SAN FRANCISCO — Here are the Week 6 coaching grades for the 49ers.
Coaching: F. This was the worst game of Greg Roman’s professional career. He did not establish a running game in the first half – he called 19 passes and 10 runs. He made the same mistake against the Vikings and his offense only scored 13 points. This time, against a much worse defense than the Vikings, Roman’s offense scored just three points, converted 4-of-14 third downs (29 percent) and never made it to the red zone.
Roman spent the last two weeks developing trick plays for Colin Kaepernick. Those plays worked beautifully against the terrible Jets and Bills, but they did not work against the Giants. When the trick plays didn’t work, it seemed like Roman ran out of ideas.
Roman must establish Frank Gore and Kendall Hunter in the first half of every single game. It’s a simple strategy and it works for the 49ers.
One more thing: Everyone thought the 49ers would be emotionally up for this game because it was a “revenge” game, but the Giants were much better prepared. That’s on Jim Harbaugh. Tom Coughlin out-coached him.
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this game sucked. get out the pitch forks
I would say throw the ball down the field. Hail mary that sucker! What do you have to lose? It’s better than dropping it off to Gore for four yards. Then at least teams will fear you.
Establishing the run makes everything else the 49ers do work. Without the run they aren’t even a mediocre offense.
True
That is the strength of this team…
Plus, I saw Gore and Hunter picking off some nice runs. We could have controlled the game.
Totally agree Grant!!! Pound the ball and play physical D. We just don’t have the QB or receiver talent to compete in the air all game. J.H. I love you man, hell of a coach but please put those Walsh tapes on hold until we get players who can execute. You can’t go from arithmetic to calculus right away. The whole Kaep experiment just doesn’t work. The SeaHawks game Thursday, should be fun…
Grant, I agree but the NYG’s don’t have a divisional game this Thursday and believe it or not, that does play into how they played poorly this game.
It seemed like Roman was saving Gore for Thursday’s game.
GC, thank for your comment. Either you or your colleagues need to ask JH if AS is a placeholder as was brought up by JJohnson in the post game show. CK was a drive killer today and NO QB wants to be ushered in and out I don’t care if you are the 32nd or 1st ranked QB not a success based on any previous history!
It seemed like Roman was saving Gore for Thursday’s game.
They seemed to do that alot after week 10 last year! I hate that! He says the season is 17 sprints well then sprint on each and every one of them!
If you noticed, Frank Gore was averaging exactly 16 carries per game before Sunday. Expect him to run 24 times (and bring his average back up to 16) against the Seahawks.
Grant if you’re banning me you might lemme know. You’ve got my email an I ain’t done nothing to deserve a banning.
If I see this two headed Monster that is Smith/Kappy for the rest of the season I’m calling for someone’s head. Roman/Harbaugh and this cute game plan needs to stop. Call the a better game than this. This plan is for the dogs as evidenced by 2 Losses. I don’t care WHO our Starter is at this point. It’s not going to matter so long as the other QB comes in every other play. How can the Starter get into any kind of a Rhythm with the Receivers if he’s constantly coming out of the game. The Line choked today. Both our QBs’ weren’t able to settle into the pocket much if at all today.
And everyone let the Smurfs crawl into their heads and camp there all week. I expect better than this from our team. They ARE better than this. x.X
Why is Grant going to ban you tonight ceadderman?
Apparently someone here got their nose bent out of joint. I dunno. All I know is the last few times I tried to comment, my comments were blocked.
Don’t know why I woulda got blocked but I did. % b
I think that is a problem with the site. Your comments might be being labeled as spam. It’s happened to me before. After all, what’s wrong about posting the word ‘Agreed’?
ceadderman
Did you use the word “retar*”
* =d
Because that is a word that will prevent your post from showing. And if you were banned, you wouldn’t still have a post here.
Midwest is also correct. I had the spam thing happen as well a long time ago. I thought they fixed that issue by now though.
