As you all have probably heard, Mario Manningham tore the ACL and PCL in left knee against the Seahawks and he’s out for the rest of the season.
The 49ers now have lost their No.2 and No.3 wide receivers (Kyle Williams tore up his knee against the Saints). The remaining wide receivers on the 53-man roster are Michael Crabtree, Randy Moss, Ted Ginn Jr. and A.J. Jenkins.
How do you expect the 49ers to tweak their offense to compensate for the loss of Manningham?
Do you expect the first round pick, A.J. Jenkins, to take Manningham’s place?
I don’t. I expect Randy Moss to be the No.2 wide receiver for the rest of the season, and I expect the 49ers to rarely use three-wide-receiver formations.
I expect Delanie Walker’s playing time to increase. He played 44 snaps against the Seahawks and was targeted a career-high seven times. I even expect Walker to play more and more wide receiver, not just tight end. That’s how the 49ers used him against the Seahawks after Manningham got hurt.
Even though Walker drops a pass about every other game, he is clearly one of passing game coordinator John Morton’s favorite weapons. I expect Morton to express his creativity by using Walker in new ways down the stretch of this season.
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I think you’re right, Grant. Obviously, they are saving A.J. Jenkins for the Super Bowl.
I think you are right, and hope that it forces Roman to stick with what they do best, run the ball and playaction off of that. They need to get back to basics.
Walker wants to look good because he is auditioning for 31 clubs next season, as the Niners probably won’t sign him, how much money can you put in the tight end position, do think Moss is possibly auditioning for 31 clubs as well, if he wants to come back and play next year. Not sure if the Niner’s will try to resign him either I do see Jenkins playing more, unless he really was a mistake in the draft, and seeing if he can earn his keep. I would not be surprised if VD skips this week with his concussion ,although we really need them. Last year Harbaugh and Baalke were caught with their pants down and having Swan and the other guy from the practice squad to play, both were horrible. Don’t know if anyone is available off the free agent market right now.
I might add, Crabtree is playing like a number one draft pick, which he was not last year.
He’s played well with every qb his whole life collegiate and pros except alex smith the qb that’s never had a wr reach 1000 yards. Even with a mediocre troy smith Crabs put up really good numbers look it up. Crabtree has always been a baller.
Kinda helps when your foot is no longer an issue!
The real question is how are the 49ers going to make up for the loss of their defensive line players. This team has been shredded for six qtrs. on defense!
Ray Ratto who is not my favorite columnist but did say last week, without JS, our defense is vey average and unfortunatley he was right.
Grant, how about giving Chad Johnson or Deion Branch a call? Or do what they did last season (likely) and bring up somebody from the PS like Lockette or Hall and hope they are better than an experienced vet because they know the offense.
Celek
How about LMJ as strictly a slot guy in a 3 wide set?
They should definitely do that. And Have Boo (Anthony Dixon) spell gore.
With a more creative and ingenious OC, the Niners could put a lot of wrinkles in to so surprise people. Unfortunately they seem to have fallen in love with the pistol.
Have they used LMJ out of the slot yet? Seems like he could do some damage there.
3TE sets bunched right or left. Then you can run pass plays off of picks with TE’s blocking CB’s or you can run off that formation adjusting them to run block.
Jenkins needs to play and if have speed like Lockette off the Practice squad, it can’t hurt. At least a few planned plays for him.
Grant, I’m more worried about the play calling and the two play option. Kill or let it roll. There should be more audible options, hand signals to WR’s etc. Kap needs plays called to his strength, roll outs and red options. How does Wilson run it better than Kap? smh….
what’s wrong with my grammar? smh..too much egg nog lol
Grant, are they bringing in any D Line help?
It’s all over! We’re doomed! Harbaugh stinks! Roman is a fake! I knew I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up! Singletary was better! It’s all their fault! Even I can coach better than those bums! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed! We’re doomed!
Now then, oughta be interesting playing Arizona. I think we lose that one too, maybe fall out of the playoffs. There, everyone happy? Sheesh… it’s only a friggin’ game played by millionaires owned by billionaires. In the meantime, my new Harley is sitting unridden in the garage because of this lousy weather. Now that’s something to get upset about…
i actually agree. I rode mine to the store yesterday, hadn’t ridden it in a month
Harley :(
Brett Swain to the rescue!
Oh man, I need a drink…
I worry about AJ Jenkins a bit, I thought he would see time here and there after Kyle Williams got hurt. If he’s not seeing the field he most not be impressing in practice, whatever the reason it’s a little bothersome. I like Delanie Walkers ability to get open but man does he drop alot of balls, and at the worst most crucial points in a game.
