How to Beat the 49ers

Before we start, you’re going to have to trust me on something. I did a lot of research on this, that I don’t have the time to put into writing, but it’s very important to remember for the remainder of this post to understand: Aaron Rodgers is a better quarterback than Jimmy Garoppolo.



That said, Garoppolo has actually been having some pretty good games this year. This is weird to say, but stopping Jimmy Garoppolo is actually more important to beating the 49ers than stopping Rodgers is to beating the Packers.



Looking at how to beat the 49ers, I’m going to look most closely at the last 5 games since their week 6 bye. There are a few trends in 49ers games from that time period:

- The team with more rushing attempts usually wins.  (not yards or yards per carry, just attempts)
- The team with more passing attempts usually loses.

- The team with the more efficient passer usually wins
- The team with the more efficient run game has little correlation with winning.

There was one exception to both of these trends, the Bears had more rushing attempts (36 vs 26) and less pass attempts (27 vs 28) and and the 49ers bucked both trends and won anyways. However, since that involves Justin Fields getting 10 attempts for 103 yards, I’m going to call that data point an outlier.



So this is easy, 49ers win when they run more so they’re a good running team? Right? Can we shut down the thread early this week and listen to the TV talking heads on TV gush about how great the 49ers rushing attack in? No we cannot. First, because those TV pieces would make us all claw our eyeballs out. Second, and more importantly, those takes are wrong.



To illustrate what I mean I have some stats and an illustrated play.



Rush Attack Illustrated

I picked this play because the television crew picked this play to talk about how great the 49er’s run game is vs the Jaguars. Basically the point that the TV crew raised was that the 49ers use a lot of motion in their blocking to confuse the defense and get advantageous angles on blocks.


This play came following a Jaguars turnover early in the 2nd while the game was still more or less in doubt (less, really). Here is the formation.





The run is going to go to the left, but look at that!  The jaguars are shading to the right side of the offense where Kittle is lines up!  This could work!

At the snap you can see what happens. Juszczyk is a lead blocker to the left. While that happens, you can see Kittle come across the formation to block the RE/OLB.

Juszczyk and Kittle are both good blockers, so this could work.  Continue the first few steps following the snap:





You can also start to see the flaw in the plan.  All the LBs who were shading left just follow Kittle.  The Jaguars D Line is getting blasted to the right, but that's not fooling the rest of the defenders who are already sliding to their right.

Next this is the part that had the announcers fawning in the press box. Kittle throws only a chip block and continues around the corner to pick up another defender downfield "Oh my lawd, he's so good!  he made 2 blocks on 1 play" . You can see that if Kittle opens up more space that should create a massive running lane for the back.




Now, what happened? All this moving around 3D chess style orchestration of the running game, were the Jaguars fooled and blown of the ball for a big gain? They were not. This was a 3 yard gain.

Here’s how the play ended.





The Jaguars remembered one of the little know secrets of football: you’re allowed to ignore funny business and just run to the ball-carrier.  The LBs, safeties and right corner did just that and ran Wilson out of bounds for 3 yards.


Rushing Stats

Remember, when you look at this, the team with more attempts (not necessarily yards, just attempts) usually wins.



To back this up with some stats, here are the 49ers rushing average over those last 5 games I talked about.

Vs Colts: 4.6 ypc (loss)

@ Bears: 5.6 ypc (win)

Vs Cardinals: 3.5 ypc (loss)

Vs Rams: 3.5 ypc (win)

@ Jaguars: 4.1 ypc (win)



Vs the Rams and Jaguars, the 49ers starts something new: working WR Deebo Samuel into the backfield as a runner (this is really important). On the season, Samuel has a 7.2 ypc average. If I take out his 13 carries and look at the rest of the 49ers rushing attack the numbers become:


Vs Colts: 4.6 ypc (loss)

@ Bears: 5.6 ypc (win)

Vs Cardinals: 3.5 ypc (loss)

Vs Rams: 3.1 ypc (win)

@ Jaguars: 2.7 ypc (win)


Those last 3 game are not good by any standard.  All this funny business and motion doesn't work.  And of the two games they did run well, one of them they lost and the other was against the hapless Bears.  This does nothing to convince me the 49ers are a juggernaut rushing attack. 




Passing Comparison:

So what happened? They run the ball well but get destroyed by the Colts. The 49ers couldn’t do anything on the ground vs the rams and win.



Here is a passer rating comparison by game





There’s a lot to think about here with the individual games.


1) Garoppolo had relatively few pass attempts in those last 2 great games. The rating was there, but those games weren’t like Aaron Rodgers 385 yard, 4TD game vs. the Vikings. Vs. the Rams, Garoppolo was 15/19 (78%) for just 179 yards. Then vs the Jags, 16/22 (72%) for just 162 yards. The take away was quality > quantity.



2) With that relatively strong rushing performance vs the Colts, Garoppolo was 16/27 (59%) for 169 yards with 2 INTs. The running game can’t carry them.



3) That Rams games needs to be questioned. Stafford is top 5 in the NFL in passer rating, was it the 49ers Defense? Is that a thing that needs focus?





A look at the 49ers Defense

The 49ers are difficult to tell how good they really are. They have 1 good win (Rams) and 1 bad loss (Seahawks… I guess the Seahawks are a bad loss now? whatever, they’re 3-7, so bad loss).



Chalk Wins: Lions, Eagles, Bears, jaguars

Chalk Losses: Cardinals x2, Packers, Colts (I guess… they have a winning record)



To look a look at the yards per game and opponent passing performance. In general the 49ers have held teams below their season average, especially passing. However that doesn’t necessarily help them win. Notably the 49ers:

- Lost to Colts giving up 142 passing yards

- Lost to Cardinals giving up 210 passing yards

- Lost to Seahawks giving up 129 passing yards


Those are games where the 49ers looked bad and lost.  But, if you look at total defensive stats, those games will skew their numbers towards looking like a lockdown pass defense.  


I called out passing yards because the 49ers rush defense is generally mid pack. In general, the 49ers run heavy attack means that time comes off the clock quickly, so the game will be decided more by efficiency than volume.



Looping back to that Rams win. There were lot of open receivers that Stafford missed. There were a lot of dropped passes. I’m concluding that was more of a self-inflicted loss by the Rams than a statement win by the 49ers.



Conclusion

The 49ers are a run first team, that doesn’t mean they are a good rushing team. They have to run first because Garoppolo is no Aaron Rodgers. They need to get him open, easy throws. They do that by running until the opponents get lazy and Garoppolo steals an easy one.  Their entire plan is to like to you, me, everyone on TV and everyone on twitter as loudly as they can, shouting: "we'Re A grEaT RUnnING TEam!!! PLEAZE BelEAVE US!!!"  


Their only trick is Deebo Samuel – handing off to him, routes out of the backfield, regular routes – he’s really good. Without that, they are just grinding away their own possessions.



How to Beat the 49ers

The Vikings must not fall for the lie that the 49ers are a good running team and give Jimmy Garoppolo nothing. Other than Deebo Samuel that is, if he’s in the backfield, pay attention.