Harbaugh's Offense, and the Wide Receiver

Originally posted by tohara3:

Originally posted by LasVegasWally:
Good post.

My take is similar to yours. JH is VERY smart.

You play the hand your dealt - that's what he did all last season. We didn't have the WR who could get seperation so he beat the other teams with a VERY solid running game. When they really stacked the line he passed - like in the 1st Giants game.

If we have better weapons, faster receivers, we'll see more complex game plans.

I feel; so confident in the management and approach Baalke/JH take.

Agree. Completely trust in the organization to make the best use of the talent they have and be able to draft and attract the kind of players they want here on the 49ers!

Also agree! Last year was such a great and pleasant time to be a 9er fan and totally beyond realistic expectations. Coaches around the league and pundits all agreed the 9ers would be harmed more than other teams by the lockout. Makes one cautiously (?) expectant about 2012!

If Baalke is half as successful with the draft as last year the niners will add several starters or important backups. They don't have that many holes!! Miller, Aldon, Culliver and Hunter all played important roles last year. This year they need a RG, backup C, WR for depth, RB for depth, and maybe a backup defender or two. OLine seems the only real area of need.

The problem I saw last year with our deep passing attack was mainly the design of the plays. Of course, the play design could have been a reflection of the talent and desire not to risk INTs. But to my point, most of the deep throws were along the sideline.

>IF, JH likes his receivers to be deep threat to keep the safeties back, which makes some sense,
>and IF last year's sideline deep routes are an indicator, then what you typically have is a trailing CB and over the top safety flowing to the outside.

What this typically should open up is deeper strikes (20-30 yards) into the soft middle of the field -- assuming you can move the underneath linebackers by having the follow RBs and TE to the sides as well. Think Jimmy Graham, Larry Fitzgerald type receptions that gouged us down the middle last year.

This type of pass and reception was sorely missing in the 49ers attack last season. We don't know why the coaches didn't call this type of play much -- or maybe they did and we didn't execute them. Was it was lack of players (receivers), lack of such designs in the scheme, conservative play calling, or limitations of the QB or all the above?

But if the OP point is that JH prefers receivers to push to the top back on the defense, I would expect to see more of these deep middle (gouging") throws emphasized this year.

Is there an area of candlestick dedicated to Harbaugh yet? Maybe an endzone? A suitable name could be harbaugh's hooligans, or Harbaugh's gay lovers, maybe Harbaugh's illegitimate children? Just spit balling here. It probably wouldn't be that hard to dress like him.