Couple of thoughts...

Originally posted by niners4lyfe:
true.Last time we lost, we won 8 in a row. If this trend continues, we will be superbowl champions.

I agree with this post and think the timing is perfect.

Gives us plenty of time to work on the oline. Will see this again and better be more prepared.

Lets the coachs know we still have much more to do on both sides of the ball in terms of new plays and game management.

Gives the team a reality check and now something to improve on and work towards.

Better to have this now than late in the season when a sense of lost MO can kill a team. We can now build up new MO for a playoff run!

We went into Baltimore on a short week with long travel and played HORRIBLE. We gave up 9 sacks, NINE EFFING SACKS, and did not even so much as TOUCH Flacco the entire game he had a clean pocket with our 3 man rushes lol. We had a huge touchdown called back on a BS call, the rule STATES "An offensive player tries to cut block a defensive player that is already being blocked by another offensive player. The second block may need to be below the thigh or knee, depending on the code" Frank cut the guy and was the one who engaged him first with Chilo pushing him over top, that's not a penalty because Gore was the one WHO ENGAGED the block before Rachal ever touched him b******t call but moving on. We had a deep ball thrown to a big tall physical receiver who made zero effort to even knock it down let alone catch it, we had a missed tackled by Whitner that would have ended a drive which eventually led to their only touchdown of the game and the last play for our offense sums up the entire game. Smith pressured heavily throws a perfect ball which is dropped, point being we were under attack all game had our chances but continously screwed up aka with penalties or mental mistakes. But guess what, we lost by 10 while being DOMINATED we couldn't get the run game going, we had no time to pass the ball efficiently, our defense had zero pressure all game, and we lost by 10. I'm not mad at all, we are 9-2 after we got outcoached and outplayed, not to mention, beat up pretty good but we have a great record at the end of the dayand over a week to rest the players and fix the mistakes and get things straight. I'm proud to be a fan and Jim will learn from his mistakes, you can't become a great winner without learning how to lose as stupid as it sounds its the truth!!!

Originally posted by SJniner7:
As much as I wanted to win, this loss was built into our schedule from day 1. Playing a division game at hme, then traveling accross the country to play in Baltimore on Thanksgiving night?

The great part about it? His brother showed him what style of play can beat him. They basically played Niner football as we had been all year. Mistake free, slow-moving offense with a stingy defense. Other teams will attempt to replicate what Baltimore did last night, but none have the personnel to do so. Jim will use this game as a tool to build for the rest of the season.

I think Jim is smart enough to realize that they now have to practice hot reads and practic quick hits where the qb throws within 2 seconds, because that is all the time alex had. In the 4th quarter is his slot receiver turned to look for the ball he could have had an open field catch with 10 yards of YAC, but the receiver did not look back.

Screens, quick hits to tackles elible, TE eligible, anything to slow down the pass rush.

Originally posted by monsterzero789:
This game probably killed Jim. It's gonna piss him off losing to his brother on a national stage like that. I feel sorry for opposing teams from here on out :)

Its Coach Hardball time!

Originally posted by PatrickWillisHOF:
Jim Harbagh and his staff have not faced a real good defense like that in their coaching careers. It is a blessing in disguise because now they have faced a team that created tremendous pressure on the offensive line. Harbaugh and hist staff can now spend time and figure out how to create plays when the defense is putting so much pressure on the offensive line.

I'm going to have to agree. On top of that, Flacco was on a roll in the second half so we definitely have to improve in coverages as well. D did fine against the Ravens but that's not going to fly with pass happy teams like NO and GB.

Originally posted by ninersbaby1:
everytime flaco dropped back he had all the time in the world and would always complete his pass especially on 3rd down in the second half im worried about our secondary

Yeah because those 3 and 4 man rushes were working so well. Even the best secondary in the world will get beat if the quarterback has 4 or 5 seconds to pick his target. Meanwhile the Baltimore secondary looked absolutely amazing because Alex was having to get the ball out in about 1 1/2 seconds before being chased out of the pocket.

