Official 49ers Thread

[Color Me Badd Fan]

The Panthers 5 wins have come over
3-6 St. Louis
0-8 Tampa Bay
1-7 Minnesota
2-6 New York
2-6 Atlanta

8-33 combined record. Sorry if I am not sold on them yet.

3 losses have come against:
8-1 Seattle
4-4 Arizona
3-6 Buffalo

Grantland's resident stat geek has a post on that. The crapiness of the opponents notwithstanding, it's still rare to beat teams as badly as they're beating them in succession.

[Sizzle]

So long Nnamdi Asomugha. Niners cut him and LB Nate Stupar to activate Mario Manningham and Eric "Eazy E" Wright.

Manningham coming back is interesting. He was decent enough last year before he got hurt, but not a game changer. After the switch to Kaep, he was targeted 2, 5, 6 and 4 times (17 total) for 13 catches. His average was substantially higher after the switch to Kaep. But I don't think he's the receiver that they need to kick the offense up. That's Crabtree. Surprisingly the one guy who hasn't had as much of an impact in the receiving game as I thought he would is McDonald. You start naming off Crabtree, Boldin, Davis, Manningham, McDonald and it seems like they could be pretty dynamic to beat teams down the stretch. December 8th down the stretch is the big game circled on my calendar. Why they didn't make that one a MNF game is beyond me.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

So long Nnamdi Asomugha. Niners cut him and LB Nate Stupar to activate Mario Manningham and Eric "Eazy E" Wright.

Manningham coming back is interesting. He was decent enough last year before he got hurt, but not a game changer. After the switch to Kaep, he was targeted 2, 5, 6 and 4 times (17 total) for 13 catches. His average was substantially higher after the switch to Kaep. But I don't think he's the receiver that they need to kick the offense up. That's Crabtree. Surprisingly the one guy who hasn't had as much of an impact in the receiving game as I thought he would is McDonald. You start naming off Crabtree, Boldin, Davis, Manningham, McDonald and it seems like they could be pretty dynamic to beat teams down the stretch. December 8th down the stretch is the big game circled on my calendar. Why they didn't make that one a MNF game is beyond me.

They cut Marcus Cooper in hopes that he would clear waivers and then be signed to the practice squad. Cooper had looked pretty good in the preseason and I thought there was a pretty good chance that he wouldn't clear waivers. Unless I have my facts wrong, the Chiefs had first dibs on players that were cut and were on the waiver wire. The Chiefs ended up grabbing him and he's been their nickel back and he's played well.

Obviously they should have kept Cooper instead of Kerry Washington's husband, but hindsight is 20-20 and all of that.

IMO, the most important game of the regular season right now for the Niners is that Saints game. If they lose that, then the Saints would have to lose two more games along with the Seahawks or the Niners are looking at going to either Seattle or New Orleans in the playoffs.

I think the Niners are going to handle the Seahawks on December 8. Despite what happened towards the end of that game in week 2, the Niners still were within one possession heading into the 4th quarter. Reportedly, Kaepernick had a foot problem during weeks 2-5. Then Vernon Davis pulled his hamstring during that game and Anquan Boldin was the only relevant 49er receiver at the end of that game -- and they were going up against the best secondary in the league. The problems continued through to the Colts game the next week.

But think again about what's at stake in that Saints game. The Niners' toughest games in the back 8 are in order: 1) @ the Saints; 2) Seahawks; 3) @Arizona; and 4) Carolina. The rest of the games are Atlanta and St. Louis at home, Washington and Tampa on the road -- four wins that should be in the bag. The Niners will in all likelihood beat Carolina and Arizona. So that leaves the Saints on the road and the Seahawks at home. If the Niners beat the Saints, they have a clear path to the #1 seed, essentially beating Seattle gives them the #1 seed. If they lose, then they're going need some help.

This is a different year from last year. The Niners knew in the last half of the year that Atlanta was going to get the #1 seed, but they were Atlanta so it wasn't as big of a deal (as it turns out, it should have been a big deal, the Niners barely won the NFC Championship). They just needed to maintain that #2 seed and get the bye and make sure that they didn't have to play in Lambeau in the playoffs. Green Bay had racked up some losses at the beginning of the year (San Francisco, Seattle and Indianapolis), so Green Bay was basically playing catch up the whole year. The inconsistency was maddening, but they were able to hold on for the #2 seed. Now, they're dealing with two legit teams that they're either trailing or tied with and they know either one is going to be tough to beat on the road in the playoffs. I think the result of the New Orleans game is going to either negatively or positively affect the team down the stretch including that remaining game against Seattle.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Crabtree's back at practice. He has to now be activated within 21 days of today. I think they're waiting until after they're done with the treacherous FedEx Field turf to put Crabtree on the active roster.

