Preseason Week 1: Thoughts after Re-Watching the game...

Regarding Moss, I have to throw out a different perspective which was covered in the Sirius XM Radio thread...

Rogers & Brown mentioned that Randy has that "switch" where he can put on a burst when needed to create separation. It's interesting to note the importance of this burst because it's something you cannot account for by lining up deeper than normal. That's why a 4.2 burner with average skills can be shut down/limited because you can take away what he's good at.

That's probably why Randy was such a monster years ago. He always had that burst, just more of it than now.

I'm sure he will still be effective. That one handed TD against Revis and the Jets from '09 season was pretty impressive.

Originally posted by Marvin49:
1) Offensive Philosophy: Yup, still a running team. ;-) The league is cyclical. Everyone sees a team having success with a particular style of offense and they copycat. Pretty soon, half the league runs an offense like that and defenses are forced to adjust. In this case that offense is the wide open spread style offense that you see in New England, Green Bay, New Orleans, and Detroit. Defenses have countered now with Detroit and Philly running that "Wide 9" stance to get extra pressure on the QB and now have put much more emphasis on DBs and Safeties who can cover. Guys don't need to be big or great tackers...they want guys who can cover.

Enter Jim Harbaugh and Greg Roman. They build an offense that innovates in the RUN game. They MAUL those defenses designed to stop Brady and Brees. All I've heard no for over a year is that "You need to have a QB and a great passing offense to win". BS. You need to have an imagination and a game plan to defeat the team lining up on the other side of the ball. The Niners will run the hell out of the ball this year and with Gore, Hunter, Jacobs, and James they will have ALOT of success.

2) The QBs: I was very suprised by my reaction to the QBs in this game. After Alex, the guys I wanted to see most were in this order: Johnson, Kaep, Tolzien. I came away likeing them in this order: Tolzien, Johnson, Kaep. Look, the 78 yard run was great, but they really had Kaep back there running the Pistol from College. I already know he can run that. Every time they put him in a conventional set, he just looked really unnatural. He didn't look comfortable. I still don't like the release either. Johnson looked smooth and played fairly well. Tolzien tho...I was VERY impressed with him. FAST release. Handles pressure. Looked comfortable. Numbers would have looked much better if recievers had caught the ball and he had had slightly better protection. Going into this I figured Tolzien was the odd man out. Now I'm wondering if Kaep becomes trade bait.

3) Aldon: OK....heart attack. Yikes. That scared me. Can't afford to lose him. In the very short time he was in there tho he looked pretty good.

4) Moss: He played very little so this comment really has more to do with what I saw at the Fanfest on Sunday. I think he's done as a speed reciever. I just didn't see it. Its entirely posible that he wasn't going 100%, but I saw ZERO burst and very little speed. That said, I think he is still a very dangerous red-zone threat. He knows how to get open, he's very tall and he still has great hands. It would be great if he could stretch the field like he did several years ago, but if he can just deliver a red-zone threat, I'm fine with that.

5) LaMichael James: Its the first preseason game, this isn't an indictment, but I didn't see the speed and elusiveness I was expecting. VERY limited sample size and I could very well completely reverse this statement next week. I only mention it because he was the number 1 guy I wanted to see so was watching him very closely.

6) Brandon Jacobs: NICE. He looks like the Brandon Jacobs from several years ago. Nice to have a guy with that kind of size to go along with the rest of the smurf RBs on the team. He does still run a bit upright tho. Hopefully that won't be an issue. Rock Cartwright also looked pretty good.

7) O-Line: Wow: I mean....WOW. That....was impressive. I don't know how much of that was the Niners being good and how much was the Vikings being bad and how much was that it was just a preseason game...but for one game the O-Line looked REALLY good.

8) Parrish Cox: I have to admit I'm iffy on the guy just because of his past. It's tough for me to root for a guy who was accused of what he was accused of. Having said that, he played very well on Friday. He's got size you don't see all that often in a CB. He could be an asset this year when playing that murderers row of QBs on the squedule.

