SANTA CLARA -- Something isn't right with the 49ers' defense.
Look at their run defense, for example. In the first half this past Sunday against the Cardinals, it shut down running back James Connor. Gave up just 9 yards on 6 carries. Utter domination.
But in the second half, the Cardinals made an adjustment, and suddenly the 49ers couldn't stop Connor. He rushed for 75 yards after halftime.
What happened?
"They were giving us a different look on the zone read," Nick Bosa said. "In all of our losses, the preparation we've had has been great, but teams are playing us different and doing things differently and we need to adjust a little better. They're just showing different looks than what we were looking at on tape. We've got to adjust."
When Bosa says "we" need to adjust a little better, he means defensive coordinator Nick Sorensen. He's in charge of in-game adjustments for the defense, as are head coach Kyle Shanahan and assistant head coach Brandon Staley. The brain trust.
Predictably, Shanahan disagreed with Bosa's assessment. On a conference call Monday morning, Shanahan pointed the finger at his players for the poor run defense.
"I know the long run, touchdown run we got," Shanahan said. "when you're in an eight-man front and you missed the back, you’re one guy short and your middle-third player needs to make the tackle and he got buried. It was going to be a big gain, but not a touchdown gain and he got buried in it too. When you have an eight-man front and no one accounts for the quarterback it's not necessarily adjustment. It's a mistake. You can always go to two-shell defenses to have a guy in that lane, which definitely helps for those things. Just makes it harder for the downhill runs to the running back. There's always give and take with that. But that's the challenge of when you play a system where the quarterback can pull it, you can't fall asleep on any play the whole game because you never know when he is going to pull it. And if you don't have a guy account for it and they have the type of speed that quarterback has, that's what happens. They got us about two times in the game on it. That one being the worst one. Then another one in the fourth quarter that hurt us.”
So Shanahan is blaming the players. Bosa is blaming the coaches. And the 49ers are 2-3.
Sounds like things aren't going so great behind the scenes.
