Can the 49ers win a super bowl with Alex Smith?

Were you guys complaining about alex watching the same game I was? Yup we were 1 for 13 in 3rd downs, which is absolutely inexcusable. Ok, why? Alex threw the ball into the turf at WRs toes on at least a dozen plays. Why? Because even with an inferior WR corps, a) they never managed to get open(no separation according to NYG coaches), b) there were no quick slants or outs called on a slick field which favors the WR, and those passes were there all day long. Guys, that isn't alex's fault. The WRs that we have could at least been coached to give a fake, or God forbid, maybe two, and they would have been open. Even with inferior WRs, we could have had those quick short outs and slants. Most importantly, alex doesn't call the plays, Roman did. This was an abject failure at playcalling with WRs who didn't show us one fake all nite, and hence never were open. All those "turf balls" alex threw, were not crappy passes. They were thrown the only place they could be...into the dirt.

I have been an advocate for drafting OL until after this game. Now we have the DE/OLB we had needed, we got coached up the DBs and CBs that we needed, we have the RB, the TEs, the OL(if healthy), we have the QB. We have the all pro ST(unfortunately not healthy on PR side). What we now, finally, need, are the WRs. Blackmon will be long gone when we draft, and there are ideas out there about Kap being traded for higher draft pick, but looking at this yr, I would say baalke and Coach have a very good feel for talent....Braylon being the one exception. Now is the time to damn the torpedoes and get the WRs that so many fans want. Finally, I agree. While at it, add a very late in the draft QB, and maybe a promising mid round OL. The WRs should include someone who has a lot of experience at PR, and we should go into next season with not just one but two PR. As for WR, we need a #1, 2 , and #3 WR. Craps was a malcontent holdout who later showed flashes of brilliance, followed by long periods of disappearance. He would be a good #4. Actually, I would love to see him bundled up for a higher draft pick and ship him and his quirkiness elsewhere. Ergo, we need 3 WRs, not 1..or 2. We got our #4 and he has proven to be a very questionable quality. Ship him out and draft/ trade/acquire a #1,2 and 3 WR.

Don't put this one on alex. He played great, and I have not been an alex fan. OC and HC needs to really look at a badly called game and WRs we had played like this was a backyard game of flag football. Time for the WR housecleaning. What we have isn't worth keeping in my opinion... but we need 3 new guys.

Alex Smith the game manager...I say NO.
Alex Smith the play maker...possibly.

The sad thing is, this year's team had a dominant defense, very good coaching, and elite special teams, and it wasn't enough to win the big game.

Ultimately it comes down to the QB position and whether or not the guy can do enough to win, and I'm not sure Alex is the guy.

we were a couple plays away from winning a SB.

The giants are gonna beat the pats which means we would've beat the Pats. Our D is much better than the Giants. Brady would've been running for his life all game.

Originally posted by BigBug415:
Alex Smith the game manager...I say NO.
Alex Smith the play maker...possibly.

The sad thing is, this year's team had a dominant defense, very good coaching, and elite special teams, and it wasn't enough to win the big game.

Ultimately it comes down to the QB position and whether or not the guy can do enough to win, and I'm not sure Alex is the guy.

So what did Eli do? Did he do enough to win? I don't think he did any more than Alex did to win that game. If we get a turnover and we are in scoring position we are not even having this conversation. If people consider Eli elite, than having both of them on the same field, I can expect Smith to win a SB in the near future.

Originally posted by redmanc07:

Originally posted by BigBug415:
Alex Smith the game manager...I say NO.
Alex Smith the play maker...possibly.

The sad thing is, this year's team had a dominant defense, very good coaching, and elite special teams, and it wasn't enough to win the big game.

Ultimately it comes down to the QB position and whether or not the guy can do enough to win, and I'm not sure Alex is the guy.

So what did Eli do? Did he do enough to win? I don't think he did any more than Alex did to win that game. If we get a turnover and we are in scoring position we are not even having this conversation. If people consider Eli elite, than having both of them on the same field, I can expect Smith to win a SB in the near future.

alex produced two tds, both excellent touch passes..eli producd 2 tds, one on a short field after williams muff, beating a backup cb...
alex missed a wide open kyle williams (with the day he was having he probably drops ball if it isnt overthrown)...eli had 2 passes that werte picks if goldson doesnt bust them up
eli threw to cruz, manning ham and nicks
alex had davis crabtree and, uhh, i ll get back to you on that one

Originally posted by redmanc07:

Originally posted by BigBug415:
Alex Smith the game manager...I say NO.
Alex Smith the play maker...possibly.