9) Chris Owusu: I think hes gonna have touble making this team that is very deep at WR, but he looked pretty damn good out there. Not just the speed, but they RAC ability he showed on one of the passes he caught. I'm hoping this guy makes it through waivers and ends up on the practice squad.

10) The D: Barring that long pass by Ponder (looks like a broken coverage...Rogers was expecting help from Goldson), they are still DAMN good. Goldson still can't tackle tho. Sigh. Why would you even attempt to tackle Toby Gerhart up high? Thats like trying to tackle Roger Craig by hitting him in the knees. It's just make you look foolish. Other than that tho...these guys are GOOD. It should be fun this year. ;-)

Originally posted by SportsFan:
Moss did look really slow to me at FanFest as well.

Yeah Moss hasn't looked fast at all. I don't see the 4.39 speed as reported. He wasn't getting any separation on streaks at the fan fest. However, he did look like a nice red zone target at fan fest and made some nice plays. He is long, great hands, knows how to use his body, and great ball skills so at least he can help in the red zone. I'm hoping he just wasn't going all out because like I said I wasn't seeing separation when it came to the deep ball, which is really disappointing.

Btw, he was timed and ran the 4.39 when he tried out with the aints

Originally posted by pwillis52beasty:
Yeah Moss hasn't looked fast at all. I don't see the 4.39 speed as reported. He wasn't getting any separation on streaks at the fan fest. However, he did look like a nice red zone target at fan fest and made some nice plays. He is long, great hands, knows how to use his body, and great ball skills so at least he can help in the red zone. I'm hoping he just wasn't going all out because like I said I wasn't seeing separation when it came to the deep ball, which is really disappointing.

he's 35 his blazing speed is gone, he will be a redzone factor though

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:

Originally posted by pwillis52beasty:
Yeah Moss hasn't looked fast at all. I don't see the 4.39 speed as reported. He wasn't getting any separation on streaks at the fan fest. However, he did look like a nice red zone target at fan fest and made some nice plays. He is long, great hands, knows how to use his body, and great ball skills so at least he can help in the red zone. I'm hoping he just wasn't going all out because like I said I wasn't seeing separation when it came to the deep ball, which is really disappointing.

he's 35 his blazing speed is gone, he will be a redzone factor though

that 4.39 speed probably some bs reported by his agent.

Originally posted by susweel:

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:

Originally posted by pwillis52beasty:
Yeah Moss hasn't looked fast at all. I don't see the 4.39 speed as reported. He wasn't getting any separation on streaks at the fan fest. However, he did look like a nice red zone target at fan fest and made some nice plays. He is long, great hands, knows how to use his body, and great ball skills so at least he can help in the red zone. I'm hoping he just wasn't going all out because like I said I wasn't seeing separation when it came to the deep ball, which is really disappointing.

he's 35 his blazing speed is gone, he will be a redzone factor though

that 4.39 speed probably some bs reported by his agent.

i don't buy that and Owens' 40 time either

Originally posted by JTsBiggestFan:
Regarding Moss, I have to throw out a different perspective which was covered in the Sirius XM Radio thread...

Rogers & Brown mentioned that Randy has that "switch" where he can put on a burst when needed to create separation. It's interesting to note the importance of this burst because it's something you cannot account for by lining up deeper than normal. That's why a 4.2 burner with average skills can be shut down/limited because you can take away what he's good at.

That's probably why Randy was such a monster years ago. He always had that burst, just more of it than now.

I'm sure he will still be effective. That one handed TD against Revis and the Jets from '09 season was pretty impressive.

