Our Underachieving Season Was Due To

think it was due to the losses.

Originally posted by Oakland-Niner:

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:

Injuries. When you lose your franchise QB that early in the season, your starting RB before the season and have to trot out a guy like Beathard, the year isn't likely to go very well for you, no matter what you do. You can nitpick everything else and come to some valid conclusions about certain things but the reality is that if this team has a healthy Garoppolo, McKinnon, Colbert, Tartt, if Reuben Foster doesn't go full on stupid and guys actually have the time to coalesce together, if Richburg doesn't screw up his knee early on in the season, limiting his effectiveness, if you get the starting players on offense and defense together far more consistently then your record at the end of the season is also likely a lot better.

With a healthy Garoppolo and McKinnon alone I don't think there is anyway that this team loses either game to the Cardinals, they probably pull out another game or two that was lost as well, putting them far more in the reasonable expected range of 7 to 8 wins for a team that is still very much rebuilding and had no edge presence on defense.

Here is the problem with your thesis. Jimmy G was not playing that well to start the season. He was taking stupid sacks and was inconsistent. We lost 2 games with him at the helm. Would he of turned it aroundd, maybe? However, Mullen's played better in a number of games. The one sore spot that I'll grant you was the stretch with Beathard, but that's on Kyle.

Also, Jet went down but Brieda and the committee averaged over 5 YPC. It's not like we lost Frank Gore in his prime and everything fell apart.

In my mind, that makes your first two point irrelevant.

Jimmy G in the 2 games after the opener was completing 66% of his passes with a QB rating north of 110 and had zero turnovers. Basically he's had one terrible game as a starter for us.

As for Jet, he was expected to be a back that threatened the defenses from out of the backfield in the passing game. Kyle was basically gonna use him like he did Freeman in Atl.

Originally posted by DRCHOWDER:
think it was due to the losses.

Personally I would like to think it was due to my lack of participation in the punting game.

I sort of feel bad about it too.

The front offices overestimation of talent at key positions particularly on defense and injuries.

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:

Originally posted by JaggedJ:

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:

Originally posted by JaggedJ:

Then your thread title is invalid.

Injuries happen, lesser players come in and are generally more prone to turnovers/inability to takeaway.

You can't disregard injuries from a discussion about why our season was poor.

Its valid to discuss if our offensive game plans were too ambitious for CJ and Mullens. That's a point of discussion here.

On defense, we didn't have any season changing injuries -- just no depth at all.Foster laid an egg his sophomore season. But that's not really meaningful injuries that change the course of a teams season.

All that you mentioned above are valid points of discussion.

However, you asked what our poor season was due to and the number 1 answer to that is injuries.

What injuries on defense where franchise-changing? If Buck went down maybe you might have a point to make. But nothing really unusual happened other than the annual season-ending injury to Jimmie Ward and tartt and Colbert Miss some games. They stunk anyway so who really cares. I think that 11 DB rotation was due as much to lousy play as being nicked and dinged. If a coaching staff can't handle injuries on the offensive or defensive side -- or at least minimize the damage with an appropriate scheme and responsible play calling -- then they're not a coaching staff that's ready for the NFL. Where everybody goes down for some time during every season

Why do they have to be franchise changing injuries to have an impact week to week?

Why do you keep focusing only on defence when give aways are as bad as takeaways?

There were many reasons why we had a poor season and injury is the biggest.

Something Else: CJ Beathard.

The losses against Arizona were the two most underachieving performances imo, and CJ played a big role in those losses. If Mullens replaces Garoppolo instead of CJ, we probably have 6 or 7 wins.

With or without the injuries this team doesn't have that much talent tbh. We were way over hyped coming into the season

Originally posted by Ronnie49Lott:
The front offices overestimation of talent at key positions particularly on defense and injuries.

Definitely agree
Tart, Colbert, Witherspoon basically the entire secondary outside of Sherman were over estimated.
And for some reason they continue to believe Curtis Marsh is enough to supplement Buckner as a pass rusher.

Lack of legit impact players that can make the difference from poor drafting as well as complacency during free agency.

To be honest, I still don't know how good Jimmy Garoppolo is. Yes, he won those 5 meaningless games. Yes, I overreacted and bought his jersey.

But also had an extremely shaky start this season and did not really play that well. MAYBE, he would have played well down the stretch. But those are just assumptions predicated on optimism.

I think going into the offseason, I'm going with the assumption that Garrapolo for where he is at learning this playbook and his low amount of starting experience in real NFL games, he probably only provides a marginal upgrade over Nick Mullens who threw for over 300 yards at CenturyLink and had a couple of good games.

McKinnon, I think is also being overstated. We think he's going to be this great weapon on offense out of the backfield. Just like how we think Marquise is going to be this great weapon that takes the top off the defense like Tyreek Hill. We start projecting and deluding ourselves that we'll be great.

At the end of the day, you need to be healthy and on the field. Both of these guys need to prove that and they have questionable durability.

Defensively, we are a complete joke. It's been beaten to death already, and at least most of the zone can come to an agreement on this

Originally posted by John_Candy:
Something Else: CJ Beathard.

The losses against Arizona were the two most underachieving performances imo, and CJ played a big role in those losses. If Mullens replaces Garoppolo instead of CJ, we probably have 6 or 7 wins.

So much this.
Considering Arizona only won 3 games total and 2 were against the 9ers lol.
CJ, 2 picks, 2 fumbles lost, and 8 sacks in those 2 games.

Jimmy G's fault.

No QB and no pass rush.

Originally posted by IT21:
With or without the injuries this team doesn't have that much talent tbh. We were way over hyped coming into the season

this sums it up very well, the five game win streak fooled many., including kyle and lynch in my opinion. into a false sense of security. and poor coaching on the defensive side of the ball

Originally posted by SoCold:

Originally posted by John_Candy:
Something Else: CJ Beathard.

The losses against Arizona were the two most underachieving performances imo, and CJ played a big role in those losses. If Mullens replaces Garoppolo instead of CJ, we probably have 6 or 7 wins.

So much this.
Considering Arizona only won 3 games total and 2 were against the 9ers lol.
CJ, 2 picks, 2 fumbles lost, and 8 sacks in those 2 games.

the defense found ways to lose winnable games in my opinion