Saleh Wants 49ers Defense to be in Attack Mode

A year ago at this time, new 49ers defensive coordinator Jim O'Neil was saying all the right things.O'Neil, hired by head coach Chip Kelly, last spring was preaching a complex, uptempo defense that would go after opposing quarterbacks.Said O'Neil, of his goal for the 49ers in 2016: "I think our mantra right now is we are going to stop the run on early downs. And then we want to confuse and hit your quarterback."Unfortunately for the 49ers and O'Neil, that didn't work out.Under O'Neil, San Francisco had the NFL's worst defense. The 49ers gave up 406.4 yards and 30 points per game. The defense was the worst part of a bad team. At the end of the season, both Kelly and O'Neil were ousted.Now, a year later, another defensive coordinator is saying all the right things, too. The question is, will he have more success than O'Neil?Robert Saleh, hired by head coach Kyle Shanahan and GM John Lynch, will be the leader of a unit that is switching from its longtime 3-4 base defense to a 4-3 scheme similar to the one run for many years by Pete Carroll with the Seattle Seahawks. The scheme essentially will feature four linemen, three linebackers and the strong safety aligning close to the line of...