2013 - Week 2: Thoughts after watching the game...

Sunday is light years away. The game is being replayed repeatedly. The media is on the case, I just can't escape from it. Everyone is ripping into the 9ers. Carroll amd Sherman are ripping us into pieces. This is terrible, is going to be a very, very, very slow week.

Nice recap as usual Marv, I still feel like crap.

Good synopsis, Marv. Yeah, the doomsdayers will be moaning our season is over...but it's not. Sure, our guys got a beatdown...but then so does just about every team that visits Seattle. 'Hawks are very good...but revenge can also be oh so sweet. Niners have to forget about last night...yes, they'll have to relive their mistakes when they see the game film, but being a veteran team, they'll fix the things they did wrong and move on. Unfortunately, Carroll and Sherman crowed about the win...with their coach even stooping to single out Boldin. I guarantee had they lost, Sherman wouldn't have bothered to greet Harbaugh after the game. No class whatsoever, but that's who they are. Again, time to move on and circle Dec 8 on the calendar.

I remember when they were in game delay and they showed a snap shot of a number of the refs hanging out in the Hawks locker room. I just thought, "Oh the irony." They were having a field day calling holding (both teams); actually laughing about it. I seriously think they were going for their own GBOW record! LOL

Glad you're not as panicked as some of your brethren, Marv. Just one game. Both defenses were dominant for two and a half quarters. Just have to find your run game and you'll be enjoying a 7-1 or 6-2 records going into your bye week (week 9 right?)

Originally posted by Marvin49:

Originally posted by Afrikan:
"The problem wasn't the plan...it was the execution. Seattle was GLUED to receivers all night and the O-Line just couldn't get a push."

Marvin, its easy to glue our receivers when the personnel we have there is a full back as one of our receivers... running routes..getting the ball thrown to him, with of course him dropping it.

it might not have been the "plan", but it was the "personnel" the coaches choose to use. I mean they also had Osgood out there running routes, what threat does he pose?

we continue to run Gore out of the pistol formation...again personnel we use. I've said it before, but we should always have Hunter or James back there for the pistol. Hunter can pass block for alittle guy. And we need to run regular WCO formations for Gore.

its the coaches man....Seattle has adjusted to us, where as we still seem stubborn to make adjustments.

There could be some merit to that....but what personnel SHOULD we have used? That's who we are. Thats how the team was built. It works pretty damn well against every OTHER team in the NFL.

Are you suggesting they go into the noisiest stadium in the NFL against one of the best defenses in the NFL and try to be something they aren't? Go 5 wide on every down?

You are telling me the gameplan was horrible. Give me a better one then.

I think African means,correct me if i'm wrong, using Gore in Jumbo packages or traditional I-formations. Gore is more of a vision runner, he likes to be patient behind a fullback or some sort of lead blocker, and find the smallest of creases for 4-5 yds a pop. The read option kinda of takes that away from him, because he doesnt have the time to let the run play develope. This is how we beat seattle at home last year. That, and taking short dump-offs to gore for 4-5 yds.

Originally posted by Marvin49:
Only watched it once. Didn't have the heart to do so twice.

1) Kap: CAREER regular season statline as a starter - 9 starts, 160 comp, 259 att, 61.77 comp%, 2139 yards, 8.25 YPA, 13 TDs, 6 INTs, 95.05 QB Rating. Ouch. That one smarts. Easily his worst game as a pro and more than a little of it had to do with WHERE they were playing and WHO they were playing. I've read reports on the Seattle board about how this justified their thinking all along that he was just a one read QB...that his first guy was covered and he'd just run. Thats BS. In fact, early on I think he too often was trying too hard to DISprove that theory when he should have just run with the damn thing. I think the issue here isn't that he was making only one read...it's that Seattle was taking ALL of his reads away and giving him very little time to get through them. The first INT was his fault. Misread the coverage. The second was his as well...underthrew the ball and Sherman made a very good play. I was annoyed at Vernon about not going up for the ball until I realized he had pulled a hamstring on the play. I'll take the INT in that game at that point over a MORE injured Vernon. Live to play another day. The last one was all Kap. He was pressing trying to find something that just wasn't there.