The sad thing is, this year's team had a dominant defense, very good coaching, and elite special teams, and it wasn't enough to win the big game.

Ultimately it comes down to the QB position and whether or not the guy can do enough to win, and I'm not sure Alex is the guy.

So what did Eli do? Did he do enough to win? I don't think he did any more than Alex did to win that game. If we get a turnover and we are in scoring position we are not even having this conversation. If people consider Eli elite, than having both of them on the same field, I can expect Smith to win a SB in the near future.

it came down to alot more than the qb position

clearly. not sure what there is to debate here.

As long as they maintain this level of defense, yes. He is not a QB that is going to put team with an average defense on his back & compensate for that by scoring a lot of touchdowns.

Yes, but not without a stud WR who is not currently on the roster.

Originally posted by SanDiego49er:
Maybe. He does some things well. Like read the field well and not turn it over. But he is pretty bad at taking chances. He is very scared, tenative and gun shy. I'd like to see him be a little more of a gunslinger. We would get more 3rd down conversions, yards, td's and time of possession. We give up too many drives because he is scared to make a throw. Some of it is the WR corps. But some of it is him too.

He has taken chances in the past, and they wound up picks. Since Harbaugh came, he has been instructed to be more conservative. I would far rather have Andy Lee punt it to the opponents 15 yard line rather than give up a pick at mid-field.

Here is my standard response to all those who ask "can Alex do this?"

There was a critical piece missing in the 49er offense all season long. It wasn't the play calling although I questioned it on occasion. It wasn't the running game although that stalled in mid-season. The missing piece was something that Harbaugh gave CLEAR NOTICE of the need and it should be abundantly clear to everyone. What was it?

The answer should have been clear to all when Harbaugh took a chance on signing Braylon Edwards to be the big, strong home-run threat that every good offense needs. Despite his well-known character issues, Harbaugh felt the need clearly enough to sign him anyway. To his credit, Edwards spent extra time working with Alex during TC, and, we saw a few glimpses of what could be at the very beginning of the season but then came the injuries and Edwards disappeared. NEVER did this offense have that critical component this season.

Too make matters worse, Joshua Morgan went down at a time when he was clearly the best receiver on the team.

The third blow to the offense was the fact that through the first 12 games, Michael Crabtree, after missing all of TC, was not healthy enough for full participation in practice during the week.

So to answer the OP question: Considering the fact the team was one blown fumble call from the Super Bowl this season despite missing WRs, it should be obvious to anyone that given the pieces Jim Harbaugh clearly indicated the team needed this past season but lost due to injury, that this team CAN win the Super Bowl with Alex Smith at QB.

Add another year of experience to that already elite defense and we can win the super bowl with me at quarterback!

Originally posted by dj43:
Here is my standard response to all those who ask "can Alex do this?"

There was a critical piece missing in the 49er offense all season long. It wasn't the play calling although I questioned it on occasion. It wasn't the running game although that stalled in mid-season. The missing piece was something that Harbaugh gave CLEAR NOTICE of the need and it should be abundantly clear to everyone. What was it?

The answer should have been clear to all when Harbaugh took a chance on signing Braylon Edwards to be the big, strong home-run threat that every good offense needs. Despite his well-known character issues, Harbaugh felt the need clearly enough to sign him anyway. To his credit, Edwards spent extra time working with Alex during TC, and, we saw a few glimpses of what could be at the very beginning of the season but then came the injuries and Edwards disappeared. NEVER did this offense have that critical component this season.

Too make matters worse, Joshua Morgan went down at a time when he was clearly the best receiver on the team.

The third blow to the offense was the fact that through the first 12 games, Michael Crabtree, after missing all of TC, was not healthy enough for full participation in practice during the week.

So to answer the OP question: Considering the fact the team was one blown fumble call from the Super Bowl this season despite missing WRs, it should be obvious to anyone that given the pieces Jim Harbaugh clearly indicated the team needed this past season but lost due to injury, that this team CAN win the Super Bowl with Alex Smith at QB.