Yeah I don’t know what what it is. Obviously there is nothing wrong with posting that word but the last time this happened I went to my 2nd email and it kept my pic from the 1st one. This time it completely changed it for my 3rd. Good thing I have a couple more but the spam filter needs to be taken out back and given a sound drubbing like the one our team got today. :S
Whatever it is, it kept me out for more than a week. I got fed up at one point. I don’t think the system should be able to do that when Grant intentionally trolls.
Say Grant, I’m not threatening bodily injury but if you ever post another Loss prediction, I’m coming down to the PD and taking it out on your Keyboard. Capiche? :p
I think you’ll have better luck taking it out on the keyboard of the one who created this site. Just saying.
Actually ceadderman, if you do post that word, it has been labeled as one that will automatically delete your post. The Software has some option where it automatically eliminates posts containing particular words. That is one such word
Try it out if you want. Within a few minutes (really seconds), your post will be deleted.
Interesting take, didn’t think about them saving Gore for Thursday. Any idea on the status of Jacobs?
Jacobs is healthy from what I’ve read, but maybe the training staff don’t believe that he’s 100% so he’s not been activated. :/
Still I would have thought there would be more Run plays called in the first half than there were. :(
Needing to “establish the runs” is one of those old fallacies that sounds good.
Thanks, Josh.
Not if you visit Mexico.
The runs can pretty much establish themselves, in that locale.
“the Giants were much better prepared.”
While Harbaugh was crafting his retort to Gilbride, Coughlin was getting his team ready. The last 2 weeks were great, but I liken it to LSU playing North Texas and Abilene Christian for 2 weeks then taking on Alabama.
And Grant, you are 100% correct with your assessment on what Roman needs to do. Establish the run so the play action game can work. It gets the linemen in a groove, and the play action stuff helps Smith by limiting his reads. He is at his best of play-action.
What did you think of the QB platooning especially in the first two series?
I don’t see that as the problem at all. They have tried to come out and be a passing team three times that I can remember, last year against the Giants in the regular season, today and Minnesota. Each time it has failed them.
Although they beat the Giants in that reg season game last year they were down 13-12 at the start of the 4th. Smith is fine, but they have to run the ball to get the best out of him. He shines off play action and when the defense sends pressure.
You have to run for any QB to do well. It seems ABradshaw was doing well today against a stout 9er DL. I’m not a fan of the platooning and never will be. Even JJohnson and TBradshaw questioned it today during the post game show. It would affect any QB’s confidence period.
On another note, Harbaugh had his “Singletary Moment” in the 4th quarter. Down by 20 and calling timeouts. Let the clock spin and get out of there.
Everywhere else they’re questioning the QB rotation which killed drives and momentum and cost us some yards in a few cases.
Mooch and Prime nailed it: what were they doing?
Dwight Clark asked the same thing in the post-game analysis on CSN.
Good question. I was asking it during the game. I don’t know what they’re doing with this mess but they need to stop before they blow up the season.
1st quarter looked pretty normal. Then… what the…?
Harbaugh needs to quit with the psychopath moments and just coach.
Adam, exactly. We mentioned it here real time and the blamers thought it was another so-called excuse! What was the coaching staff thinking? The first two series were going well and I don’t care if you are an elite QB or not your confidence gets messed up when being ushered in and out. Ridiculous playcalling.
Very easy to point to CK coming in as the problem with the offense, when the issue is that they got away from establishing the run early in the game, then Smith started throwing interceptions. Almost a carbon copy of the Minnesota game offensively.
If Roman doesn’t come out running on Thursday night you will see a lot more of Kaepernick than you did tonight because Seattle will have it’s way with them.
I say that “platooning” needs to be scrapped.
Seriously. Against the weaker opponents it’s not bad to mix it up to keep your upcoming opponents guessing.
But when you’re OLine is playing like canned dog doo doo and your QB needs to build chemistry with his Receivers, platooning only disrupts the timing. Against the Jets and the Bills was fine. The Giants have a 4 man Pass Rush that is a bit like Our 3 man Pass Rush. On top of it all it doesn’t help when their Line “gets away with murder” was there a single Holding call thrown on their Line? I know for a fact that they were Holding up and down the Line but I don’t recall a single penalty in that regard on any of their Linemen. Gilbride had em ready to play though.
