49ers Head Coach Kyle Shanahan Thread

Originally posted by Giedi:
It would be nice if we can do another back to back super bowl! The 1988-1989 and 1989-1990 season was fun!

FU Leonard Marshall

Originally posted by Giedi:

Originally posted by Niners816:

Originally posted by Bigfishrider:
Amen to that! I was too young in '94 to remember the experience of winning it all. Still waiting to earn those memories, after that I'll get greedy

Originally posted by Giedi:
It would be nice if we can do another back to back super bowl! The 1988-1989 and 1989-1990 season was fun!

Both Kyle and I are '79 models so it's pretty cool having a coach that I share an age with (im a couple months older). I was a Sophomore in HS during our last title and it was awesome. I still remember that entire season from the tremendous expectations leading up to the start, Jerrys huge Monday night opener, losing to Joe a week later, getting the absolute s**t kicked out of us vs Philly, looking just as pathetic the next week in Detroit before rebounding, dominating ATL in Prime's return and thing the Juggernaut run in the throwbacks culminating in beating Dallas twice and landing #5. I still have a hard time believing that 2019 will be a quarter century since that season.

What I most remember from that run is defense. Yes, the offense was top of the line, but that defense was incredible. Haley, Carter, f*gan, Holt, Romanouski, Lott,
Wright, Keena. They dominated the opposing offenses. Teams would wilt after the first QTR. They would give us their best shot in the first QTR, and then pretty much give up after that, once they couldn't move against our defense. Or, if they would score against or defense in the first QTR, they wouldn't score again because the offense played keep away and when we got ahead, we turned Haley loose. Michael Carter was an absolute monster. Not only could he two gap, but he was a fantastic pass rusher from the middle too. Once teams fell behind and we turned loose our pass rush, it was game over.

1981: Stuckey, Reese, Board, Harper, Reynolds, Bunz, Turner, Lott, Wright, Williamson, Hicks...my favorite group. Fred Dean on passing downs. The turn around niner defense!

Originally posted by SmokeCrabtrees:

Originally posted by Bigfishrider:

Crazy to think this was 20 years ago

Lol, red. AF compared to his neck.

Gosh, I missed the color range on the 90's color tv

Originally posted by dtg_9er:

Originally posted by Giedi:

Originally posted by Niners816:

Originally posted by Bigfishrider:
Amen to that! I was too young in '94 to remember the experience of winning it all. Still waiting to earn those memories, after that I'll get greedy

Originally posted by Giedi:
It would be nice if we can do another back to back super bowl! The 1988-1989 and 1989-1990 season was fun!

Both Kyle and I are '79 models so it's pretty cool having a coach that I share an age with (im a couple months older). I was a Sophomore in HS during our last title and it was awesome. I still remember that entire season from the tremendous expectations leading up to the start, Jerrys huge Monday night opener, losing to Joe a week later, getting the absolute s**t kicked out of us vs Philly, looking just as pathetic the next week in Detroit before rebounding, dominating ATL in Prime's return and thing the Juggernaut run in the throwbacks culminating in beating Dallas twice and landing #5. I still have a hard time believing that 2019 will be a quarter century since that season.

What I most remember from that run is defense. Yes, the offense was top of the line, but that defense was incredible. Haley, Carter, f*gan, Holt, Romanouski, Lott,
Wright, Keena. They dominated the opposing offenses. Teams would wilt after the first QTR. They would give us their best shot in the first QTR, and then pretty much give up after that, once they couldn't move against our defense. Or, if they would score against or defense in the first QTR, they wouldn't score again because the offense played keep away and when we got ahead, we turned Haley loose. Michael Carter was an absolute monster. Not only could he two gap, but he was a fantastic pass rusher from the middle too. Once teams fell behind and we turned loose our pass rush, it was game over.

1981: Stuckey, Reese, Board, Harper, Reynolds, Bunz, Turner, Lott, Wright, Williamson, Hicks...my favorite group. Fred Dean on passing downs. The turn around niner defense!

I visited Dan Bunz's restaurant in Rocklin, he let me hold his Super Bowl ring. That thing was heavier than a 5 pound lead weight!

