Nuance is non-existent when talking about the 2024 San Francisco 49ers. The conversation is always binary. There’s no middle ground in the discussions surrounding the Niners.
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After multiple Super Bowl and NFC Championship appearances, head coach Kyle Shanahan suddenly becomes terrible and needs to be fired.
After 1.5 seasons of superb quarterback play, fans are starting to wonder whether paying Brock Purdy large sums of money makes sense after seeing his performance these past two outings without his full complement of weapons — despite battling through an obvious injury to his throwing shoulder.
Oh, and it’s Nick Soresen’s fault the defense built on star power doesn’t have Nick Bosa — the one player who has proven he’s capable of ending at least two drives a game, his $84 million defensive tackle, a hobbled All-Pro linebacker, and endless injuries to the team’s depth that has led to 33 different players taking a defensive snap.
The 49ers entered this season with Super Bowl aspirations, but Murphy’s Law had other ideas.
Business as usual for the 49ers, right?
On Monday, Shanahan said, “Everybody has a job to do” when discussing the different challenges the 49ers have been through this season. He added, “People go through a lot of stuff, but whatever their line of work is, they have a responsibility to do.”
That’s the bottom-line answer to a question in a business that judges you on results. Nobody feels sorry for the adversity you had to fight through at the end of every season. But calling what the Niners have endured this season “adversity” lacks empathy and is flat-out wrong.
Too often, the human element aspect gets ignored when talking about a sport played by humans.
Every NFL player is banged up to a degree right now. Playing through pain is an example of adversity. Getting shot after a robbery attempt is a traumatic experience.
Losing your job and figuring out your next move is an example of adversity. Losing your one-year-old daughter or having to cremate your son the Friday before the game like Trent Williams did last week qualifies as the type of trauma that sticks with you for the rest of your life.
Adversity ≠ Trauma.
To think that a locker room could carry on after three of their brothers went through unthinkable experiences in the span of three months without missing a beat is admitting that we are not viewing them as people.
Moving on after one of these morose experiences is understandable. Two is pushing it, but three, from an emotional standpoint, is impossible.
These tragedies get ignored when you’re screaming to fire the head coach. It’s on Shanahan to keep the group together. He spoke about that on Monday:
“When you’ve got to deal with tragedies like this, it’s hard as a coach. It’s hard as a friend, it’s hard as a family member, it’s hard for everybody. But we spend a lot of time with each other, and that’s what’s cool about a football team. Whatever you go through, the good or the bad, we go through it together. And I do like for those guys because I do like that they have this: they have a group of guys they can go to, a group of guys that could see them every day. And you can’t ever escape that full grief and stuff. But I do think it’s nice for those guys to have another avenue to get out on the football field, to get around teammates and things like that.”
The avalanche of inevitable injuries
The 49ers were always going to sustain injuries this year. That is an example of adversity. At the beginning of October, the Niners had lost the fourth-most total points due to injury. That was the game after Javon Hargrave tore his trieps and was lost for the season.
Hargrave was playing at a high level, and losing him would be an obvious blow to a defense that relied on pressuring the quarterback with four rushers. Still, San Francisco has a deep enough roster to overcome losing one of its star players. It’s something they’ve dealt with every year under Shanahan.
Unfortunately, one injury turned into a kamikaze. Later in October, Talanoa Hufanga — a year removed from being an All-Pro safety, went on the Injured Reserve with a wrist injury. Hufanga will return to practice this week after Shanahan said that it’s “not a sure thing” Hufanga would return this season back in October.
OK, so that’s two quality starters in two months. All good. It should stop there...right?
It did not, and we didn’t have to wait long for the subsequent avalanche to hit.
In Week 7, the 49ers lost their best offensive weapon and wideout, who helped establish their passing identity. Wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk, who had earned a $120 million contract, needed surgery to repair a torn ACL and MCL in his right knee.
Christian McCaffrey returned for two games but was recently shut down after a PCL injury. Trent Williams, Nick Bosa, Jauan Jennings, Deebo Samuel, Charvarius Ward, and George Kittle have all missed multiple games.
In the most literal sense, the best players on the team have been listed in this injury section and have missed multiple games at one point or another this year.
Overcoming one or two of these would be a fair expectation. But thinking the machine the 49ers have been during the past few seasons would carry on without the main ingredients in the equation is naive, to put it politely.
But remember, fire Shanahan!
Identity crisis
When you only look at the box score or judge a player’s success based on when they’ve been thrown the ball, you’ll come to the conclusion that Aiyuk was undeserving of his contract and underperforming this year.
If we’re using logic and reason, we’d throw the first month of the season out as it’d take time for Aiyuk to get back into playing shape, get his legs underneath him, and return to the player that made him so potent in 2023.
Sure enough, Week 5 against Arizona was the week Aiyuk exploded for eight receptions and 147 yards. For reference, Aiyuk earned as many points in that game as Deebo Samuel has all season, using Sports Info Solutions' “total points earned” metric.
That’s how impactful he was against the Cardinals. To date, it’s been the best performance from a pass-catcher donning a 49er uniform in 2024. Aiyuk could have surpassed 100 yards against the Kansas City Chiefs two weeks later had he not dropped a pass. Still, the signs were there that Aiyuk was rounding into the same form which made him one of the five to seven best receivers in the game before his injury.
Context is everything in football. Shanahan has been forced to cultivate a passing attack on the fly without his two best players.
McCaffrey was automatic in third-and-short situations, and gave the offense a free explosive play a game. The 49ers went from No. 1 in the NFL in red zone scoring percentage (68%) to 27th (48%), mainly because they lost their ace.
