Week 7 2015: Thoughts after rewatching the game...

Ug.


1) Kap: I don't want to over sell this because he had a bad day, but watching the game again really did help quite a bit on this one. Yes, he airmailed a few passes. Yes, he looked afraid to make a mistake. Yes, he didn't see some open receivers.

...but he didn't play as poorly as I thought on first glance. Some of the overthrows may have really been throwaways. One of the early high throws to Bolin had 2 guys downfield and NOBODY even remotely open. The one that had me the angriest last night (pass to Bush from the endzone that landed at Bushs feet) wasn't as bad as I thought as its clear that Kap had to let the ball go long before he wanted to but had a defender bearing down on him while he was standing in the endzone. Bush hadn't cleared his defender yet. It looked like Kap was avoiding both a safety and a turnover by basically throwing the ball into the turf.

Again...I don't want it to appear I'm making the point that Kap is just fine and it was everyone elses fault, but he wasn't as bad as I thought. He did look a lot like the shell-shocked Kap we got against Green Bay though. He's terrified right now to make a big mistake and THAT is making him ineffective. He doesn't trust himself and is still trying to be what people say he's supposed to be on not just being what he is.

He's gotta have the "f*ck it" moment that Alex Smith had late in 2010. The moment where you just stop listening to all the voices telling you what to be and just freakin' PLAY.



2) O-Line: Sweet Jesus. Every bit as bad as I thought. How bad do Thomas and Brown have to suck to not get some play over Devey and Pears? Right side of the line might as well not even be there. Kap struggled as I said, but my god the line is not helping him.

You have a QB who is trying to learn how to pass from the pocket. Ya know what helps in that regard? HAVING A POCKET. How in the hell do you teach a guy to trust the pocket being there if it ain't there. Of COURSE his eyes would start to be on the rush and not downfield. Kap wasn't seeing ghosts. When you are getting hit when you hit the third step of a 3 step drop, you got problems.

A line rebuild is in order. In the offseason I'd expect $$$ spent in Free Agency and picks spent in the draft, but they need to know what they have. They need to let guys like Thomas and Brown play if for no other reason to see what they have.



3) Hyde: Sometimes I hate bein' right. This is one of those cases. Guy can't continue to run like that. He's an injury waiting to happen. I love the heart (and particularly playing hurt the way he did), but you HAVE to protect yourself in the NFL or you are going to have a very short career. Frank lasted as long as he did because he seldom let himself take big shots. Hyde takes them on seemingly every play. The kid is a talent, so don't get me wrong, but I don't think we can count on him making it through an NFL season without getting hurt.



4) Aaron Lynch: At least somebody came to play



5) Broken Coverages: Its really getting old. I think the Niners have DBs who can play, but the amount of confusion that I see in the secondary every single week has to be put on the coaching. I can't remember the last time I saw guys running so wide open on a consistent basis (and I'm speaking about the entire season, not just yesterday).



6) Tomsula: WTF. You are down 3 scores and you are punting on 4th and 3 with 3 minutes left? Why bother even taking the snaps? Just walk into the locker room. So what if you don't convert. YOU ARE ALREADY DOWN 3 SCORES. SMDH.



7) Seattles in trouble: Not Niner related, but I couldn't help but realize that the Wilson got sacked 5 times against a team with little pass rush and was losing by at least 2 scores for most of the game. Niner O-Line might be the worst in the league, but Seattle ain't a whole lot better.



8) Receivers not getting open: I heard Deion say it at halftime when I rewatched it and Phil Simms said it all game, but those guys pretty much confirmed what I was seeing live. There weren't a lot of open guys running around out there. Now I don't want to say Kap NEVER had open guys or that he didn't miss guys or wasn't reluctant to throw to guys that were open...but there weren't a lot of opportunities out there. I don't know if that's personnel or scheme. I have no answers and it appears neither do the coaches.



9) Tartt: Actually saw him flash a few times there. I think Bethea is history next year and Tarrt will be in the starting lineup. In fact, I don't know the extent of Betheas injury (I was at the game and didn't see report afterward), but perhaps its time to play the youngster THIS year to get him ready for next year.



