" highlight reel. Is there a any chance of a rout, or even a decisive win, in our near future? For now, perhaps it's enough that there's a weekend of stress-free NFL football ahead that will enable us to simply relax before the next one. 

Point to Point

As the two best teams in the NFC head toward an Inevitable Showdown a week from this coming Sunday, the spectre of a third team, like the Ghost of Seasons Past, shadows the fortunes of both.

Either our 49ers or their nemeses, the Seattle Seahawks, will win the NFC West this season. Both have a chance to end up the NFC's top-seeded playoff team. They are tied atop the division with identical 11-3 records. Right now Seattle holds the tie-breaker advantage, thanks to their overtime win at Levi Stadium a month ago. But that advantage is only temporary; it will be lost for good if the 49ers defeat  the Seahawks on Sunday night, December 29-- no matter what else happens. 

The reason for that can be laid at the doorstep of last year's NFC champions, the Los Angeles Rams, who Sunday lost in humiliating fashion and  essentially eliminated themselves from contention, just a week after their best and most important win since January. Whether or not their dominating 28-12 win over Seattle two weeks ago was illusory, it made this division battle between the two top teams as close as it could be. And the Rams get a chance to do the same thing to the 49ers this Saturday night, to play a spoiler role. Following the horrific and inexcusable loss to Atlanta last Sunday, the 49ers really can't afford to lose to the Rams now, can they?

Actually, they can. It would probably cost them the top seed, and it might even cost them the first-round bye, but the Niners absolutely can lose to the Rams this week and still win the division if they beat Seattle in the finale-- even if the Seahawks defeat Arizona this week and take a one-game lead. For that, we can thank the NFL's complex tiebreaking procedures-- and we can thank the Los Angeles Rams.

The division tie-breaking procedures start with head-to-head record, then division record, then conference record, then common opponents, at which point almost all ties have been broken in the past.  Right now the 49ers and Seahawks are dead even in division record (3-1) and conference record (8-2).  Each is 3-1 against the AFC North, with victories over Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh, and a loss to Baltimore. Each is 3-1 against the NFC South; the 49ers lost only to Atlanta (at home) and the Seahawks only to New Orleans (at home). Each beat a different team in the NFC East and NFC North, so those don't count as common opponents. Nor does the 49er-Seattle game last month. So, against common opponents, the 49ers are 9-2 and the Seahawks 8-3. That's meaningless, today, because Seattle won that game over the Niners and holds the head-to-head advantage.

Now follow the bouncing ball. If the Seahawks beat the Cardinals and the 49ers lose to the Rams this weekend, Seattle would then take a one-game lead, 12-3 to 11-4. The Seahawks would have a 4-1 division record and 9-2 conference record to the 49ers' 3-2 and 8-3, and both would then be 9-3 against common opponents.

But one-game lead and head-to-head win notwithstanding, Seattle still would have  to win or tie on Sunday night the 29th to win the division.

If the 49ers, trailing by a game as outlined above, should summon up their best effort and beat their rivals on their home field that night, the teams would be tied even tighter than they are today: both 12-4, even in the head-to-head series, both 4-2 in the division, both 9-3 in the NFC-- and both still 9-3 against common opponents, which would then become extremely meaningful.

That's tied, all right. Tied at five levels.  Tied up tight. Maybe tighter than any division race, ever.

What happens then? The NFL rules say it goes to "strength of victory," and all of a sudden it's no contest. The 49ers have outscored their opposition by 161 points this year, an 11.5-point margin of victory. The Seahawks have barely broken even, outscoring the opposition by a total of 26 points over 14 games, same as the 8-6 Rams.  That's less than two points per game. If we look only at victories, it's almost as lopsided; the 49ers have a 173-point margin in their wins, Seattle is at 62.

Has a NFL division, or any playoff berth, ever been decided by points? We don't know. But if this year's NFC West race ultimately is so decided, it's nice to know our guys will come out on top.

Lonely at the Top

And then there was one.  The New England Patriots ran into a human highlight reel named Lamar Jackson on Sunday night, and after it was over the Belichicks had given up as many touchdowns in one game as they had all year, and their record dropped to 8-1. Thus, as Week Ten unfolds and our 49ers enjoy a long week before taking the field Monday night against Seattle, San Francisco boasts the only undefeated team in the NFL.  Did anyone really expect this?

