The San Francisco 49ers defeated the New England Patriots 30-13 this week.  This was supposed to be a “get well” game for the 49ers but, even though the score makes it look like it was, it really wasn’t.  Let’s look at what went right and what went wrong for the Bang Bang Niner Gang.

As it has become tradition, let start off talking about an injury.  Talanoa Hufonga returned from his torn Achilles from a year ago last week and then sprained his ankle at practice this wee and had to miss the game.  During the game the Niners lost another Defensive tackle in Jordan Elliot who was only playing because Javon Hargrave is out for the season.  This meant rookie Evan Anderson had to play.  He actually looked pretty good.  He finished with 2 tackles, a sack and a tackle for loss.  It would be rather impressive start if it wasn’t against the lowly Patriots offensive line. 

One last injury note, and it could be a big one, Fred Warner left the game at half time and did not return.  He hurt his ankle and will get an MRI today.  He stayed in uniform and stood on the sidelines all game so hopefully it won’t be that bad.  He was having a hell of a game with a 45-yard Pick Six and a huge tackle for loss on a fourth down.  Warner now has 2 INTs and 3 forced fumbles.  If he isn’t injured and keeps it up, he is on his way to defensive player of the year. 

The 49ers defense had a pretty good day giving up only 13 points, seven of which came after a fumbled kickoff, and recording the aforementioned pick 6, 2 fumble recoveries, and 6 sacks.  However, it’s hard to say they played great when the Patriots are so bad.  But it’s a lot better to put up big numbers against a bad team like you are supposed to than to have a slow day against them. 

The big problem with the defense is that they are still giving up too much in the run game.  This was a game where they knew the other team was going to run a lot.  A lot more than they passed.  And while they did have their share of stuffs, they gave up a lot of little runs that kept New England ahead of the sticks.  The Pats only ended up running it 24 times for a 3.0 average but that’s skewed a bit by 2 QB sneaks that went for 3 total yards.  The Niners are not giving up huge gashing runs.  However, the 3.3 yards that Stevenson averaged is enough to keep the Pats out of 3rd and long.  It has been like this the whole season so far.   It why they struggle to get off the field on third down.  I wouldn’t say it’s the biggest area of concern, if they were getting gashed for 7 or 8 yards a carry it would be, but it’s a pattern that is showing up every week now. It’s something they have to work on. 

The passing defense was very good but that had a lot more to do with the Patriots than anything else.  The Pats hardly ever look to throw the ball more than 5 yards down field and their offensive line does not give them the time to try to go deep.  If you do not miss tackles against the Pats, I have no idea how they score. 

Now let’s talk about the offense and why this really wasn’t a get right game.  For one, it was not a clean game as far as penalties go.  There were a lot of flags thrown on the offense and a lot of them were for procedural stuff such as illegal shifts.  Given, some of them were bad calls.  This is stuff that needs to be cleaned up and stuff that will kill them against a real NFL team. 

The bigger problem was the offensive line.  It was terrible again.  Brock was forced to do a whole lot of running both behind and past the line of scrimmage.  Luckily, he’s great at it and was able to be productive even when the protection broke down, which was very often.  If Garoppolo was still the QB, they would not have scored an offensive point.  This is going to be their biggest weakness all season and how it progresses may determine how far they can go. 

The 49ers made an effort to throw a handful of deep balls against the Patriots secondary.  I was kind of surprised by this but it was really effective.  When Purdy had a nice pocket, he was able to throw some beautiful balls down field to Deebo and Jennings.  Jennings, of course, made another really nice catch. 

Speaking of great catches, George Kittle made a highlight reel catch for a touchdown over three Patriot defenders.  But as I mentioned last week, his impacted is as much, if not more, in the running game.  This week Jordan Mason had another big week with 123 yards on 5.1 per carry.  That’s a whole yard more per carry than last week.  That’s the difference Kittle makes.  It’s why he’s the best tight end in the league even though he doesn’t put up the big receiving numbers anymore.  He has a huge impact in the running game and he makes big plays when they need him to. 

Deebo and Aiyuk had solid games even though they only combined for 5 catches.  It’s hard for either of them to have huge games now with Jennings having an extended role.  They are only throwing so many passes and not they are being distributed between 3 receivers and a tight end.  Wait until CMC comes back and they start throwing to him as well.  The balanced attack makes the 49ers more effective and much harder to defend but it does not help individual stats.  I am fine with that.

Aside from the O-line, the biggest issue the 49ers have had on offence has been in the red zone.  Usually they are one of the top teams in scoring touchdowns in the red zone.  They have been terrible at it this season.  Now, not having the reigning offensive player of the year is going to hurt your red zone efficiency but they should be better than they are.  This is something I have confidence in the team figuring out and getting right.  Plus, CMC is going to come back at some point.  Hopefully it will not be an issue down the road but for now, they need to find ways to kick extra points and not field goals when they get down there. 

This brings us to the Special Teams.  I cannot believe it has gotten this bad.  Seriously.  They fumbled on another kickoff.  It led to the only Patriots TD.  Against a better team it would probably have been a devastating play like the bad special teams plays were the last two weeks.  They really need to fix this issue or it’s going to cost them their season.  It’s not like it’s one guy or even one issue.  It’s both sides of every part of special teams.  They give up big returns in punts and kickoffs.  They miss kicks and have punts blocked.  They give up fake punt and fumble on kickoffs and punts.  The whole thing has been a disaster so far this season.  At least this week they made all of their kicks and didn’t give up any big returns.  That’s a step in the right direction.  Of course, the highlight of the special teams was seeing the full back Juszczyk return a punt.  You don’t see that every day.    

I say this wasn’t a get right game for the Niners because they played the same way they have played all season. The only difference was that the Patriots couldn’t take advantage. I would not say they were dominate on either side of the ball and they haven’t seemed to fix any of their issues. It’s always good to get a easy win but they are far from righting the ship.

Some quick hitters…      

–Brock Purdy threw three touchdowns on one possession as the refs kept inventing penalties to try and keep the 49ers from scoring.  (OK, one of them seemed to be invented, I don’t even recall what the second one was.)

–The Patriots field goal kicker made a 63-yard field goal.  For the longest time that was the NFL record.  Now he’s the 7^th guy to make one and three people have longer field goals.  When I was young, 63 yards seemed ridiculous.  Now, not so much.    

–Coming into the game the Niners were number 1 in passing yards and last in RAC yards.  That’s weird because I was told the only reason Purdy gets a lot of passing yards is because of all the RAC yards Deebo, Aiyuk and Kittle get.  Very strange.  (It would be nice if the YAC Bros started doing their thing)

–I have to give the Patriots credit for sticking to their guns and keeping Drake Maye on the bench.  You could see this coming a mile away when they signed Brissett to be the “bridge” QB.  They were going to lose and lose early and everyone was gong to start screaming for Maye to play.  Good for them, and him, that they are sticking with the slow path for him rather than changing the plan because they can’t win. 

–Brock Purdy leads the NFL in passing yards.  Oh, and he also has the highest QB rating through 25 starts in the history of the NFL. 

–By the end of the game 3 rookies were playing key positions for the 49ers defense.  DT (Evan Anderson), middle linebacker (Tatum Bethune) and safety (Malik Mustapha).  They all did well, although Mustapha did miss a tackle on the first 3^rd down that gave the Pats a first down.  This bolds well for the near and distant future of the team. 

Well, the 49ers are back to .500 at 2-2.  Next week they have another must win at home against Arizona.  After that the schedule gets really, really hard so they really need to bank this win on Sunday.