206-666-2826

I know the episode is late.  Yes, the date I quote at the beginning of the episode is wrong.  This is what happens when it takes so long to encode your MP3, you forget you haven’t even posted the episode.  The title is in the ID3 tags for the file, and it has something to do with News and Feedback and something else, and honestly, I’m not taking the time to figure it out.

Anyway, talking about the Playoff games we just witnessed, and the ones we will witness forthcoming.  No episode from Kevin and I this week, as I completely flaked on him.  We will likely have an episode to preview the Super Bowl, at the very least.

 

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Discussing our sterling 1-3 record on 1st round game picks, how we see the Divisional round playing out, and we touch on the “greatest quarterback of all time” argument.  Bonus discussion of Mark McGwire’s recent admission to steroid use.  Email 49ersfancast@gmail.com, or leave a voicemail at 206-666-2826.

 

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Prompted by comments from a listener, I talk about where this team has bean, where it is now, and how the future will be affected by it.  Also looking at a couple recent news stories regarding the team.  Email 49ersfancast@gmail.com, or call the voicemail line at 206-666-2826.

 

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Due to some recent trouble with my Feedburner feed, I have abandoned use of it until I can figure out what went wrong.  My site RSS no longer redirects to the Feedburner feed, so if you want the latest episodes of the 49ers Fancast, you must change your feed subscription to http://indianajim.net/49ersfancast/?feed=rss2.

I had noticed that my iTunes listing was only updated to Episode #28, so I realized (after a few listeners complained) that there was something obviously wrong.  When I removed the feed redirect and refreshed my iTunes listing, it was updated with the latest episodes.

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and I apologize for the inconvenience.

My friend Kevin the Bengals Fan joins me to discuss the upcoming playoffs.  Who do we like in the Wildcard games, and who do we see going forward to the Super Bowl?  Plus some obligatory bashing of the Pittsburgh Steelers.  You’ll have to excuse Kevin.  He is, after all, only a Bengals fan….

 

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Talking about the win over the St. Louis Rams, and a little discussion of things to come.  Email 49ersfancast@gmail.com or call the voicemail line at 206-666-2826.

 

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• Going into this game I wasn’t expecting a blowout.  As I said before, this is not a team of whom we can demand a blowout performance.  Just like the Lions, the one thing the 49ers proved is you can come in against the Rams completely lifeless, and still win going away.  The entire team seemed to come out lifeless in the first half, like they were running plays just to see what would happen.  The defense was stout, if only enough to hold the Rams to their two field goals, but the offense was simply nonexistent.  It didn’t seem like Alex Smith or Jimmy Raye had a cogent plan.  They woke up in the second half, however, and instead of trying to run out a 14-6 victory, they actually kept the offense going for a couple more scores.
• Alex Smith finished the game with a respectable stat line after that 73-yard touchdown to Vernon Davis.  He was much better in the 2nd half, even if the offensive line was not.  This isn’t a performance to write home about, but it wasn’t like Smith was sitting back there with time.  The Rams kept up the pressure, seeming to channel their inner Philadelphia Eagles defense.  On the season, Smith finishes with 60.5% completions, 18 touchdowns and an 81.5 rating, all career highs, and 15 of those came in nine starts.  It is a step in the right direction for Smith, whose career was much in doubt after he spent the last two seasons rehabbing injuries.  At the very least, he’s earned himself a full offseason–fully healthy, I might add–without a quarterback competition dominating the team’s focus, going into 2010.
• The thing that will, and ought to, dominate the offseason is just what can Jimmy Raye do with Alex Smith?  I go back and forth on Jimmy Raye, and the only way to answer the questions surrounding him is to allow 2010 to unfold.  The good: he’s gotten more out of Alex Smith than a lot of people expected; he continued to try and find ways to get Gore his carries; he did a fantastic job with Vernon Davis, who had his first Pro Bowl season; he took a very raw Michael Crabtree, who had missed out on a ton of time, and was able to utilize him on a game-by-game basis.  The bad:  He didn’t seem to know how to gameplan to exploit the weaknesses of an opposing defense; he continued to force plays that didn’t work (Morgan motion-stop formation); he struggled to call plays that led into the next to move the ball consistently; many times his strategy induced great head-scratching (draw plays on 3rd and 22).  Jimmy Raye must find a way to use this offense to go on the attack, and really gameplan to beat the opposing defense.
• What can Scot McCloughan do with two first round picks?  The 49ers absolutely must address the right tackle and outside linebacker positions.  It has once again become clear that Adam Snyder is overmatched at right tackle.  Ahmad Brooks has come on strong, but the jury is still out on Manny Lawson, and Parys Haralson to some extent.  If they cannot find an explosive pass-rusher in the middle of the 1st round, then in my opinion they should go offensive line with both.  Offensive line and pass rush.  To me these are the two primary targets for the draft.  Also, I’d like to see them pick up a standout corner.  If they can find a really good one in the second or third round, I’d like to see them make the pick there.  Scot McCloughan must have a good draft class in 2010, or else I will be campaigning for his departure.

