49ers week 18 mailbag: An NFC West battle of the 3rd string quarterbacks plus what the defense must clean up for a playoff run
It's week 18, everyone is tired, and I tried my best to answer questions from Twitter followers in this mailbag article. With film!
Author’s edit: The title of this article and the body of it claimed that David Blough, the Cardinals week 18 starter, is the 3rd string quarterback when in reality he is the 4th quarterback to take snaps for them this season.
It’s week 18, the final week of the regular season, and the 49ers get set to take on the Cardinals with a chance to go 6-0 in the division for their first time since the AFC and NFC realignment of the divisions in 2002. Every other NFC West team has finished 6-0 one time since 2002: Seattle in 2005, Arizona in 2008, Rams in 2018. None of those teams won the Super Bowl that year but all three did play in it.
The 49ers should cruise in this one with the Cardinals playing their 3rd string backup quarterback too. They are also down several key players like DeAndre Hopkins, Zac Allen, Robbie Anderson, Zaven Collins, James Conner, and Antonio Hamilton. That’s a good chunk of their starting core.
With that said, let’s get into the week 18 questions from the readers on Twitter.
1) @life_49ers on Twitter asks, “Why did Shanahan have to wait until Jimmy got hurt to finally unleash his offense?”
I don’t necessarily think Shanahan had to wait to unleash his offense. Purdy is still running the same basic structure of the offense Jimmy was running with an uptick in the usage of pistol formations. I think that’s the only difference. With Purdy, the difference is that he will look to take the deep throws if they are there when Jimmy was more cautious and methodical.
Shanahan even said after the Miami game:
“I think Brock naturally looks a lot more often for the deeper one than the shorter one, which is awesome. Sometimes, it helped today. In a couple early, I thought he missed just having someone quick right there and just trying to look for something deeper and then ran out of time to come back to the short one. You like that about a guy’s personality. You want that much more than the other way.”
I covered that in detail in last week’s mailbag article, linked here, and in other recent articles you can find on the homepage of West Coast Football.
The other reason the offense functions differently than it did with Jimmy is that Purdy is just a smart, efficient quarterback who knows where to go with the ball and when, how to make subtle movements in the pocket to give himself time to throw and a throwing lane, how to evade defenders who do get through to him in the pocket, and how to manipulate defenders to create throwing windows.
The 49ers offense with Jimmy G, pre-McCaffrey trade, ranked 14th in EPA/play at .037 and post-McCaffrey trade with Jimmy G in week 7-12, they 49ers offense ranked 5th at .127 EPA/play. With Brock Purdy in weeks 13-17 so far, the 49ers offense ranks 3rd at .149 EPA/play over that time period. (EPA stats courtesy of the website rbdsm.com)
So the offense was just above middle of the league and somewhat efficient pre-CMC, then exploded with Jimmy G and CMC, and then somehow got more efficient with Purdy since week 13. Here’s how below.
Here you can see Purdy make subtle movements in the pocket to buy himself time and create a throwing window. He doesn’t panic, his feet aren’t like cement bricks in the ground, and he doesn’t drop his eyes.
All this allows him to be able to hit throws on time as the play develops and he can’t find guys open. He hits the checkdowns on these throws but that isn’t a bad thing at all, especially as there is no one open late in the down.
He’s making some tight window throws as well as he’s able to look off defenders and create a throwing lane for himself.
And he’s not so easily fooled by exotic coverages and defender zone drops. Last week I showed how the Commanders tried to bait him with robber coverage after he beat their regular cover-1 coverage with a throw in stride to Kittle.
The Commanders tried to bait him with a 2-deep safety coverage pre-snap that rotated down to cover-1 robber. No big deal, Purdy recognized what they were doing and threw his pass outside the linebacker away from the robber safety to Jennings for a long third down conversion.
Here on the goal line versus the Raiders, the Raiders defense tried to bait him with drop-8 coverage in the end zone to compress the space and take away the throwing lanes. Most of the time this coverage is effective in these situations. The Raiders didn’t just drop a defensive end, they dropped a defensive tackle into a zone to the wider side of the field where the trips receivers were lined up.
