I would’ve never expected this. Like honestly. This is weird. I thought that the San Francisco 49ers were going to be a solid team, but I honestly didn’t expect them to get to the playoffs (I thought the Rams and the Seahawks would be the NFC West teams that make the playoffs). THEY WENT 4-12 LAST SEASON! So how in the world are they the last undefeated team in the National Football League?
Looking back on last season, it’s easy to see how the 9ers were able to improve. The 2018 season for them was a serious of unfortunate events to say the least. Starting running back Jerick McKinnon, who many expected to have a huge season, tore his ACL during training camp and starting quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo tore his ACL during the third game of the season. And then in Week 8, Garoppolo’s replacement C.J. Beathard injured his wrist and was out for the rest of the season as well. So the 49ers went the majority of last season with their third-string quarterback Nick Mullens. Another thing that plagued the 9ers was their defense. During the entire 16 games schedule of the 2018 season, they only had two interceptions. TWO! The previous record for least interceptions was three and that included strike shortened NFL seasons! 40 different players that season had more interceptions than the entire team. The 49ers had just seven total takeaways on the season, smashing the previous record of 11.
Miraculously, these two things are the positives of the 49ers this season. Jimmy Garoppolo has the 10th best passer rating in the NFL and has thrown for 13 touchdowns this season. In their last game against the Cardinals, he had 317 yards passing and 4 touchdowns. But in all honesty, the 9ers would probably be perfectly fine in Garoppolo took a knee every time he had the ball; their defense is that good. Led by rookie standout Nick Bosa, their 49er defensive line is terrorizing opposing quarterbacks. Bosa leads the way with 7 sacks, followed by Dee Ford with 5.5, Arik Armstead with 4.5, and DeForest Buckner with 4. This is a team that has other offenses seeing scarlet red and gold in their nightmares.
A lot of the success of the 49ers can not only be credited to the players, but the coaches as well. Kyle Shanahan has been delivering a masterclass this entire season on how to scheme players open. Tight end George Kittle leads the team in both reception and touchdowns largely because of this. On the other side of the ball, Robert Saleh has the defense playing like madmen. Throughout the season the 49ers have been using the motto “All gas, no brakes” and it shoes in their play. They have the second best defense in the league (second only to the New England Patriots), but they shouldn’t sweat not being in first place, because they are still undefeated.
The San Francisco 49ers have been a pleasant surprise this season and hopefully they can keep this up all the way to the playoffs. While I don’t believe that they’ll stay undefeated (because that is extremely difficult to do) I do think they’ll play themselves into a number one seed come playoff time. And everybody knows that playoffs is what separates the boys from the men.