Sorry about the lateness of this episode.  I ran into some FTP difficulties yesterday, and laziness the day before that.   Many, many meanings behind the word “inconsistency,” eh?

Talking about beating the Detroit Lions, and looking forward a bit to 2010.  Also briefly looking at the Rams.  But only VERY briefly.

 

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This is a different Postgame Reactions post.

The most readily apparent thing about this 49ers team is how incredibly inconsistent they are from top to bottom.  The first thing I noticed is how easy it seemed for 3rd-stringer Drew Stanton to move the ball against this defense.  Yes, the 49ers gradually became more opportunistic as the game dragged on, but it was yet another example of how this team plays up or down to its competition.

The other microcosm of inconsistency was this: Alex Smith play fakes and drifts to his right.  Michael Crabtree breaks wide open downfield with no safety help.  Imagine seeing a tree uproot itself and walk, and you might understand how rare an occurrence this is.  Crabtree does not have game-breaking speed, and Jimmy Raye’s offense does not produce many long balls.  I can imagine Smith’s overriding thought: “Don’t screw this up.”

Michael Crabtree and Vernon Davis are both in the top 5 in drops in the NFL right now.  So imagine Michael Crabtree, so wide open he’s probably thinking that they’ve crossed into another dimension.  He’s a rookie, and he’s probably thinking, “Don’t screw this up.” Remember Josh Morgan with a Shaun Hill pass falling into his arms and dropping it?  He said it was like a punt.  Smith’s ball to Crabtree was hardly a punt, and yet when Crabtree brings it in, the ball pops out of his hands, and he has to catch it again.

Whatever happened on the play, the route worked, and Crabtree was wide open.  The 49ers are not accustomed to plays working the way they’re supposed to.  The 49ers of old knew which plays would work, when they would work, and how to execute them.  But those teams had a lot of time together.  The 49ers of now are starting to figure out what works, they don’t quite know when it’s going to work, and when it does work, they can’t quite execute it just right.

Therefore, sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t.

It ain’t sexy football talk, and it’s not going to be a locker room slogan any time soon.  I can’t see the 49ers PR department signing off on that going on a billboard.  But it is the truth about this team.  As for the current PR slogan, “Don’t tell me, Show me,” the 49ers have definitely seemed to stop telling us.  But somewhere along the way, they forgot to show us.

The 49ers don’t field a team that gives us the right to demand a blowout of anyone, even if it is the Lions.  As Mark Purdy of the Mercury News has stated in his most recent column, “the 49ers could get away with being less than perfect.”  They couldn’t get away with that this season.  The fact that the 49ers won by two touchdowns is a testament to how bad the Lions are.  Imperfect and inconsistent teams can still walk out with a win.

First of all, apologies for completely whiffing on the feedback episode.  I thought for sure I released it.  After making such a definitive statement about my schedule, I completely failed in that regard.

In this episode, talking about the loss to the Eagles, and what it all means to the team as a whole, starting with Quarterback Alex Smith.  Then I look (briefly) at the upcoming Lions game.  Call the voicemail line at 206-666-2826, or email 49ersfancast@gmail.com.

 

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