As an Atlanta Braves fan, I’ll use Chris Sale as an example. You know Sale is throwing a slider as an out pitch in the same way you know McCaffrey is getting the ball inside the 10. That doesn’t mean you can make contact in the same way that doesn’t mean you could prevent McCaffrey from scoring.
The 20 percent dip in red zone scoring isn’t a coincidence. The 49ers went most of the season without targeting a running back in the scoring zone because they didn’t have one who could win the same way CMC could.
Let’s switch sports for Aiyuk. Brandon Aiyuk’s emergence last season was like dropping Kevin Durant into the Golden State Warriors offense. Without KD, the Warriors were a Championship team but needed breaks to go their way to win it all. With Durant, good luck getting stops. That’s what watching the 49ers at full strength was like.
Leaving Aiyuk 1-on-1 was a deathwish the same way it was when teams guarded Durant 1-on-1 on the perimeter. When Aiyuk is on the field, the 49ers yards per rushing attempt, passing and rushing success rate, and explosive run rate peaks. The offense also generated 7.1 yards per play (up from 5.5 with Aiyuk off the field) with a +8.6 overall success rate with Aiyuk on the field since 2023. He’s a superstar, and opposing defenses treated him as such.
However, it’s important to understand the why and not just look at numbers.
Aiyuk was the first receiver under Shanahan who consistently won outside of the numbers and down the field. He opened up the offense and took the passing game to heights we hadn’t seen before.
Only Tyreek Hill had more receptions past the sticks in 2023. Aiyuk led the NFL in yards on out routes. So, anything outside of the numbers, where you can’t double a wide receiver, the 49ers took advantage of. Those “free” first downs are obsolete without Aiyuk. Now, the red zone freebies and throws outside of the numbers are a distant memory.
Quietly, Aiyuk’s speed is missed. Next Gen Stats tracks the average speed at the pass arrival. In 2023, Aiyuk was the 8th-fastest among all receivers. Without Aiyuk, Shanahan has resorted back to a timing offense through the air. The offense can no longer rely on a wideout winning 1-on-1 at every level, which has shrunk the field and the margin for error.
Jauan Jennings is a high-level WR2, but there’s a ceiling to what you can do with him due to his lack of explosiveness. Brock Purdy’s timing and accuracy has to be pristine for those two to consistently connect.
This season, over 61 percent of Jennings’s targets have been contested. Because he’s a dominant “ball winner,” Jennings is catching over 72 percent of his passes. But there are several examples this season of what it looks like when the timing is slightly off.
The lack of volume outside the numbers beyond ten yards is telling. Jennings only has 12 targets beyond 10 yards outside of the numbers this year. To me, that says Shanahan knows it’s not an area where Jennings thrives and not a sustainable way to win.
The decline of Deebo
And then there’s the decline of Deebo. In an offense that predicates itself on throwing intermediate passes, Deebo has caught four of his 12 targets, with a -25.1 catch rate over expected, -7.7 EPA, and only averaging 2.4 yards of separation on said targets. He cannot get open. The more concerning part is the burst is no longer there.
Those same stats that had Aiyuk among the fastest receivers in the NFL a season ago list Deebo’s average speed at the second-worst since entering the NFL. Speed was Deebo’s one pitch. Now that he’s lost his fastball, teams are sitting on his predictable route tree.
Jet sweeps to Deebo are no longer viable. Last year, he had an expected yards per carry of 6.5. This season, that number has plummeted to 3.8 on 23 tries. Per Next Gen Stats, Samuel recorded 11 explosive gains and at least +5 rushing yards over expected on five carries last season. He has accomplished neither feat in 23 carries in 2024.
Nobody has ever confused Samuel as a route-running extraordinaire. Shanahan has attempted to use Deebo on routes outside the numbers in the same way he did Aiyuk, but the experiment has failed.
The routes that it takes Aiyuk to get out of his break in one step, it takes Deebo three — and that’s after he throttles down. The out-breaking routes where Aiyuk excelled, Deebo rounds out of and it looks like Purdy is inaccurate when it reality it’s on the receiver.
Using the Snow Bowl in Buffalo as an example is cheap, but the week before at Lambeau Field, it looked like Samuel was jogging on half his routes. I understand the footing was slick, but there’s a reason Purdy is averaging under six yards per attempt in his previous two starts.
The domino effect of not having Aiyuk has taken its toll on the 49ers. Ricky Pearsall was supposed to replace Deebo down the line. But each player has been bumped up on the totem pole, and it’s evident neither is ready to perform at the level needed for the Niners to succeed.
Curious George
The 49ers are holding on for dear life from a playoff perspective. The biggest advantage they have through the air is George Kittle, who had two targets against Buffalo in Week 13. Kittle should have two targets per series.
Heading into Week 13, Kittle led all players in red zone targets and touchdowns. Moving forward, he should lead all pass catchers in targets. Shanahan must make Kittle a priority in the passing game and take whatever lumps there are in pass protection. The 49ers cannot afford to sacrifice their slim hopes by using their best weapon as a blocker.
It’s been a trying season, and it’s commendable the Niners are still in the playoff picture. Using Shanahan as a scapegoat for the failures of this team might make sense for sports talk radio, but the number of moving parts that has taken place this season would have any coach or team grasping at straws and looking up in the standings.
From a big-picture standpoint, you might be able to stick a fork in the 49ers this season, but if there’s anybody who could right the ship, it’s Shanahan.
