Kyle Shanahan talks 49ers’ loss to Eagles, Nick Mullens, Trent Williams, Brandon Aiyuk, injuries

San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan spoke with reporters after Sunday night's 25-20 loss to the Philadelphia Eagles. Here is everything he had to say.

Transcript provided by the San Francisco 49ers Communications staff.

Opening comments:

"Alright, guys. Injuries, we had [DL Ezekiel] Ziggy [Ansah] had a bicep, he's out. Went out, probably will have to go to IR. [CB] K'Waun [Williams] had a knee sprain, did not return. We'll have to get that looked at tonight. Find out tomorrow. [CB Jason] Verrett had a hand, he returned. [WR Dante] Pettis had a knee. He returned. Go ahead."

When it came to the offensive the struggles, especially in the fourth quarter, how much of that was on QB Nick Mullens and how much was it on the pass protection?

"I think it was on everybody. That's a good front. They did that to the team they played last week. Some's on play calling, some's on Nick, some's on all of us. We've got to play better and all around."

We haven't seen T Trent Williams struggle like that, certainly not here. Maybe not even in Washington. Any mitigating factors? Is he healthy? How do you explain his outing today?

"No, he's healthy. Just didn't have one of his best games. I'll see more when I watch the film tonight, but I thought as a whole, the entire often struggled a little bit. Right when we did get some things going, it was really one weak link on each play that just got us in some bad situations and costs us some drives. So, expect him to do better and expect all of us to do better."

On Nick's two interceptions, he threw it right to the guy. Obviously, he doesn't want to do that. What did he see and why did he make those throws?

"The first one, he just missed the throw. He's got to get it out there. Check it down to [FB Kyle Juszczyk] Juice beneath him. And then the one in the red zone, it wasn't a good play call. No one was open. Had a short edge and he needed to throw it away or take a sack, but threw it into double coverage. Just a bad decision, but he had no other choice on the play. He had to just take it."

Did you try to get the ball to WR Brandon Aiyuk more and what did you think of that touchdown he had? It seems like it showed what he can do.

"I thought the touchdown was a hell of a play. It was a really good play. Thought we could get the first with the look we had, but for him to turn that into a touchdown was an unbelievable play. It seemed like he did some good things out there. I'll see more when I watch the tape, but when we went to him, I thought he thought he did his job."

It seems like TE George Kittle has more of an affinity to be able to make himself available for catches more than he used to. Do you see that improvement from him?

"Just looking at the numbers of stuff, George had unbelievable game. Didn't realize it was like that and he got open a lot and when he didn't, he still was able to come down with the catch. I know that's something George has worked on for awhile and came through today for us in that way."

Through the first three quarters, the receivers only had two catches. I would assume that the game plan was probably to get them to Kittle. Would you expect more from them typically than what happened tonight?

"Yeah, just how the game goes sometimes. I don't remember any times where - they had a couple of opportunities, we didn't get the play off. When you miss a few of those and you just miss a few catches when you had a chance to get it and it wasn't their fault I didn't go to them. And then you struggle on some drives, that's just what happens. I thought for the most part, a lot of them, when we did go to them, they did a good job, but it takes a whole offensive to get the ball to a receiver. Not just the receivers."

Nick was, in his first two throws, WR Kendrick Bourne was open and then Juszczyk was open down the left side line. Was he just kind of a little bit off and maybe just slow throughout the evening?

"Yeah, it seemed that way a little bit, especially the second play and stuff. It seemed good in pregame warmups and stuff, but that happens. You started the play with two passes and miss both of them. Thought we'd give him a chance to get going, get in a little bit of a rhythm. Seemed like whenever we did, something else came up and just wasn't able to get him into much of a rhythm today. So, I know he had a tough challenge here going against that front and everything. But, I know and Nick knows, he can play better. Gave an opportunity for [QB] C.J. [Beathard] to come in and see C.J. did a good job with the reps he had."

You mentioned about Ziggy Ansah, the bicep injury. Is that preliminary, is that a torn bicep, something that will require season ending surgery?

"That's what it sounded like. Everything that I've heard in there, sounds like that's going to happen. So, pretty sure we'll find that out. Confirm that tomorrow, but that's what it sounded like."

After the last game, you said you expected that kind of performance. You expected a good win. Did you feel that way about this one or was there perhaps a chance this might've been a little bit of an emotional let down because of kind of the rally with the injuries and this one now you're back home after those two wins?

"I was worried about that a little bit on Monday and Tuesday. That kind of went away. I thought we had a good day of practice on Wednesday, not so good on Thursday, but I thought we came back and had a good Friday. I loved the energy of the guys at the hotel last night. I was expecting us to come out and play good. Missed a few at the beginning, just a couple of opportunities. When we did get it going finally and I thought we had kind of a bump there when we had the turnover in the red zone on that pick. That's an aggressive defense. It's hit or miss with those guys. Just the style they play with, the style their front is, the style of their coverages. We had a couple opportunities we missed. And then the other ones we went for, we got way too many negative plays. So, I wouldn't say I thought it was a let down of guys, just their energy or everything, but we definitely didn't play well today. Not to take anything away from Philly or anything, but just from an execution standpoint, the whole team playing together in terms of when one side is doing good, the other side does good also. I just didn't like the rhythm of our whole team today and we'll have to go back to the drawing board tomorrow."

You stuck with RB Jerick McKinnon a lot more than you did last week. Why did you decide to do that and then how would you assess how the running game performed?

"I think that just happened because we didn't have as many long drives as we did last week. We had a lot more long drives last week where you get in a little bit of a flow with rotating the guys and then with the lead we had last week, I think we took Jet out most of the fourth quarter and let [RB] Jeff [Wilson Jr.] go. That was about it with that. The run game, so, so. I expected us to do better. There was a couple opportunities that I thought we had where I thought we could have gotten some big runs on and we just had one guy off here and there and ended up losing a few yards on them. So, I expect more out of our run game. It wasn't completely bad, but I expected us to do better than we did."

How optimistic are you about QB Jimmy Garoppolo's status this week?

"I'm not sure, totally. I didn't talk to him today about how it went. We'll see tomorrow when he comes in. I know he'll have a good workout here Monday and Tuesday, and hopefully he'll be good to go for Wednesday, but I'm not sure yet."