2) Run game: 2 weeks now of NOTHING. Kaep can win the game "on his own" against a GB defense, but when the run gets taken away AND you are facing the best secondary in the NFL AND you're IN Seattle....yeah...we saw what happened. I expected the 49ers to lose, but I have to admit that I was surprised they stopped the run game so effectively. I don't think the issue is Frank. I don't know if its scheme or what but the last two opponents have found a flaw in the design of the 49ers run game. The entire O-Line played poorly in this regard but in particular Joe Staley. He let defenders get inside him on several occasions and they simply blew up the play. Was he expecting help from Iupati or a FB or TE? Dunno...but WAY too much penetration to get anything going. Is Gore getting old and slow? Lets be real...Gore was never FAST. LOL. I don't think Gore is the issue here. He just hasn't had ANY room to run in 2 games now.

3) Defense: Ya know something? This game was much closer than the score would indicate. No excuses here. Seattle DOMINATED the 49ers offense, but the 49er Defense played very, very well. All they gave up in the first half was 3 points and that was after the Kap fumble so they were given a short field. What killed them? No help whatsoever from the offense and...

4) Penalties: Sigh. Ya know, its hard enough to beat Seattle in Seattle when you aren't beating yourself. That isn't to say that the 49ers lost because they beat themselves (Seattle did more than enough to win the game)...but they certainly didn't help themselves. Stupid, costly Personal Foul penalties. The one on Brooks I actually felt bad for him on. I don't think he intended to hit him in the face like that. You could see by his reaction. That gave them a first down in the redzone and resulted in a TD. The one on Aldon was inexcusable. STUPID, STUPID play. That would have been 3rd and very long and he gave them another 1st down...and another TD. The score at that point is closer to 11-3 instead of 19-3. If those drives don't result in TDs then Kap isn't forced to pass into a DIME defense and he possibly doesn't turn the ball over 2 more times in Seahawk territory. In a game that close bad decisions can spiral a game out of control in a hurry. Those two penaties in particular against Brooks and Aldon were backbreakers.

5) Injuries. Ugg. Again...not sure how much they affected the game (dunno if Williams would have made a huge difference over Dorsey...D played well all night so tough to put it on them). What it does affect tho is the rest of the season. We are again shorthanded up front. Williams gone and McDonald gimpy. Reid may be out as well. Great. Just perfect. The worst part of the Reid hit is that he was trying to do the right thing when he got hurt. He was leading with his shoulder that he ended up getting hit in the side of the head. If he keeps his head up and see's his target (IE, doesn't use the crown of his helmet) he doesn't get hurt on the play.

6) "THE SEASON IS OVER!!!": OMG people please just STOP. LOL. Have just an OUNCE of PERSPECTIVE. I was pretty sure this was a game the 49ers were going to lose. If they lost by 2 or by 50...it adds up to ONE loss on the schedule. The Seahawks have a one game lead after 2 weeks. They won't win every game. Relax. Lemme roll off some scores for you....26-3. 42-13. Those are the scores of games the 49ers lost LAST YEAR. They still advanced to the Super Bowl. How about this score...40-8. 1994 Super Bowl Champion team...and THAT was at home. How about these....43-13 (Ravens last year), 49-24 (Giants the year before). Moral of this story? CHILL. It aint the end of the world. We are one game back with FOURTEEN left to play. LOL. The first 5 games of this season are a crucible. All we needed was to get out to a 3-2 or 4-1 start before we can start cruising a bit. We are 1-1 and now face a Colt team thats struggled, a Ram team I'm not convinced was all that good to begin with, and then the Texans who have performed miracles to win over so-so teams. We still get Seattle at home this year and they still have 7 more road games (although maybe we shouldn't count the Jags) where they went 3-5 last year. This is a LONG, LONG, way from being over.