Purdy spins out of the pocket to the left with no throw to the right side. It looked like he wanted Kittle shallow over the middle but the presence of the defensive tackle in the low hole discouraged that throw. As he scrambles, the defense comes up just enough to chase him that Kittle is able to slip behind everyone to the back corner where Purdy places the pass over everyone in front of it. That’s not an easy throw.
So I don’t believe that Kyle Shanahan is only now unleashing his offense. I think this is what it was finally supposed to look like with efficient quarterbacking.
2) @ReyesAngelr on Twitter asks, “Is Demeco Ryan's accurate in his assessment that Hufanga needs better eye discipline or is his poor play from his lack of athleticism?”
Hufanga’s biggest knock coming into the NFL draft in 2021 was his lack of speed. Which is why it was always less than ideal that they would continue to live in the 2-deep safety world of years past when Jimmie Ward and Jaquiski Tartt were roaming the deep parts of the field.
His best fit was always going to be down low as a box safety and where he could cover certain zones of the field without having to chase players all over it. He’s a very good and instinctual as a flat defender and hook/curl zone defender, the areas of the field usually between the hash and numbers and or numbers and sideline, but lately teams have been burning him in the seam where they can mess with the coverage rules.
The first coverage bust in the Raiders game on the touchdown to Darren Waller was the exact thing DeMeco Ryans was talking about with Hufanga’s eye discipline. It came on a similar play that the 49ers had already hurt the Seahawks on by putting the Seahawks corner in conflict on his coverage versus run fit responsibility.
Whereas the 49ers caught the Seahawks in bad run fit to coverage responsibility in the Seattle cover-3 defense, the Raiders caught the 49ers in bad run fits to coverage responsibility in the 49ers two-deep safety coverage on this play.
Ultimately, Hufanga was responsible for the coverage bust. The indicators? The backside coverage is in cover-2 over Adams. This puts the corner low and outside hip on him with safety help over the top. This tells us at a minimum, they’re in some form of two deep safety coverage even though Hufanga is aligned as a box safety.
On the front side, the Raiders have an extra offensive lineman plus they are in a closed YY formation. This likely means the corner/safety duo that side is playing quarters due to the run fit responsibility. Lenoir is responsible for outside force and crack-replace and Huf has the gap between the tight ends. This would put them in 1/4s responsibility (tough assignment already to play out this run look) as this takes pressure off of Lenoir’s fit/coverage responsibility.
The defensive line is in an under front.
At the snap, Lenoir comes up as the force/crack replace defender seeing the defensive end get cracked so he has to fill that part of the run. This means that Hufanga, seeing #2 tight end stay in, has to get eyes on #1 and get over him.
The coverage is likely cover-6. Gipson’s initial footwork, backwards read steps, plus his eyes on Adams suggest cover-2 “post to curl” read. Hufanga is the 1/4s “curl to post” defender and has a flat-footed key read of the tight end to running back/backfield flow.
With no release of the #2 tight end, Hufanga got caught looking at the backfield flow and lost Waller. This is an extremely tough assignment for him.
Lenoir probably should’ve chased the quarterback booting out his way too. So it’s not all on Hufanga but has the primary responsibility here.
No matter the coverage, cover-2, quarters, etc., this puts the deep vertical route responsibility on Hufanga to carry. That means he cannot get caught with his eyes in the backfield and must learn (or re-learn) quick recognition. It was also just a good play call by Josh McDaniels to put the 49ers coverage in conflict. And it wasn’t the first time he did that (more on that later)
3) @phulltimephill on Twitter asks: “McCaffreey in 4 weeks with Jimmy averaged 4.1 yards per carry (YPC). In 4 starts with a Purdy he’s averaging 5.3YPC. What’s been the difference?”
I don’t think there’s been too much of a difference considering on most 1st down runs, they’re still facing 8 men in the box from the defense. To the extent his YPC average has gone up, I think that’s more of a function of just getting comfortable using him in the offense as the full time running back. He’s just a better runner than anything they’ve had really since Frank Gore.
