49ers’ Kyle Shanahan refers to artificial crowd noise as ‘human torture,’ Raheem Mostert calls it ‘different’

The final episode of this season's "Brick by Brick" may have been one of the more entertaining I can remember during the Hard Knocks-style online series' run. Most fans probably enjoyed listening to (likely very edited) defensive line coach Kris Kocurek mic'd up. However, watching head coach Kyle Shanahan try to endure the artificial crowd noise being pumped into Levi's Stadium as his team practiced was riveting.

Fans will not be allowed to attend Week 1's matchup between the 49ers and Arizona Cardinals at Levi's Stadium. In lieu of real crowd noise, simulated noise will be pumped through the sound system. It may not necessarily be what fans hear on their televisions at home, either.

Shanahan has previously said that the team has experimented with everything from 60 to 80 decibels. It sounds like the NFL will require 70 to 75, and the noise will be constant without the deviations you would typically notice in a game with fans in the seats. As you can imagine, that could be enough to irritate you if you have to listen to it for three hours.

"One practice was 60 (decibels)," Shanahan recently said during a KNBR interview. "We did it yesterday (September 2) with 70, which, it's alright. You can hear the cadence and stuff, but you can't have a conversation with the person next to you during a game, which is kind of tough."

Fans got a glimpse of Shanahan trying to deal with the artificial noise during "Brick by Brick." It didn't sound like the 49ers coach was a fan.

"That really is a form of human torture," Shanahan could be heard saying during practice.

The quarterbacks, while speaking with Shanahan, didn't seem too bothered by the noise level.

"It wasn't (bad) for you guys?" Shanahan asked them.

"Not at all," one responded.

"Alright. It's just a form of human torture for me," Shanahan said.



A reporter on Monday asked running back Raheem Mostert about the experience practicing with the fake crowd noise inside Levi's Stadium.

"It's definitely different, I would say," Mostert responded. "We tried it last week, and we had it, I think it was at 60 (decibels) the first time, and then they bumped it up to 70. So it's definitely different when it's at the 70 level, but I think that we're just going to be in our zone and not really worry about the crowd noise too much, even though it's going to be playing the entire time from start to finish. That's going to be a little bit different.

"But I don't believe that I'm going to necessarily be affected by it when I'm on the field between those white lines. It's going to be nice to hear it once I'm on the sideline, or something like that, to see how annoying it is or if guys really do love it. And I also heard they're playing music too, so that will be nice."