His tackle at the goal line was the best tackle in the entire game. He told me he didn't know how significant it was to the game until after the game was finished and he reviewed it. But he said, he was just making his tackle like an ordinary tackle, but if he didn't do it perfectly, that was a 6 easy.

Originally posted by Giedi:
I visited Dan Bunz's restaurant in Rocklin, he let me hold his Super Bowl ring. That thing was heavier than a 5 pound lead weight!

His tackle at the goal line was the best tackle in the entire game. He told me he didn't know how significant it was to the game until after the game was finished and he reviewed it. But he said, he was just making his tackle like an ordinary tackle, but if he didn't do it perfectly, that was a 6 easy.

Nice! Heard he had some post football issues with health, hope he is OK.

Originally posted by dtg_9er:

Originally posted by Giedi:
I visited Dan Bunz's restaurant in Rocklin, he let me hold his Super Bowl ring. That thing was heavier than a 5 pound lead weight!

His tackle at the goal line was the best tackle in the entire game. He told me he didn't know how significant it was to the game until after the game was finished and he reviewed it. But he said, he was just making his tackle like an ordinary tackle, but if he didn't do it perfectly, that was a 6 easy.

Nice! Heard he had some post football issues with health, hope he is OK.

I haven't seen him in a while, and this is the first I've heard of any health issues regarding him.

This has probably been mentioned before but I'm getting a stronger and stronger impression about what Shanahan prefers in terms of player quality overall (not necessarily any one individual player). Say that he could choose between two teams that have limitations in talent due to the cap (as is the situation with every team) with one team having three elite players but few good to above average players* (with many players being average and some below average) and the other team having no elite players but loaded with a few very good players and many above average players; I think that he would pick the latter.

I say that because of the players they have signed to the team and that I get the impression that Shanahan's long term plan is to have a team of players that will win more from his ability to call plays and having players that reliably execute the plays the way he intends them to be executed. That way if you lose a starter, you are more likely be able to plug in another above average but good-at-reliable-execution player.

Look at his desire to get Kirk Cousins for so long. Cousins seems to me to be a just above average QB that Shanahan could rely on to execute the plays the way he intends them when he calls them. I suspect that if he had gotten Cousins that he would have been still looking for his elite QB of the future, but that he could keep developing the team with Cousins, probably win enough to get into the playoffs and with some luck make it to the Superbowl with Cousins.

If so, I think his plan could work to create a sustainable winning franchise over many years. Maybe something like Belichick has seemed to be able to do with what appears to be a very good plug and play scheme. Of course, without Brady as an elite QB, Belichick's plug and play scheme may not have been tenable. Fortunately for Shanahan, he may very well have his elite QB in Jimmy G.

Anyway, if that is what Shanahan is thinking then the drafting that Lynch has done makes more sense. Looking for players that may not be elite, but that have a good chance of developing into at least above average players that are smart and can reliably execute the plays as they are meant to be played. I'll admit that I am assuming that Shanahan is the senior partner with respect to choosing players in the Shanahan-Lynch relationship even though Lynch formally supposedly has the senior role.

Sorry about the length vagueness of this post. I hope it makes sense even though I rambled on too much.

*I'm thinking of players classified as elite, very good, above average, average, below average and bad.

Originally posted by 49erphan:

This has probably been mentioned before but I'm getting a stronger and stronger impression about what Shanahan prefers in terms of player quality overall (not necessarily any one individual player). Say that he could choose between two teams that have limitations in talent due to the cap (as is the situation with every team) with one team having three elite players but few good to above average players* (with many players being average and some below average) and the other team having no elite players but loaded with a few very good players and many above average players; I think that he would pick the latter.

I say that because of the players they have signed to the team and that I get the impression that Shanahan's long term plan is to have a team of players that will win more from his ability to call plays and having players that reliably execute the plays the way he intends them to be executed. That way if you lose a starter, you are more likely be able to plug in another above average but good-at-reliable-execution player.

Look at his desire to get Kirk Cousins for so long. Cousins seems to me to be a just above average QB that Shanahan could rely on to execute the plays the way he intends them when he calls them. I suspect that if he had gotten Cousins that he would have been still looking for his elite QB of the future, but that he could keep developing the team with Cousins, probably win enough to get into the playoffs and with some luck make it to the Superbowl with Cousins.