Well anyway this platoon garbage doesn’t work. It’s never worked in the history of the game. Why are we even trying to run it this deep in the season? Are Harbaugh and Roman intentionally sandbagging? Sure seems like it when they trotted out the same failed game plan for the Minnesota game. >:(
That would make sense grant, In a previous conference harbaugh did highlight that the division game was a bigger worry then this game.. Also I think its awesome that you do this blog for the fans alot of people give you a hard time for your opinions and to me its rude and disgusting. I appreciate the hard work and time you put into this. Thank you.
Everybody gets an F- today. Including JH.
The issues this offense has had since last year, are still here. What is it about 3rd downs and the redone? Last year we were coming off the lock out. Ok, I got that. But now you are 1/3 through year two and you have had all offseason to get the redone issues fixed.
I agree with the other posters that this Kap/wildcat/pistol offense gimmicky stuff has to stop.
Also, ask Roman/Harbaugh what do they have against screen plays?
GR should be focused on their go to plays in the RZ. How many do they have for runs and passes? If they remove AS for each RZ play, how do they get continuity? It’s about team but the run option doesn’t let GR off the hook. It’s his job to call a good play.
We were great on 3rd downs in the 1st quarter. Got us a whole 3 points!
Turnovers determine the game. -3, don’t be shocked to lose that game.
12 carries?? Unbelievable.
There’s a reason why we have been successful on offense – our running game. They decided to put it in Alex’s hands and he choked in a big way (much like he did in the NFC Championship game last year). He could easily be demoted on Thursday night considering the Hawks have a much better D than the Giants… If the 49ers want to win, they need to get back to doing what they’re good at – running the damn ball.
The team also needs to move on from the former #1 overall pick, aka Alex Smith…. 8 years later and he’s still nothing special. Ugh…..
Folks,
We’re seeing a pattern here. After a few impressive wins, the Niners seem to get complacent (first vs. the Vikings and now the Giants). WTF? I place this kind of lackluster performance mainly on the coaching staff. There’s no excuse for it, especially at home.
Harbaugh sure has become less popular since he started working to replace Alex.
As Jimmy Johnson said, you don’t sub out your starting QB unless you plan on replacing him.
Yup, and TBradshaw disagreed with him saying that the 9ers have/had the number one rated QB and platooning backfired on them!
TB and TA were QBs.
Johnson was a coach and he did his share of replacing QBs. I think he knows what it looks like.
JJohnson was giving his opinion on why he thought they were platooning. TBradshaw was stating it was not working and that going with AS was working last year and earlier this year.
This is the same garbage we put up with in 1980. Walsh kept messing around with DeBerg and Montana, Neither one could get any real rhythm, both would play great then blow it. Rinse and repeat.
All they’re doing with CK is these trick plays, for the most part. To me it’s stupid. Wasting downs, losing yardage. Then Smith has to come in with a 3rd and 10+ (and hope we don’t jump offsides) and get a first down. We’re not built that way.
DO the stuff (trying to be PG here) that got you where you are. Quit with all this other BS.
Absolutely foolish of Harbaugh to let this continue.
Adam, I hear you but when BW utilized it the team was losing. AS is 17 – 7. CK really hasn’t been needed for his rushing tds in blowouts against the Jets and Bills. JH may be building CK’s confidence but it disrupting the WHOLE offense. Good to see DClark, Mooch, and TBradshaw sees how this is affecting the offense which validates the point. I hope the beat writers are relentless tomorrow.
*17 – 5*
#1 ???
Oh please. You must be watching a different quarterback. Eli Manning is a #1 quarterback. Drew Brees is a #1. Tom Brady is a #1.
Alex Smith??? What planet are you on?