Originally posted by SJniner7:
As much as I wanted to win, this loss was built into our schedule from day 1. Playing a division game at hme, then traveling accross the country to play in Baltimore on Thanksgiving night?

The great part about it? His brother showed him what style of play can beat him. They basically played Niner football as we had been all year. Mistake free, slow-moving offense with a stingy defense. Other teams will attempt to replicate what Baltimore did last night, but none have the personnel to do so. Jim will use this game as a tool to build for the rest of the season.

Nice post

Thank god everyone replied with optimism in general! I'm new and just registered a few minutes ago because I had to jump on this one after I saw the immediate pessimism as the FIRST reply. I am glad we're all now more level headed about what happened last night. Guys, our team will study, look at film, and we'll get back to winning. Relax, win, lose,or tie,NINERS till we die!

PatrickWillis HOF is spot on. Ravens were bigger, faster,meaner, stronger, smarter, and outcoached us. That said, this is a blessing in disguise, and
"laughsatyou"'s comment about opinions, if I understand it correctly, would have a better handle if it were "laughs-at-me". There was nothing to laugh about here, in that we just got an azzwhippin' out in the woodshed. Why the blessing in disguise?

At 9-1 and "2nd best team in nfl", a lot of us really believed that. Watching the official "best front 7 in football" destroy, demolish and demoralize our OL was a painful thing to see, yet this yr our OL has been amazingly resurrected from total futility to become a strong point on our team. Alex's improvements all went away once there was no OL to protect him. Watching Ngata eat Iupati's lunch, the RDE schooling Staley, the LDT and LE gaming Snyder and AD, the SS and CB blitzes along with the above, the resulting 8 sacks, 9 hits, 12 hurries on alex... man, we got a look at what a real "best D in the league" looks like. And , we were not up to the occasion.

I had said earlier that ravens lose even if they win, because of the short 3 day week with 1and1/2 days to prepare, plus the 3 time zone difference (on a Thurs nite? how stupid of nfl network), would all give a huge advantage to Ravens, and if they won, it would be a pyrrhic victory. Wrong. I didn't conceive of a bushwhacking like this, and Ravens left no doubt, depite their record, they are a vastly better team. It didn't hurt that their QB was perfect, we didn't get near him, no sacks(or maybe 1), and virtually on target all nite with no pressure. Wow! Forget about the short week and 3 time zones. We got stoned by a way better team, a much better coached team....a team with a much better O and D gameplan.

Fangio just got embarrassed. Coach Jim H got really embarrassed. ST got neutralized, tho there was one "c.s." call on Ginn's TD called back. So here are the lessons:

D game plan: playing off on receivers, with no pressure on passer was an open invitation to complete everything short and underneath. It was a disaster. No meaningful blitzing, nor putting any pressure on Flacco was inexcusable. Our run D did themselve proud, with still no running TD. But that was the extent of it. Pass coverage schemes were ineffective, and players executed poorly

O game plan. Once it became apparent that Ravens could blitz at will ,5,6-7 guys, the immediate coaching calls should have been for quick one step snap it and sling it. Instead, remarkably, Coach called for 3, step, 5 step, some 7 step drops that were doomed from the git go. Alex had no time to do anything except handoff, or throw quick. This was a game that shouted out, "49ers got outcoached". What Coach H was thinking , no one knows. But one thing for sure. He sure didn't take into consideration our Ol was getting its azz kicked on each snap of the ball. And that was pretty easy to see.

O play: alex had a bad game, but he had a shiddy plan to follow. After the first 4 downs, there should not have been a pass longer than 1-2 seconds after that. For what ever reason Coach didn't see it. Receivers as a group once again did not shine. I counted 6, maybe 7 really nice catches, and then we had the showpieces like at the end of the game with Ginn, hitting him in the stomach and falling incomplete. Our Run game was better with Hunter, not Frank, because they were looking for frank on every play. How he got any yds is a tribute to him. Our OL ground it out, but Ravens DL just beat them bad. Yet Coach never really gave Hunter many more carries.