Long-suffering (well, relatively so) 49er fans were the butt of countless internet jokes, gibes, and insults a year ago after many made a slew of hyperbolic Super Bowl predictions in the wake of Jimmy Garoppolo's arrival. His subsequent season-ending injury splattered egg all over many a Faithful face, and coming off a 4-12 season few were ready to make reservations for Miami. Yet here we are. The naysayers who've loudly blared that "the 49ers haven't beaten anybody yet" are getting a bit muted now.  Holding the Rams to one first-quarter touchdown in LA is pretty impressive, completely demolishing a decent Carolina team is several times more so, and hanging tough to decisively finish out a division opponent on their turf is exactly what good teams do in a "trap" game.

That the 49ers have done this over the past month without two starting offensive tackles and their go-to fullback is even more impressive. It was the offense, after all, that closed out the Arizona game, driving for emphatic first downs that took the ball and the clock away from the Cardinals. The defense, with a fearsome pass rush, active linebackers, and a turnover-focused secondary, has been solid all year. But there's a reason Jimmy G is 14-2 as a starter here; he "just wins." He doesn't let things bother him; he's cool, calm, and collected regardless of situation or circumstance. There's no way to accurately measure just how infectious this type of confidence is, but we can see it in action.

The last time the 49ers started a season 8-0 was in 1990. They were the two-time defending Super Bowl champions then, going for the unprecedented "three-peat."  All told, the Niners won ten straight to open that season, as did their bitter rivals, Bill Parcells' New York Giants. A week ahead of their Monday Night Showdown in week 12, both teams were upset at home by division rivals-- the Rams, in San Francisco's case. Nonetheless, that Monday night battle against the G-Men, which ended 7-3 in the 49ers' favor, was a classic, and it foreshadowed the NFC Championship battle a month later, in which New York still couldn't score a touchdown, but did win the game.

Is this team better than that one? Well, consider: the 1990 49ers, after two years of a powerful running game led by Roger Craig and Tom Rathman, couldn't run the ball at all. Joe Montana attempted more passes, was sacked more times, and threw more incompletions in 1990 than in any other season of his career. The team scored 353 points, down from 442 in the epochal 1989 season, and scored over 30 only twice. For reasons we still can't figure out, the coaching staff shuffled the offensive line that year, moving Steve Wallace from left to right tackle and Harris Barton from right tackle to guard. The line simply didn't dominate in 1990 as it had in 1989. The Niners' success that season--  a 14-2 mark and top seed in the NFC again-- was primarily due to the defense, which had a terrific year.

This team runs better than that one did. Jimmy G hasn't had to throw as many times as Joe did. This defense may not be at the level of that one, yet, but it's sure getting there. And, just as in 1990, there is a NFC team standing in the way, confident it can block the 49ers' path to Miami.

That's the Seattle Seahawks, of course, who come in to Levi Stadium next Monday, Veterans' Day, on a roll, with a 7-2 record and a MVP-worthy season from Russell Wilson. This isn't the "old" Seahawks we learned to hate earlier in the decade. That team relied on constant defensive holding and relentless pressure, waiting and waiting for the opposition to make a mistake and then pouncing on it. The offense generally stumbled and bumbled through much of a given game, relying on Marshawn Lynch to break a big run or a Wilson prayer to somehow come down in the right hands. Those things happened often enough to earn Seattle back-to-back Super Bowls.

This Seahawks team is different. Wilson is now the best quarterback in the NFC. As with Jimmy G, though in a completely different way, Wilson inspires his teammates to a great level of confidence. The Seahawks have a legitimately explosive offense now with a lot of talent. On the other hand, their defense has been vulnerable all season, as Tampa Bay and Jameis Winston showed last week, running up 34 points on Seattle's home field.

Time was when the Seahawks' game plan was to keep it close and low-scoring, and wait for something to break. (Green Bay, in the 2014 NFC Championship, and Minnesota, in the 2015 playoff, are textbook examples.) No more. With Wilson playing lights-out, the Seahawks can win a shootout against anyone, especially if they can get the ball last. Monday night, we believe, will be the game that shows us just how good the 49er defense really is, and whether their running game can effectively keep the league's most dangerous man on the bench.  Bring it on!