7) O-Line: Rough, Rough night. Noise clearly affected them. Avril/Bennett getting an extra beat to get upfield and it showed. Anthony Davis just couldn't get back fast enough all night. As I said before, the combination of the secondary mauling the WRs and the Line getting Kap no time is what resulted in what we saw. No run lanes, No time, No open receivers = Ugly, ugly performance. I don't expect that to continue tho. No other team in the NFL is built to do what the Seahawks did last night. Nobody. Even the Seahawks would have trouble replicating it at Candlestick.

8) Aldon/Justin: Outside of that horrific penalty, Aldon's back. He is who we thought he was. 3.5 sacks already and played very, very well in the run game as well making a few tackles for loss. Justin is the same guy he's always been. That D-Line was NOT the reason they lost. Running a 7 man front all game against Seattle was going to catch up with them eventually.

9) Gameplan: I'm actually not upset about the offensive gameplan. You can look at what happened in the game and think that I just made a ludicrous statement, but hear me out first. The offensive gameplan was to run up tempo to tire that Seahawks D, silence the crowd somewhat, and prevent clock issues. They also ran completely silent for portions of the game. They could just never get any drive going long enough to tire the D. The problem wasn't the plan...it was the execution. Seattle was GLUED to receivers all night and the O-Line just couldn't get a push.

10) Is it Sunday yet? This one is gonna linger.

I liked the game plan as well. I don't know if it was by design to feature Bruce Miller so much or if it was because Seattle just left him open, however I thought the 49ers should've gone up-tempo/no huddle, with a heavy dosage of the run game, passes to the backs and TEs and the occasional deep pass. Kaep truly did have his worse game as a pro. If he can work on connecting those easy short passes, we at least extend drives and at bare minimum, give Seattle a longer field to go if we end up punting.

I do not understand how they completely took Vernon out of the game. To me it seems they could've schemed some type of way to get a linebacker to cover him or just created some other type of mismatch that would get a linebacker having to cover either of our tight ends in space.

I also agree that Kaep should have ran more. IMO, in environments like this, you have to try and muster something positive out of every play and keep the chains moving.

I honestly think our D played well enough for us to win. If the offense were halfway decent, we win the game.

On another note, we shouldn't even bother talking to those Seahawk players. Just play under the assumption that anything we do wrong or are perceived to be doing wrong will be called.

The gap between these teams isn't as far as it seems. I'll give Seattle the nod right now. Even though homefield had a lot to do with it, you can't be blown out two straight times by another team and them not be better, no matter what the reason is. However I think the two loses are more on what we are not doing than what the are doing. They have a great defense that can do things to us that no other team is capable of doing. But our defense has proven they can at least stop their passing game. We just need the offense to get on track. I also don't think it was wise to have Boldin out there basically wrestling with Richard Sherman all night. If he's doing that, it's a win for Seattle because he will never be open. Seeing as how we don't have the personnel to consistently win one on one match ups against their secondary, this is where a Kendall Hunter, Vance MacDonald, Frank Gore, and Bruce Miller come into play as pass catchers. It's the reason I said Kaep could've used a little more Alex Smith yesterday on his passes, while still taking his shots deep every now and again.

No worries. I still contend if we open this season 3-2 or 4-1, we should take the division. Though I admit, there is a part of me that would LOVE to take those guys out in the playoffs on the road.

Two weeks in a row they been trying to run Gore from the pistol and we all know it's not working. They either need to put Kaep under center and run Gore or bench gore and put in Hunter/LMJ. Also, Kaep needs to hang out with Smitty and learn how to check down.

Originally posted by ECLaloosh:
Glad you're not as panicked as some of your brethren, Marv. Just one game. Both defenses were dominant for two and a half quarters. Just have to find your run game and you'll be enjoying a 7-1 or 6-2 records going into your bye week (week 9 right?)

Yeah, week 9.

