The 49ers defense ranks first in both yards and points allowed. They haven’t given up a touchdown in four of their last five games.
Give Vic Fangio credit. The defense’s statistics have improved since last season even though they’re not getting as lucky forcing turnovers, they’re not getting as much pressure on the quarterback, and Justin Smith and Carlos Rogers have declined a little bit.
The 49ers defense has weaknesses (every defense does), and Fangio does a good job masking them. He lines up Aldon Smith on both sides of the formation so offenses have a tougher time picking on him in the passing game. Fangio makes sure his defensive backs are never beaten deep, and if they’re beaten short, Fangio makes sure they make the tackle. The 49ers are the best tackling defense in the NFL.
Give Fangio credit.
MIDTERM GRADE: A.
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I give him an A-. I feel he needs to dial up a little more pressure vs. the good QB’s and when he blitzs have a little more confidence in his DB’s and tighten up the coverage a little
Really good point, Coach…I’ve thought for a long time that on blitzes the D should take away the hot throw into the area the blitzer vacated and the slant. Making the QB read quickly where the guy who fills the blitzer’s area and forcing throws to be outside or long should make blitzes more successful or, in the case of forcing sideline throws, lead to more picks.
I would give him a B+, just being outplayed and out coached by the Viking and Giants.
Giving up 24 and 26 points against the Vikings and Giants wasn’t great, but I don’t think it is fair to say Fangio was out coached in those games. If 26 points is the most they give up in a game all season that is a fantastic effort. The offense was poor in both of those games, and shares a larger burden of the blame for the losses than the D – especially the Giants game. Turnovers were killers and felt like the D was on the field almost the entire 2nd half.
smiths interceptions led directly to the ny giant loss
No old coach
Us abandoning the run while the Giants couldn’t stop it led to AS Int’s. The first 2 drives, AS was great. We ran the offense we ran on Monday running for nice chunks, then hitting them with quick passes.
Then we stopped being us. For the 2nd straight time, our offense stopped doing what the Giants couldn’t stop the whole game.
I think we are just faking them out till the playoffs.
DS, you and i have different views often however somehow i agree with most your comments on the blog recently:) whats up, did you start your meds! Just joking and keep up the good work. GO ALEX and the NINERS
chicago
Thanks…I think
:- )
Maybe somebody else can confirm it, but I don’t think I’m saying anything drastically different than I have before.
Maybe you’ve read my non-football posts all this time. I wold skip them if I were you. No need to read them. I skip a lot of the non-football posts from everybody here more often than not, so it’s cool if you skip over mine.
If I were to go along with your name, and you live in Chicago, tell me what you think of the Bears? Are they (fans) excited about reviving a rivalry with the Niners in a few weeks? What happened last year? To me it looked like they started slow, then got injured at key positions, and then GB beat the tar out of the team after their injuries. So, GB never faced the Bear team that was any good.
DS, I have lived in Chicago for the past 10 years because of my Job but I grew up in California.
You are correct about the Bears last year once Jay Cutler got injured the team regressed and the season was over!
This year, the Bears defense is extremely opportunistic but their offense is bipolar! For example last week they almost lost to the Panthers and suddenly got cranking and put up some points in the 4th Q. To my opinon the addition of some new WRs (Marshall) and a good back up running back (Bush) to compliment Forte has helped the offense!
I can not wait to watch the Niners play the Bears with some of my buddies here! I think it should be a tough game ! GO NINERS
Boy Neal you are tough to please my friend! Number one defense in the NFL and you give him good grade of B+! come on man, we can be better but this is the NFL and every team has very good coaches and players! GO NINERS
I agree with Old Coach
The Vikings game was an aberration. The entire team looked slow. I think the team had focused on Green Bay and Detroit so much they took the Vikings for granted.
The Giants game the turnovers killed them and the lack of pressure on Eli hurt too. I think there are some QB’s you have to pressure or they will tear you apart. Brady is one who you have to pressure up the middle. I would hope they would blitz PW and NB alot when they play.
I will go with a B here. Those two losses were big especially the vikings. I can understand how he got outcoached by the giants.Giving up 20 points is not elite.
I think Fangio has the defense overachieving. It is vulnerable to a chaos quarterback like Christian Ponder.
It is vulnerable to a balanced offense with good QB play.
I think it’s also vulnerable to a one-dimensional offense like Green Bay. The Niners dime defense is vulnerbale. The Packers can’t beat the 49ers because they can’t stop the run.
They gave up a lot of yards in GB but not very many points. They are much better against one dimensional teams.
Green Bay was out of sync. The dime defense is vulnerable. It takes Willis or Bowman off the field. Perrish Cox is bad.
So we both agree they are a bit vulnerable. Now about this Roman thing….
Justin Smith and Carlos Rogers are in decline? I wonder how the Godfather Fangio would respond to that one. I’d love for you to state matter of factly to The Cowboy he is in decline. Ha! Yea, I’d actually pay to see that.
Justin Smith was the best defensive player in the NFL last season. He could stop the run and get pressure. This year, he’s mostly stopping the run.
Carlos Rogers is not having a Pro Bowl season like he did last year.
Grant, NFL coaches have adjusted to Justin and Rogers by attaching them differently!
“Grant, NFL coaches have adjusted to Justin and Rogers by attaching them differently!”
I’m sure it was a typo, but you used the word “attaching” with Justin Smith. Didn’t several teams imply that JS attaches (holds) the OL more so than is permitted by rule?
Yes it was :} LOL
sometimes i wonder if we need the auto correct feature on the iphone!!! i meant adjusted!
PFF had Justin as the #1 defensive player last year. This year he ranks 28th. Age catches up with everyone. PFF has been high on Justin for years so trying to claim bias is simply silly.
Rogers hasn’t been very good in coverage. Last I saw he was allowing opposing QBs a 90+ rating. Once again – age. He’s not bad but he isnt great like he was last year either.
Glad he is our coach! I know Roman has apirations of being a head coach. Does Fangio?
Fangio’s D reminds me a lot of Seifert’s. Sometimes I get frustrated at the bend-don’t-break conservatism but at the end of the day it gets the job done more often than not. The fall off in turnovers seems to be balanced by a better job of keeping teams out of the end zone.
Aside from a horrible game against the Vikings they’ve been very good and Fangio seems to have them in the right spots to succeed.
No sacks and just one hit on EManning the whole game which was a very big game. B+