That's possible. It's also possible it was just practice so he wasn't going all out. I simply didn't see it on Sunday. I would really, really love to be wrong

Originally posted by susweel:

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:

Originally posted by pwillis52beasty:
Yeah Moss hasn't looked fast at all. I don't see the 4.39 speed as reported. He wasn't getting any separation on streaks at the fan fest. However, he did look like a nice red zone target at fan fest and made some nice plays. He is long, great hands, knows how to use his body, and great ball skills so at least he can help in the red zone. I'm hoping he just wasn't going all out because like I said I wasn't seeing separation when it came to the deep ball, which is really disappointing.

he's 35 his blazing speed is gone, he will be a redzone factor though

that 4.39 speed probably some bs reported by his agent.

...and thats why I don't buy 40 times reported in the media.

Originally posted by ApatheticIAm:
Is this a general week 1 preseason thoughts thread? If so, then the Rams offensive line looked like the 2004 49ers O-Line They were letting Bradford get hit every play. Hopefully our defense will feast on them

You mean like our OL last year? LOL

Originally posted by NCommand:

Originally posted by ApatheticIAm:
Is this a general week 1 preseason thoughts thread? If so, then the Rams offensive line looked like the 2004 49ers O-Line They were letting Bradford get hit every play. Hopefully our defense will feast on them

You mean like our OL last year? LOL

2004 was the most pathetic worthless piece of crap team in 49er history lol

Originally posted by Marvin49:

Originally posted by susweel:

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:

Originally posted by pwillis52beasty:
Yeah Moss hasn't looked fast at all. I don't see the 4.39 speed as reported. He wasn't getting any separation on streaks at the fan fest. However, he did look like a nice red zone target at fan fest and made some nice plays. He is long, great hands, knows how to use his body, and great ball skills so at least he can help in the red zone. I'm hoping he just wasn't going all out because like I said I wasn't seeing separation when it came to the deep ball, which is really disappointing.

he's 35 his blazing speed is gone, he will be a redzone factor though

that 4.39 speed probably some bs reported by his agent.

...and thats why I don't buy 40 times reported in the media.

yah same here.

If he really did run that time then why didn't the Saints sign him ?

EXCELLENT post - keep them coming.

I'd also add the fluidity the coaches got substitutions on the field and decisiveness in play calling. They managed the clock pretty good.

Our coaching staff give me mega confidence.

Originally posted by Marvin49:

Originally posted by lamontb:
I was most impressed by the short yardage runs. Really in the last few years they have been terrible on short yardage runs. They always get stuffed in goal line situations. Another reason why they struggled in the red zone last year. They dropped the ball vs the Giants when they couldn't convert on that short yardage run late in the game and had to settle for 3. Jacobs and Bruce Miller along wiht the entire o line looked great.

I don't think they will use Moss much in pre season. Gotta save whatever he has left in the tank for the regular season.

And watching the game it seems like offense will continue to attack Whitner covering tight ends.

YES...I saw that with Whitner. He just doesn't have the hieght to cover those TEs. That is one of the D's few weaknesses....they are vulnerable to TEs.

Yes they are...we typically have Willis & Whitner covering tall TE's (mostly) and that is a major mismatch. I'd like to see Culliver or Cox cover them or Goldson and free up Whitner and Willis to play down hill. Scheme seems to be an issue here as much as personnel.

Nice read, thanks!

I think that what we can take away from the game is that our offensive line can push some people around. They looked amazing. And it was against some guys who will actually be playing on sundays.

On the QB front they all looked good. I just dont see how everyone is jumping on the Tolzien bandwagon just yet. He earned some more reps with his performance for sure, but Kaep made atleast two plays that the other qbs could only dream of making. The run was great. I think only Newton could do that. Also, the out he threw to aj jenkins was amazing. I dont think very many NFL qbs could have thrown that pass like that. The seam that SHOULD have been picked was certainly not great. If youre not seeing the major improvement that kaep had moving around in the pocket, then youre not looking. Until both of these guys throw passes/make plays when it matters, then its not a big deal either way.

In the end, i think our defense carries the team, and hopefully the offense can convert some third downs and we keep winning.