I'm surprised to see how they were playing away from their obvious strengths and not establishing their great run game. Kaepernick is a great QB but should not be expected to do everything on offense. Just pound the rock, establish the run and do what the Niners do. So strange to see them play outside of that plan. There seems to be a typical freak out about Gore. He played against two very good D's and not surprisingly couldn't get going. Let's see how he plays against a not very good D next week.

Unlike others, I don't think the 49ers were holding back. I hate how it's considered holding back when they struggle, but all the sudden changes when they succeed. Gore couldn't get going. CK did get some running plays in, but he didn't always have room to run. I don't think you want him to turn into RG3 when the run and passing game is struggling. Remember, he's in this for the long haul. Also, did anyone expect Boldin to dominate against Sherman and the rest of the pro bowl secondary? This was a wake up call for the 49ers, nothing more. I think they'll come back better from it.

This hopefully silences those who underestimated us after that Panthers game. So the Seahawks looked like a .500 team after handing Newton the worst game of his career while 2500 miles away in Carolina, in 90 degree weather, and at 10am? Wilson was under pressure all day against a top 5 front seven and managed 300+ yards. How is that an 8-8 performance?

I feel for the 49ers in the injury department. Both teams are stacked with talent, but they're sort of waiting in limbo and wondering how good they can be if healthy. I hope they get healthy just as much as I hope Okung, Harvin, Browner, Hill, and Clemons get healthy.

I hope Gore gets it figured out. If there was any reason to be disappointed about the 49ers losing the SB last season, it was because Gore deserves it. He is a class act and somebody everyone can look up to.

Originally posted by LifelongNiner:
I liked the game plan as well. I don't know if it was by design to feature Bruce Miller so much or if it was because Seattle just left him open, however I thought the 49ers should've gone up-tempo/no huddle, with a heavy dosage of the run game, passes to the backs and TEs and the occasional deep pass. Kaep truly did have his worse game as a pro. If he can work on connecting those easy short passes, we at least extend drives and at bare minimum, give Seattle a longer field to go if we end up punting.

I do not understand how they completely took Vernon out of the game. To me it seems they could've schemed some type of way to get a linebacker to cover him or just created some other type of mismatch that would get a linebacker having to cover either of our tight ends in space.

I also agree that Kaep should have ran more. IMO, in environments like this, you have to try and muster something positive out of every play and keep the chains moving.

I honestly think our D played well enough for us to win. If the offense were halfway decent, we win the game.

On another note, we shouldn't even bother talking to those Seahawk players. Just play under the assumption that anything we do wrong or are perceived to be doing wrong will be called.

The gap between these teams isn't as far as it seems. I'll give Seattle the nod right now. Even though homefield had a lot to do with it, you can't be blown out two straight times by another team and them not be better, no matter what the reason is. However I think the two loses are more on what we are not doing than what the are doing. They have a great defense that can do things to us that no other team is capable of doing. But our defense has proven they can at least stop their passing game. We just need the offense to get on track. I also don't think it was wise to have Boldin out there basically wrestling with Richard Sherman all night. If he's doing that, it's a win for Seattle because he will never be open. Seeing as how we don't have the personnel to consistently win one on one match ups against their secondary, this is where a Kendall Hunter, Vance MacDonald, Frank Gore, and Bruce Miller come into play as pass catchers. It's the reason I said Kaep could've used a little more Alex Smith yesterday on his passes, while still taking his shots deep every now and again.

No worries. I still contend if we open this season 3-2 or 4-1, we should take the division. Though I admit, there is a part of me that would LOVE to take those guys out in the playoffs on the road.

Nice post!

I'm getting tired of people talking about their loud stadium. It certainly helps them get the other team rattled and messes up communications. But that pales in comparison to the NFL allowing them to so blatantly cheat in the secondary. I get the 5 yard rule where you can jam a WR, but you're not allowed to straight up grab/hug/maul a guy so that he can't even run his route... the lack of enforcement on that rule is BS because they never stop contact at 5 yards... they keep going until 7 or 8 yards and then ease up a little but continue with lots of illegal contact with little shoves and holds.

