Here are the grades for the 49ers offense from their 24-3 win over the Arizona Cardinals.
Quarterbacks: A. Alex Smith played one of the best games of his life. He only attempted 19 passes, but he completed 18 of them, and Delanie Walker dropped the one incompletion. That’s a 95 percent completion percentage. Smith broke Fran Tarketon’s record for the most completed passes in a game in which he threw just one incompletion. Smith mostly threw short and intermediate throws, but he was perfect on those. His only knock is he took four sacks because he held onto the ball too long in the pocket.
Offensive line: C. They got manhandled a bit both in the run game and in pass protection. Defensive linemen Darnell Dockett and Calais Campbell broke through to the backfield a few times to tackle Gore for losses. Alex Boone gave up a sack. The 49ers only gained 103 yards on the ground, and Arizona had been giving up more than 120 rushing yards per game.
Running backs: C+. Frank Gore had a good first quarter but the Cardinals shut him down the rest of the game, and he finished with just 55 yards on 16 carries. Kendall Hunter had a slow second half as well, and he finished with just 43 yards on 10 carries. But the 49ers remain undefeated in the Harbaugh Era when those two combine for more than 21 carries.
Wide receivers: B+. They took advantage of the Cardinals defensive backs’ poor tackling to rack up more than 100 yards of YAC. Michael Crabtree made Patrick Peterson look bad (or maybe he’s just a tremendously overrated cornerback). Crabtree made a nice jumping touchdown catch over Peterson on a fade pass. Randy Moss ran away from a couple defenders to score a touchdown. Mario Manning caught four passes for just 20 yards.
Tight ends: B. Vernon Davis was only targeted two times (that’s five times in the last three games), but he caught both passes for a total of 34 yards. Delanie Walker caught two passes as well, including one on the sideline after the ball had been batted into the air by a Cardinal cornerback.
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