The other reason that's helping them is what they’re doing to teams on 2nd down. I don’t have hard data on this, but when the offense faces at least 2nd and 6 or longer to go, they will primarily line up in 11 personnel but sometimes they will line up in 21 personnel (2 running backs, 1 tight end, 2 receivers) and spread out the base defense.
When they do this, the defense cannot stack the box and at a maximum can only play with seven defenders inside. They have to kick out an extra defender over the slot and this removes a defender from their run fits.
And the 49ers are already hugely successful running against 8-man boxes. They kill teams with the run who end up playing 6 and 7 man boxes.
The Raiders matched the 49ers here with base 4-3 defense but the 49ers are in a 2x2 with Kyle Juszczyk out wide as the #1 receiver. This reveals zone coverage since the linebacker stayed in and bounced out over the slot. When the 49ers are under center, they almost never straight drop back pass, they always run or play action pass.
The Raiders are probably thinking play action here. The defense is in cover-2 and the linebackers are at a depth of at least 6-yards off the ball plus are light with 6-men in the run fit. The 49ers run the ball to the left side behind Kittle and Williams for a 9-yard gain.
The 2nd and 10 play to McCaffrey late in the fourth quarter is another good example here. The 49ers are in 11 personnel on this 2nd and 10. Anticipating a late game blitz to get after the quarterback, who already beat the blitz with a great throw over the middle to Aiyuk two plays earlier, Shanahan called a screen to get the ball out quick to his playmakers.
The Raiders this time are in nickel personnel showing a cover-0 blitz. At a minimum, they can clog up the running lanes with a 7-man front across the line with the 0-blitz stealing back gaps. At best they should be able to get an extra rusher at the quarterback and force him to make a bad decision. Shanahan accounts for this with a quick screen pass to McCaffrey.
With the defense in cover-0, there’s no one to chase down McCaffrey right away and he rips off a 38-yard gain.
When Shanahan is able to play these cat and mouse games with the defense, I’ll bet the house every time that he’s going to win that match up. So it isn’t a matter of just Purdy being more efficient or McCaffrey, it’s also the play caller having a full menu of options even on 2nd and 10.
4) @JoRo_NFL, a Broncos writer, on Twitter asks: “What are your dream matchups in each round of the playoffs? What presents the Niners best chance at a Purdy fun run?”
I don’t know how to answer this without explaining who I **do not** want them to play. The team I least want them to play is the Packers. And yes, I know, the 49ers have a good track record of somehow always knocking the Packers out of the playoffs (2012 divisional round at home, 2013 wild card round at Green Bay, 2019 NFC Championship game at home, 2021 divisional round at Green Bay).
And while Shanahan has a great record against his former offensive coaches during the regular season and playoffs, that is one team I do not like in a potential 2 seed versus 7 seed matchup based on how they have been playing lately.
The Packers came into December with an abysmal 4-8 record and many Cheesehead fans were ready to throw in the towel on the season. This was despite the fact that at 4-8 they still mathematically had a 3% chance to make the playoffs. All they had to do was run the table in December and have a few other games break in their favor.
Well, to the surprise of many, including me, that actually happened. The Seahawks and Commanders downward slide, which the 49ers are partially responsible for, and the Packers being 4-0 in December has vaulted them into really the only meaningful week 18 game outside of the Jags/Titans tonight.
The final spot comes down to Seattle, Green Bay, and Detroit. Green Bay gets the 7th seed with a win no matter what. Seattle gets in with a win and a Packers loss. Detroit gets in with a win and Seattle loss. The Packers playoff odds are sitting at 61% before week 18.
The most likely scenario is Green Bay wins and is in. Finishing the season 5-0 and having to face a Packers team with Rodgers and that offense finding its rhythm at the right time plus a stout defense is a less than ideal match up. And why are they finding their stride?
On offense, it’s the emergence of Christian Watson.
Watson lost Rodgers confidence at the start of the season when he dropped a deep touchdown pass that went right through his hands. That pretty much set the tone for the entire season. The offense went stagnant and Rodgers spent all season trying to build chemistry with his receiver room. Then Watson just exploded for five touchdowns in the span of 4 days. His emergence as a reliable and speedy deep threat should have every potential playoff defense equally concerned.