I've watched other Seattle games and they aren't allowed to do that to anyone else but the 49ers. Sure they play physical, but they don't just maul and throw WRs to the ground without drawing a single flag until the game is already over.

Originally posted by Marvin49:
The one on Aldon was inexcusable. STUPID, STUPID play. That would have been 3rd and very long and he gave them another 1st down...and another TD. The score at that point is closer to 11-3 instead of 19-3.

Actually, it was even worse than this.

It was 3rd and 28. The Seahawks were out of field goal range. On third down, Wilson completed a pass for something like 10 yards to their tight end, putting them in line for a high-40's/low-50's field goal. Then, after the play was over, Aldon was flagged for the personal foul. So it's even worse, because it actually would've been 4th and long if Aldon didn't pick up that flag.

Originally posted by Bay2Bay9erAllday:

Originally posted by Marvin49:

Originally posted by Afrikan:
"The problem wasn't the plan...it was the execution. Seattle was GLUED to receivers all night and the O-Line just couldn't get a push."

Marvin, its easy to glue our receivers when the personnel we have there is a full back as one of our receivers... running routes..getting the ball thrown to him, with of course him dropping it.

it might not have been the "plan", but it was the "personnel" the coaches choose to use. I mean they also had Osgood out there running routes, what threat does he pose?

we continue to run Gore out of the pistol formation...again personnel we use. I've said it before, but we should always have Hunter or James back there for the pistol. Hunter can pass block for alittle guy. And we need to run regular WCO formations for Gore.

its the coaches man....Seattle has adjusted to us, where as we still seem stubborn to make adjustments.

There could be some merit to that....but what personnel SHOULD we have used? That's who we are. Thats how the team was built. It works pretty damn well against every OTHER team in the NFL.

Are you suggesting they go into the noisiest stadium in the NFL against one of the best defenses in the NFL and try to be something they aren't? Go 5 wide on every down?

You are telling me the gameplan was horrible. Give me a better one then.

I think African means,correct me if i'm wrong, using Gore in Jumbo packages or traditional I-formations. Gore is more of a vision runner, he likes to be patient behind a fullback or some sort of lead blocker, and find the smallest of creases for 4-5 yds a pop. The read option kinda of takes that away from him, because he doesnt have the time to let the run play develope. This is how we beat seattle at home last year. That, and taking short dump-offs to gore for 4-5 yds.

Honestly just because running worked before does not guarantee it'll work again. Fact is every season is a different one. I agree with Marvin's response to Afrikan. And the more I think about it, is really realistic to think we can just take the run game and impose our will on the Seahawks?! I highly doubt that.

Them dudes came to play. And imo, the only way to beat this year's Seahawks in their home is to play a near perfect mental-game (flawless exection, and zero mistakes), and capitalizing on the field position. If we had done that last night and STILL lost, only then I would question the game plan.

Originally posted by Afrikan:

"The problem wasn't the plan...it was the execution. Seattle was GLUED to receivers all night and the O-Line just couldn't get a push."

Marvin, its easy to glue our receivers when the personnel we have there is a full back as one of our receivers... running routes..getting the ball thrown to him, with of course him dropping it.

it might not have been the "plan", but it was the "personnel" the coaches choose to use. I mean they also had Osgood out there running routes, what threat does he pose?

we continue to run Gore out of the pistol formation...again personnel we use. I've said it before, but we should always have Hunter or James back there for the pistol. Hunter can pass block for alittle guy. And we need to run regular WCO formations for Gore.

its the coaches man....Seattle has adjusted to us, where as we still seem stubborn to make adjustments.

Thank you!!!!!! Everyone is good in the nfl. It's about adjustments. Our use of personnel and scheme just scream of arrogance. Our scheme obviously wasn't working and there was no plan to do anything different