10) Bottom line on Passing game: So this is what you had last night. Kap rarely had time to do much of anything. On the instances he did, there weren't a lot of open receivers out there. On the rare instances there were, he was reluctant to put the ball on target for fear of turning it over. On the rare instances he was willing, they'd drop the damn ball.

IE, everyone shares a piece of the blame on that one. ALL of them right up to Tomsula.

I couldn't watch the second half, much less rewatch the game.

Nailed it for me. You can analyze until you are blue in the face but if the boat has a hole in it you have to fix the hole before you can start figuring out what the heck else to do. In the case of the 49ers offense, this is clearly the offensive line. I really hope next seasons draft is a good one for OL because we're going to need a couple. Once that is shored up then you can really get a gauge on what's going on. Are the receivers not getting open because they don't need to worry about the run?

On defense I think the DL are doing about what we thought they would. The problem here is the LB's. The loss of Willis, Boreland and the decline of Bowman post-injury loom large. Better add a pass rusher or a MLB who can roam around and cause havok like Willis.

What to do?

When so many things are broken this falls on leadership. We have had no rookie standouts in recent years and I'm not even talking about potential pro-bowlers. Basically, Baalke has missed on far too many draft picks and it's now killing this team. He is the one with the bulls-eye on him. If we could dump York then yes for choosing Baalke over Harbaugh.

I think your analysis is spot on. Last night's game was a complete team failure. There isn't one spot to put blame and I think that makes this loss even more frustrating. At this moment the Niners are at best an average team, and that isn't necessarily indicative of the talent on the team. Coaching is a big issue right now as many of the issues during the game seem to be communication breakdowns.

The o-line of course has a very long way to go. That right side is abysmal and it is severely impacting Kap.

I'm unsure why the Niners can't seem to get receivers open. Seattle has more or less nothing at receiver and yet they are able to scheme guys open fairly often. Wilson made some nice throws last night, but most of his completions were a result of guys just running wide open. Some of that is due to the Niners just having a terrible time getting it together on defense, but there were a lot of little flat route throws that were designed to get a guy open for 3-4 yards. The Niners need to incorporate those type of plays into the passing game.

One last observation, and it is something that has frustrated me for a long time now. When the Niners get a negative play on offense, that drive is done. It seems if they can't get 3-4 yards on first down, they may as well punt right there. Now I know 2nd down and 10+ is difficult for any team, but the Niners almost always seem to get nothing on that second down. It is a problem and something I would love to see addressed. Being able to come back and get a first down after a negative play on first down is very frustrating for a defense.

This coaching staff is probably in over their heads. Turning over the entire coaching staff was a poor move. I still stand by my position that Harbaugh had to go, but some continuity at the coordinator position would have been nice. Even giving Fangio the HC job may have been a smart move if it meant the defense didn't have to undergo this massive scheme change.

I'm not saying you gave Kap a pass but it's pretty close. Five sacks and two interceptions and we're not even in shouting distance. Tank finally got some PT and was active. Harold has bird legs and shows nothing thus far. Tarrt is a player, another Hawk in the making?

I thought the offensive line gave Kaep some good pocket to throw in the 1st half, at least the 1st qtr. It wasn't until 17-0 down that the Seahawks knew we had to throw to get back into he game. Pass rush was on and ferocious. Very similar to the second half of TNF 49ers vs. Ravens game in 2011.

Originally posted by RishikeshA:
I'm not saying you gave Kap a pass but it's pretty close. Five sacks and two interceptions and we're not even in shouting distance. Tank finally got some PT and was active. Harold has bird legs and shows nothing thus far. Tarrt is a player, another Hawk in the making?

Wasn't intending to give him a pass. He played poorly, just not AS poorly as I thought when I saw it live.

Theme for the most part though is it wasn't ALL Kap. Everyone had a piece of this one.

When Bush dropped a simple pass in the flat, the Seahawks knew they had us. They basically were willing to give that up some but we couldn't take it. Their defense is basically stop the run, no deep passes, give up the short stuff if you have too. We couldn't take what they gave us.