ST play: Prior to this game we were #1 in field position with kicks and return exchanges. Ravens changed that, and THEY had best field position.

D play: Front 7 again looked great, but Not as good as Ravens, who were better. DBs laid off and let one pass after another get completed. The ones that were incomplete should have been caught. Give the D backfield an F.

Coaching: Offense F
Defense A for front 7 , F for D backfield . Overall C-

Game plan: Obvious F.

So how, then, could this be the blessing in disguise? Until this game, it looked like we were looking at a first rd bye, and ultimately end up playing in GB. If we played like in this game, we would have been demolished. This one Ravens game gave Coach H all the things he needed to know on what to work on. Obviously if our OL is getting beat, then throw quick 1 steppers until D backs off LOS. On D, if there is a great OL, and we are not playing close coverage, opponents will throw and complete passes on us all day long.

OL: Our OL has come a long way and I thot was one of the best in league. Wrong. They saw stunts last nite that rendered them useless, and alex got pulverized. Coach has done a fantastic job on OL. Now he needs to teach them how to play all the stunts that Ravens used...along the entire OL. Our game plan has to reflect that, and our individual OL players have to learn to recognize that. They have come a long way. Now they know they have another long hill of "D recognition" to climb.

DBackfield: If DL can't get passrush, then rush more guys(on occasion), esp corner and safety blitzes, and second, make coverage tight. Last nite all the 8- 10 yarders were gimmes.

Coaching: Coach got stuck in a mindset, and didn't translate what was happening on field with what needed to be changed. Eg, at end of half, we had Ravens on their heels, with the 2 minute drill, and were beating them. Come 2nd half, we should have run the 2 minute drill exclusively to prevent Ravens from making personnel changes.
Finally, Coach needs to teach OL, individually on how to read and pickup blitzes, from DL that fooled them virtually every play. He isn't ready for the bigtime...yet.

Silver lining: this game just may, give us the extra oomph to get ready for the playoffs. Looking at this game, we were NOT close to ready. We can beat NFC East, and hopefully Saints, but we were not ready for Packers,(who also would have lost to Ravens last nite.) Now maybe Coach can work on our severe deficiencies, and maybe, just maybe , if we get to GB we can match them.

Unh, playing Ravens again...ummm...I don't know if we can beat them without a major overhaul in game philosophy.

anyone else notice our front 7 hasn't put near as much pressure on the qb since the what redskins game?

I wish the 49ers had stuck with the no huddle offense in the 3rd quarter. The Ravens defense looked all kinds of out of sorts, really struggling and confused when that happened. They rely so much on structure and having the right personnel in place that going with a no huddle put them in a bad spot, especially with Ray Lewis out. To me that would have the correct call offensively, go no-huddle, use slants, screens, quick passes to keep them off their heels and uncomfortable all game long.

Originally posted by NinerDieHard:
anyone else notice our front 7 hasn't put near as much pressure on the qb since the what redskins game?

This. Its why I started the other thread and people get sand in their vagina's and took it personally. 49ers defense has done well but lately they're resembling a Manusky type "bend but don't break" b******t defense that gets no pressure on the quarterback. What good teams will do, and you saw this last night, is sit back and take you apart, convert third down after third down because you give the quarterback an eternity to sit back in the pocket, meanwhile the Ravens had pass-rushers in Alex's face all game long.


I can tell you that McDonald hasn't seemed the same since his injury and as a result. the rest of the pass-rush hasn't seemed the same either but the play-calling has been way too vanilla.

Originally posted by NinerDieHard:
anyone else notice our front 7 hasn't put near as much pressure on the qb since the what redskins game?

Ray McDonald was a monster until he was injured with the hammy. Makes me wonder if he's at 100%. He's the guy that makes our pass rush better. They couldn't rush the passer like the Ravens were doing to us cause they have to be aware of Rice. Ravens did a better job against the run against us forcing us to pass more.

Man wtf. OL played like it was 2005.