The loss in Seattle doesn’t look good because of how badly they were dominated, alot of factors at play for why the 49ers lost that game but to simplify everything went Seattles way and they are 7-0 for a reason. I’m not worried about Colin he had better numbers against Seattle than alex smith did earlier this year and we played them at home, with a better defense, and without all the injuries. Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady struggled in Seattle and I honestly think unless they play a team like Chicago Seattle will lose it’s first road playoff game. My worries about the niners are teams running on them when for a few years now nobody runs on the niners d, and most of all, the injuries. Kendall Hunters loss is brutal, kyle williams is shifty and a great deep threat, now manningham , and Justin Smith needs to get healthy in a big hurry. Bad timing for these injuries.
7-0 at home for a reason I meant.
Next man up, right? The only thing is that the 49ers are running out of those except for inexperienced undrafted/PS players right now. Something about this reminds me of last season’s WR situation.
We can utilize L James, Frank, D Walker and Jenkins for the rest of the season but losing Hunter, KW, and now Manningham is going to hurt us big time! specially Hunter!
In addition, we are thin on the D line and Backers with J Smith and P Haralson being injured! We must draft a few high motor D Linemen
Sheldon Anderson, DT out of Mizzou. 49ers have done well with those Missouri boys – and who would be a better mentor than Justin Smith?
AJ Jenkins, #1 draft pick, its long past time you made us notice you on the field. Now we need you. Time to step up, young man.
We are assuming that Jenkins is not far along at this point to fully step in. If that is the case I look for LMJ to become more of a factor in the passing game We might even see him in the slot with Crabtree and Moss split out. As others have written I too am quite worried about the defense so it might be the case that the offense really needs to open up and at the college level LMJ was much like a time bomb. Opposing teams did not know when it would happen but knew it was was going to happen as the touches he got increased. So far, he seems to be handling whatever they give him.
Grant first let me say happy holiday to you and yours. Second, do you think that there is any chance the 49ers don’t bring Mario back next year? I ask that not knowing anything about what the team is on the hook for him salary wise for next year.
Did/Does his production justify his price tag?
The stuff I’m reading is saying neither Manningham nor Williams will be available for training camp next year. Makes some sense (especially with Manningham) the rehab for those tears is murder.
Makes me a bit worried, a 35-year-old guy is our #2 receiver now and we have a QB who’s still green and tends to lead guys in to heavy traffic.
I’d say with this Cards game we need to see (finally) what it is we have in Jenkins. Maybe Celek steps up or Vernon is cleared to play, etc. Could run LaMike in the slot but with Hunter down and Jacobs in the doghouse we’d have Boobie and Jewell backing up Gore – may be too much of a risk.
Makes me a bit nervous. Kind of deja vu really. Reminds me of going in to last year’s playoffs.
Adam
Not sure where you’ve seen Kaep lead guys into traffic? He throws through and over traffic, but not often into it.
Intrigued by Hampton. Think Celek is an A- career TE who must get more targets. The WR position is incredibly fragile.
Adam, great points. It can be debated that the throws to VD and MM weren’t the best and could have attributed to them getting hurt. Regarding the WRs, it does seem to be similar to last year. It probably doesn’t matter with GB and Sea peaking at just the right time and the 9ers injuries mounting.
I’ve seen it several times, Mr. E.
I like CK but he’s green and seems to be easily fooled (on more than a few occasions) against more creative defenses. The alt plays are confused and he tends to kill or keep the wrong play, the play clock issue is a big one and then occasionally he leads guys in to trouble.
One thing you never do at the QB position is lead a receiver in to a smackdown. It’s not always a disaster if the ball arrives on time and the receiver can cover up but it’s ugly if they’re stretched out with a couple DBs bearing down and can’t.
Not sure much could have been done on the Davis throw. CK is nailed for throwing bullets and not putting enough air under the ball or having ‘touch’, so when he finally floats it a bit (it was a nice throw) Davis is uncovered and smacked. In that situation he’s damned if he does, damned if doesn’t. Critics won’t leave him alone either way.
He’s just green, he needs more work managing the game. Probably not a huge issue.
If we lose any more receivers this week though, we’re in deep doo-doo. Maybe we’re already at that tipping point.
If Jenkins has some speed (which he supposedly does) they need to get him playing, let’s see if CK overthrows that guy.
Celek needs more time, hopefully as good as his bro. This nonsense abt AJ is all based on what? Only prob is he needs to drink nothing but protein shakes and live in weight room. He kinda small, if VD cn get knocked out like so, imagine lil AJ.
His hands are fine, we have no choice but to get him in, AZ game is perfect test