[Sizzle]

Vernon Davis goes down and the offense shuts down. I've been wanting to see more of Vance McDonald, and while for the most part he looked good, he had a big drop that really hurt yesterday. The type of pass that Davis catches and turns into a TD.

Manningham actually looked like a semi-competent receiver, though he also had a drop or two that hurt yesterday.

It seems like the 49ers forgot what got them where they needed to be: running the football with Frank Gore. Gore only had 16 carries and averaged 5.1 yards per. I get that Davis going out hurt, because he is a very good blocker, but that teams also have to play SF differently because he is also a threat to stretch the field. But only 16 carries is not acceptable. Kendall Hunter's fumble also hurt, which leads me to wonder why Gore only got 16 carries. That isn't a crazy amount. I don't remember seeing him get hurt.

In the stats that really mean nothing category, Niners are 5-0 when Aldon Smith is out, and 1-3 when he plays this year. Yikes!

[Walter Sobchak]

The Panthers 5 wins have come over [...] Sorry if I am not sold on them yet.

The Niners will in all likelihood beat Carolina and Arizona. So that leaves the Saints on the road and the Seahawks at home. If the Niners beat the Saints, they have a clear path to the #1 seed, essentially beating Seattle gives them the #1 seed. If they lose, then they're going need some help.

No way the Niners beat the Saints on Sunday.

[smokymountainrain]

No way the Niners beat the Saints on Sunday.

Home team wins that one. Game must be in NO.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Time to go back to the drawing board if this offense doesn't improve when Crabtree comes back. The QB and OC will need to be replaced. The second half collapses by the offense two weeks in a row are deplorable.

The Niners got the ball with over two minutes left and they only needed to get into field goal range. Instead, they called plays like they had 30 seconds left and needed a touchdown.

If Alex Smith wins tonight, I'm sure he'll love what's happening to his old team. It's becoming painfully apparent that the Niners made the wrong decision last year. It's impossible to prove of course, and I was wrong last year too, but Kaepenick might have hit his ceiling last year simply because teams didn't yet know how to prepare for him. Think about what people were saying heading into this year about the 2011 and 2012 drafted QBs, it was all about Wilson, RG3 and Kaepernick. Wilson is the only one to live up to the hype, while RG3 is coming off an injury. Kaepernick is playing like a fresh steaming dog turd and Luck is making everyone wonder why he wasn't really much in the conversation.

Can there be much doubt at this point? I don't think he has a clue how to read a defense and I've never seen him punish a defense once when they blitz.

[Sizzle]

I'm probably biased but the call of the hit to the head of Brees was absolute bullshit. Brooks hit him high but the contact was at his shoulder pads, not his helmet. The fumble there is the difference in the game.

[hostile]

I'm probably biased but the call of the hit to the head of Brees was absolute bullshit. Brooks hit him high but the contact was at his shoulder pads, not his helmet. The fumble there is the difference in the game.

Maybe I don't understand the rules but it looked like a clean hit to me. The ref who threw the flag was behind the play. He saw Brees head go back and it probably looked like the hit was high. I guess it's not a reviewable play.

[ewth8tr]

Maybe I don't understand the rules but it looked like a clean hit to me. The ref who threw the flag was behind the play. He saw Brees head go back and it probably looked like the hit was high. I guess it's not a reviewable play.

It might have been a reviewable call, but Harbaugh wasted his challenges in the first half.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Tapatalk

[Sizzle]

It might have been a reviewable call, but Harbaugh wasted his challenges in the first half.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Tapatalk

It's not reviewable.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

I'm probably biased but the call of the hit to the head of Brees was absolute bullshit. Brooks hit him high but the contact was at his shoulder pads, not his helmet. The fumble there is the difference in the game.

It was a shitty call. The refs also should have taken into account that Brees is about a half foot shorter than the average QB. I saw another bad call go the Saints way a few weeks ago where someone tackled Brees at the thighs and they were called for hitting him too low. They need to really watch how they call those low hits on the QB. It was a response to Palmer and Brady getting their knees blown out within about two years of each other. Pollard probably went for Brady's knees intentionally, I'm not sure about Van Oelhoffen

[Walter Sobchak]

Wilson is the only one to live up to the hype...

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Well, Andrew Luck was at times forgotten and he's infinitely better than the whole lot of them. If they put every player in the league in one huge draft, I'm pretty sure Luck would go number 1 overall and Rodgers would go number 2. After that, I'd pick Calvin Johnson #3 because he makes average QBs look good. Johnson is easily the second best player to ever play WR. After that I suppose the old QBs like Manning, Brady and Brees would go quickly because one in the hand is worth two in the bush. In other words, being really competitive for a couple years is better than being barely competitive over a longer period of time.

Finally, I'd suppose that Romo would go and then Russel Wilson. Guys like Matt Ryan, Flacco, Rivers, Eli Manning and Stafford would fly off the board.