Very good points. To me, the biggest, most consistent issue all season has been the OL line. Devey and Paers are horrible. Now I know why they were cast off from their previous teams. They suck. I'm 5'9", 200 lbs and I could have done a better job than Pears did last night. Hopefully Davis comes back out of retirement for next season, and move Boone back to the right side where he belongs. Mind you, Boone will likely be playing for another team next year since his contract is up. I doubt he'd want to re-up for another year of this mess.

I'm not a huge Kaep fan, but: a) he gives us a better chance than Smith ever did, b) he might develop as a pocket passer faster if he wasn't digging sod out of his mouth guard most of the time.

Lastly, someone needs to remind Brock of some fundamentals. If he reached out with his left arm on that long touchdown throw like he should have, he would have knocked the ball away.

I can't believe the 49ers are playing Hyde with a bone fracture in his foot. He's one of the few players on the team we should be protecting for the future. I would play all the young guys, and let them audition/lear for next year. 49ers need a massive-overhaul! Which of course, goes without saying.

The only guys I want back next year, are the guys on their rookie contracts, plus Staley, Boone, Bowman, Dawson, and Torrey Smith..

Getting old having the same " It's not all Kap's fault" conversations. Someone out there has the answers.

Originally posted by legomeiago:
Very good points. To me, the biggest, most consistent issue all season has been the OL line. Devey and Paers are horrible. Now I know why they were cast off from their previous teams. They suck. I'm 5'9", 200 lbs and I could have done a better job than Pears did last night. Hopefully Davis comes back out of retirement for next season, and move Boone back to the right side where he belongs. Mind you, Boone will likely be playing for another team next year since his contract is up. I doubt he'd want to re-up for another year of this mess.

I'm not a huge Kaep fan, but: a) he gives us a better chance than Smith ever did, b) he might develop as a pocket passer faster if he wasn't digging sod out of his mouth guard most of the time.

Lastly, someone needs to remind Brock of some fundamentals. If he reached out with his left arm on that long touchdown throw like he should have, he would have knocked the ball away.

I think Brock did actually deflect the ball a bit, it just wasn't enough to stop the catch. You're still correct, but Brock was very close to making a play. And in real time, I wasn't sure how he didn't make a play.

I'm glad that even though you're not a fan of Kap, you're at least willing to see what he's battling against. I think many QBs would struggle with this team. The line is a mess and receivers aren't getting open. I'm a huge Kap fan, but I try to temper that and I do realize there are many things he can improve on. He needs to trust his receivers at times to just make a play on the ball. If he sees one on one coverage with Torrey, he just needs to chuck it out there. Put some air on it and let Torrey go up and get it. He also needs to get the ball out quicker and trust what he sees. We had this problem with Smith where he was waiting to actually see a guy get open rather than throwing to a spot and trusting the receiver would be there. Kap has shown flashes of that, it's just not consistent. That, more than anything, is what frustrates me the most with Kap.

I also want to say if Boldin was battling a hammy, he shouldn't have been out there. He looked slow and lethargic last night. If that was the case, I'd rather see Ellington and Patton on the field.

Originally posted by 951NINER:
Getting old having the same " It's not all Kap's fault" conversations. Someone out there has the answers.

For the most part I believe folks realize Kap needs to step up his play. But after watching last night, how can you put the blame solely on Kap? It was a complete team failure, from coaching all the way down to technique. Top to bottom. Yes, Kap could have played better. But on the other hand, he wasn't working with much last night. The line was getting destroyed and at the same time, receivers weren't getting open.

Good write up as always. When it's obvious when they go 3 and out on the first drive and allow a score on the next they are going to lose, there's a big problem. I had little hope after that first series when Bush dropped the ball. This team just mentally cannot compete with Seattle and it shows in their body language.

I don't know how you do it. I wouldn't rewatch this horror show of a team for any reason. Like what Lynch, Hyde and Tartt could be. The rest of this team and organization is dumpster fire.