Seems like this year’s team is having trouble transitioning to being the favorite. Their two bad games, against Minnesota and the Giants, both came after back to back convincing wins. They were also against teams with winning records. 49ers need to stay hungry. The haven’t won anything yet. The Montana/Young era 49ers were always the “hunted” and had to deal with that year in and year out. This team is not good enough to not get fired for each game. I didn’t really see the intensity today.
Harbaugh and G-Ro have tried to mask Alex Smith and his weaknesses in this offense… They took the training wheels off and you see what occurred. They need to pound the rock and get back to playing 49er ball. Alex Smith’s time is just about up.
You got it Bob. Amazing, when fans are wearing blinders, they see what they want to see. Alex Smith is the key to this teams failure or success. The experts know that Smith is not the answer for the Niners. Trust that JH knows that as well. He wouldn’t open himself up to this criticism if he wasn’t sure what he was doing. He knows that Alex Smith needs help. He can’t make all the throw to threaten a defense. That’s why he checks down continuously. Alex is at Safeway, trying to get Lucky!
I’d love to pile on Alex Smith and say I told you so but I just don’t think that is the correct assessment. Alex Smith completes a 5 yard pass to Randy Moss and the momentum is taken out by putting Kaepernick In. Stupidity.
Kendall Hunter breaks out on two runs and the team goes back to Gore. Really?
My biggest knock on Harbaugh is that he doesn’t do half time adjustments. If you are looking to replace Alex, maybe it’s time to look at Tolzien. Hard to believe you could play worse than Kaepernick.
All the sarcasm aside, you can’t plug and play QBs in the nfl. This isn’t Stanford.
* 50 yard pass
Simple fact: 49ers lose when they don’t run the ball over a hundred yards.
I have to give Roman an F- (if that is possible) for not learning from the Vikings game. This was his pathetic game plan and Harbaugh allowed it to take place so he gets an F-, too.
I can understand if an opponent’s defense is shutting down your run game, but to not play to the strength of your team in your game plan is absolutely intolerable for an OC to do. Roman is no offensive guru. You don’t need trick plays and jumbo packages if you are. Time to stop the high school and college stuff and play NFL style football.
Grant,
I agree with your assessment. I would also like to see our weapons on the field at one time. Make the other teams defend moss, davis, crabtree, and manningham, with gore in the back field. All of this trick offense needs to stop.
all of the other qb’s seem to have all of their weapons playing together. no more of this walker, celek, davis, formations. what’s worse is the coach’s try to have alex pass the ball out of this formation. all out madness. the coaches have definitely taken this evil genius stuff too far.
last comment, please review the tape and tell me why vernon davis one of the niners main weapons is running a 4 yard curl route on 3 and 21, and a 5 yard drag route on 4 and 15? knowing alex has a tendency to throw these routes no matter the circumstances, why call these plays when the situation calls for a long yardage completion? either the coaches don’t trust alex to make the long plays when needed or the coaches are lost. either way, horrible play calling and execution!
They don’t trust smith on long throws. That’s why they replace him with Kap. Smith can’t make those throws. He hasn’t done it. He won’t do it. That’s it, that’s all. JH has no confidence in Smith, he has no choice!
There is no truth to what you are saying here Jordan. Have you not been paying attention to the long passes they’ve attempted with Smith the past 3 weeks? If you want to rant about how much you think he sucks, that’s fine, but don’t make stuff up to try and make your opinion more credible.
AS completed a 55 yard pass (further if you include where he actually threw it). CK didn’t attempt anything near that. Explain.
I’ve been calling it for 2 weeks now about this WildKrap offense. Its fun to throw in there with a lead and give other coaches something to prepare for but to make it part of your identity is ludicrous. It’s just a matter of time before it bites you in the WildKrap!
The idea that it is put in to make the defense waste practice time on defending it goes out the door when nearly 1/3 of our plays had him. All we’re doing is teaching the NFL how to stop it.
It was obviously worked up as the team prepared their defensive game plan against Jets/Tebow. Coaching staff kind of fell too much in love with it after the success in the Jets and Bills games. I think they’ve come back to earth with a thud.