San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo had a nice bounce-back game on Saturday night against the Kansas City Chiefs. There was one play, however, Kyle Shanahan wished his quarterback thought through a little better before letting the football leave his hands.
You probably know which play it was. Garoppolo tossed a pass toward wide receiver Dante Pettis near the goal line. The problem was that the football headed into triple coverage. In the end, it didn't matter because no one came down with the ball, but the play could have been a black mark on an otherwise stellar performance by Garoppolo.
The 49ers head coach was asked via a conference call on Sunday what he saw during the play while reviewing the game film.
"The same thing I saw live," Shanahan responded. "He shouldn't have thrown into triple coverage in that situation. We were fortunate not to have a pick. I'd like Dante to go up and try to make more of an attempt to catch it, but that's a ball that should never leave his hands."
Garoppolo played the entire first half, and after earning a 0.0 passer rating on Monday night against the Denver Broncos, he went 14-of-20 for 188 yards with a touchdown and a passer rating of 116.2 aganst the Chiefs.
Garoppolo's pass attempt to Pettis was certainly aggressive; probably too aggressive. One reporter noted that the 49ers offense looked a lot more aggressive in Kansas City than it had during previous preseason games.
"We'll take a shot down the field every time if we think that's the right thing to do," Shanahan said. "I think there were some different matchups in Denver with protections. I don't think we ran the ball as well; we didn't get into a grove as much, doing as well on third downs.
"When you don't get the whole offense in a rhythm, for whatever that might be, depending on what you're going against, just missing a few plays, where you don't stay on the field, then you become pretty one dimensional.
"When you can stay on the field and have a couple of 12-play drives, a couple of seven-play drives, you get to mix up things and set it up. Sometimes that gives you more opportunities for bigger plays."