The Packers run game is equally dangerous with the 1-2 punch of Aaron Jones and A.J. Dillon and their run game is just as creative lately as the 49ers usually is. They had their way on the ground with the Vikings in week 17.
The defense, in particular the pass defense, has been the anchor, racking up six interceptions in the last two games. And they held Justin Jefferson to one catch for 15 yards.
The best matchups for a Purdy Fun Run are definitely home games versus the Lions or Seahawks. But barring some miracle where the Giants backups beat the Eagles, my #1 preference for wild card weekend is that the 49ers have the #1 seed and the bye week.
5) This is a 2-part question since they are kind of related. @ds42424 on Twitter asks: “Has Lenoir genuinely been a liability at cornerback the whole year or just in the Raiders game?” and @robtmatson on Twitter asks: “Were there similarities in the bad showings on defense against KC and LV? In your opinion, were they just off days for SF, or were there real/consistent schematic things done to make them look so beatable?”
The answer to part one of this question is yes, Lenoir has probably been the second biggest liability in pass coverage after Hufanga this season. Hufanga has only been worse because he’s given up five touchdowns in the last five games. Lenoir hasn’t surrendered a touchdown but he’s given up big pass plays regardless. And those are just as bad.
The Raiders went at him seven times and completed five passes for 108 yards. They also ran at him several times too. Overall this season he has been targeted 80 times and has given up 57 catches for 668 yards. There is more than enough cause for concern.
Part 2 of this question, were there similarities in the bad showings versus Kansas City and Las Vegas, the short answer is yes. In addition to coverage issues versus Kansas City, a game where Charvarius Ward and Tashaun Gipson both gave up over 200 yards total downfield to Chiefs receivers, the other area the 49ers struggled in both games were in the screen game versus the Rams, Chiefs, and Raiders.
Those are just three of the teams I remember that had success running screens against an aggressive defensive front. The 49ers don’t run that much two-deep safety coverage and as a result, they sacrifice coverage on the back end to keep a safety in the box on the front end. That’s less defenders to chase down screens. It works if the downfield pass coverage isn’t giving ground (Rams game) but doesn’t work if they are (Raiders/Chiefs games).
Thank you to the readers/Twitter followers for submitting questions this week for this mailbag! Hope the new year is treating everyone well and get ready folks, 49ers playoff football is upon us!
one more comment. you mention how Purdy’s feet “aren’t like cement bricks in the ground” which is very true. But i was also noticing -- and i could be off on this -- that at the same time, confident QBs like Brock seem to stand with conviction/have their whole damn feet on the ground WHEN they pass from the pocket. Heavy feet...right up until they need fast feet. Like Brock in that first clip: calm calm calm here comes Maxx and zoom. Brock goes from still to darting away. -- Anyway here’s my observation and i wonder what you think. Ive been watching a talented but raw QB develop at WA’s 4A HS champ the last 2 seasons- his 9th & 10th grade years. For the first 1.5 seasons dude was constantly throwing off one foot, off the wrong foot, off the balls of his feet, with his weight back with his weight forward. he was never set. as if he thought there would never be time for that. it was like he was so hyper ready to move his ass that he didn’t set himself to throw. And he is fast so he was escaping, was making plays. HOWEVER he hit a different level the last .5 of that two season period and the main difference i noticed was he was throwing with the spikes of both of his feet firmly in the grass most of the time. if he had to run? he ran...but up until that moment it was like he was finally letting his weight reach the soles of his feet. To me it seems like Brock does that too. To me it seemed like Jimmy maybe not so much. Maybe that’s why brock looks calm & jg didnt. Anyway. Do you think that this is a stretch am i seeing shit or does this make sense?
PS i love the old school in-line correction to
the most minor of errors. Don’t you know that journalism lost that ethic Rich? Now even NYT and WaPo just straight up change the shit with no record as if there’s always been only one draft. (There’s still a right way to do things tho and that’s showing the math. You don’t have to lead with it tho lol)