This. Alex is limited, but we were inconsistent in terms of personnel at WR. Doesn't mean we don't have talent at WR, but losing your pre season #1 and #2 targets along with losing Ginn here and there doesn't help.

Originally posted by Joecool:

Originally posted by dj43:
Here is my standard response to all those who ask "can Alex do this?"

There was a critical piece missing in the 49er offense all season long. It wasn't the play calling although I questioned it on occasion. It wasn't the running game although that stalled in mid-season. The missing piece was something that Harbaugh gave CLEAR NOTICE of the need and it should be abundantly clear to everyone. What was it?

The answer should have been clear to all when Harbaugh took a chance on signing Braylon Edwards to be the big, strong home-run threat that every good offense needs. Despite his well-known character issues, Harbaugh felt the need clearly enough to sign him anyway. To his credit, Edwards spent extra time working with Alex during TC, and, we saw a few glimpses of what could be at the very beginning of the season but then came the injuries and Edwards disappeared. NEVER did this offense have that critical component this season.

Too make matters worse, Joshua Morgan went down at a time when he was clearly the best receiver on the team.

The third blow to the offense was the fact that through the first 12 games, Michael Crabtree, after missing all of TC, was not healthy enough for full participation in practice during the week.

So to answer the OP question: Considering the fact the team was one blown fumble call from the Super Bowl this season despite missing WRs, it should be obvious to anyone that given the pieces Jim Harbaugh clearly indicated the team needed this past season but lost due to injury, that this team CAN win the Super Bowl with Alex Smith at QB.

This. Alex is limited, but we were inconsistent in terms of personnel at WR. Doesn't mean we don't have talent at WR, but losing your pre season #1 and #2 targets along with losing Ginn here and there doesn't help.

Since we are in basic agreement on the main need, I won't quibble over your "Alex is limited" insertion. My only point is that we don't know that until he is given at least the average set of receivers that playoff teams have. If we are able to get the kind of receiver that Edwards represented, and Morgan stays healthy and Crabtree has a full, injury-free camp, and Alex is still making very conservative decisions, THEN we can say he is limited, but not now.

Originally posted by dj43:

Originally posted by Joecool:

Originally posted by dj43:
Here is my standard response to all those who ask "can Alex do this?"

There was a critical piece missing in the 49er offense all season long. It wasn't the play calling although I questioned it on occasion. It wasn't the running game although that stalled in mid-season. The missing piece was something that Harbaugh gave CLEAR NOTICE of the need and it should be abundantly clear to everyone. What was it?

The answer should have been clear to all when Harbaugh took a chance on signing Braylon Edwards to be the big, strong home-run threat that every good offense needs. Despite his well-known character issues, Harbaugh felt the need clearly enough to sign him anyway. To his credit, Edwards spent extra time working with Alex during TC, and, we saw a few glimpses of what could be at the very beginning of the season but then came the injuries and Edwards disappeared. NEVER did this offense have that critical component this season.

Too make matters worse, Joshua Morgan went down at a time when he was clearly the best receiver on the team.

The third blow to the offense was the fact that through the first 12 games, Michael Crabtree, after missing all of TC, was not healthy enough for full participation in practice during the week.

So to answer the OP question: Considering the fact the team was one blown fumble call from the Super Bowl this season despite missing WRs, it should be obvious to anyone that given the pieces Jim Harbaugh clearly indicated the team needed this past season but lost due to injury, that this team CAN win the Super Bowl with Alex Smith at QB.

This. Alex is limited, but we were inconsistent in terms of personnel at WR. Doesn't mean we don't have talent at WR, but losing your pre season #1 and #2 targets along with losing Ginn here and there doesn't help.

Since we are in basic agreement on the main need, I won't quibble over your "Alex is limited" insertion. My only point is that we don't know that until he is given at least the average set of receivers that playoff teams have. If we are able to get the kind of receiver that Edwards represented, and Morgan stays healthy and Crabtree has a full, injury-free camp, and Alex is still making very conservative decisions, THEN we can say he is limited, but not now.

We do know that he has limitations. Better QB's production, in the long run, does not drop down very far without top tier WR's or with changes at WR. They will still throw the ball to 4th string WR's and make completions happen.