If so, I think his plan could work to create a sustainable winning franchise over many years. Maybe something like Belichick has seemed to be able to do with what appears to be a very good plug and play scheme. Of course, without Brady as an elite QB, Belichick's plug and play scheme may not have been tenable. Fortunately for Shanahan, he may very well have his elite QB in Jimmy G.

Anyway, if that is that is what Shanahan is thinking then the drafting that Lynch has done makes more sense. Looking for players that may not be elite, but that have a good chance of developing into at least above average players that are smart and can reliably execute the plays as they are meant to be played. I'll admit that I am assuming that Shanahan is the senior partner with respect to choosing players in the Shanahan-Lynch relationship even though Lynch formally supposedly has the senior role.

Sorry about the length vagueness of this post. I hope it makes sense even though I rambled on too much.

*I'm thinking of players classified as elite, very good, above average, average, below average and bad.

I agree. I think Kyle has very specific needs in certain positons on offense, and in some positions, he can be flexible in the type of talent he can use. He's more flexible in this compared to his father.

I think some of it has to do with the qb on the team too. He can help and also enhance with what that particular qb does well by acquire talent for that purpose to a certain degree within the makeup of Kyle's offense.

I think had he acquired Cousins instead of Jimmy, we would have a slightly different talent make up at the skill positions. Kyle likes speed on offense, but now he has a lot of speed to go with Jimmy's quick release and accrucy. Quick, fast, and deadly

This seems right, but it is the best way to build a team as many teams have shown. You build every position, elevating the play as best you in each, rather than dump huge amounts of money on FAs. But...when he has that good level of overall talent he might/should go after missing pieces--edge rusher, shutdown CB. They have a FQB so I'll leave that off the list!

This seems right but my biggest concern is capital management (cap and draft) - we tend to pay players at a level above their performance/market value (pay avg players like good players) and similar approach in the draft for guys we fixate on. I like the approach overall but it will get us into trouble fast if we can't keep guys like Buckner bc we're paying a bunch of relatively avg players (Garcon, Marsh, McKinnon, Cooper, Ward, Armstead, Tartt) good to great player money when we could've likely had the best of both worlds and paid market value for them or similar players AND had a few elite players.

Originally posted by 49oz2superbowl:
This seems right but my biggest concern is capital management (cap and draft) - we tend to pay players at a level above their performance/market value (pay avg players like good players) and similar approach in the draft for guys we fixate on. I like the approach overall but it will get us into trouble fast if we can't keep guys like Buckner bc we're paying a bunch of relatively avg players (Garcon, Marsh, McKinnon, Cooper, Ward, Armstead, Tartt) good to great player money when we could've likely had the best of both worlds and paid market value for them or similar players AND had a few elite players.

lol, pay FAs market or below market value.. that was a good one

Sooo top 10 offense this year??

Originally posted by DonnieDarko:
Sooo top 10 offense this year??

On paper and with Kyle calling the plays, why not?

Originally posted by 49oz2superbowl:
This seems right but my biggest concern is capital management (cap and draft) - we tend to pay players at a level above their performance/market value (pay avg players like good players) and similar approach in the draft for guys we fixate on. I like the approach overall but it will get us into trouble fast if we can't keep guys like Buckner bc we're paying a bunch of relatively avg players (Garcon, Marsh, McKinnon, Cooper, Ward, Armstead, Tartt) good to great player money when we could've likely had the best of both worlds and paid market value for them or similar players AND had a few elite players.

The contracts, for the most part, are front loaded to achieve maximum future flexibility, so I'm not too worried. I think Jimmy's contract drops to 20 Million or so next year - in terms of cap hit, vs the cap hit he has for 2019 (whatever it is) 40+ million? Point is, paying above the market is an illusion because the contracts are front loaded and look *like* they are above the market rates - when prorated over the life of the contract are pretty reasonable. My hope is that as we win more and more games, Kyle and Lynch can continue to draft and develop relatively unknown players and exchange them for draft picks. Brieda, Bourne, Bolden and low round picks like Colbert can be exchanged (hopefully) for actual draft picks that we can trade to move up in the draft to get elite players to sustain a possible future dynasty.