The 49ers’ best is yet to come, and that should worry the rest of the NFC
The 49ers have been scrapping and clawing to hold together their season since Week 2, doing everything in their power to prevent a long and ever-growing injury list from torpedoing their playoff and Super Bowl hopes.
This season has been so laborious that you could be forgiven for not noticing that Sunday will mark the halfway point of the campaign. Where does the time go? Somehow, someway, the Niners are still in the thick of things. They might be in last place in the NFC West at 4-3, but they stack up well amid an ever-diminishing second tier of teams in the league. The Niners could stand to improve on offense, and we’ll see if recent injuries on defense will prove critical on Sunday against the Seahawks and perhaps in the weeks to come, but San Francisco is a good team. The 49ers’ hopes are alive in 2020.
If you ever doubted the culture that Kyle Shanahan has built in Santa Clara, let this be just the latest reminder that it’s something special. Make no mistake about it, lesser organizations would have crumbled if they picked up the breaks the Niners have so far this season. And if you don’t think culture is important, then may I direct you to a number of implosions around the league so far this season.
Of course, the Niners are in the middle of the toughest stretch of their schedule. This upcoming week and its two games on Sunday (at Seattle) and Thursday (vs. Green Bay) will tell us so much about what to expect from San Francisco this winter. The Niners could even jump into that top tier of NFL teams with a pair of wins. But no matter what happens, it’s clear now that Shanahan’s group has the upside of a team to be reckoned with in January.
Because, you see, the reinforcements are starting to arrive.
Now, the reinforcements just so happen to be players they started the season with, but let’s not argue semantics. The point is that this season has already progressed so far that those players the Niners expected to be out injured for a long time are starting to re-join the team.
Wednesday, the Niners opened the practice windows for running back Tevin Coleman, tight end Jordan Reed, and nickel back K’Waun Williams.
“I think all three of those guys have a chance this week,” Shanahan said yesterday.
And if they do play, that significantly changes the complexion of this team. No longer would the Niners be relying on a fifth-string running back to be a bell cow. They would have another elite receiving option alongside George Kittle to help make up for the loss of Deebo Samuel. And Williams has long been a lynchpin of the Niners defense.
There are more players, just like them, waiting in the wings, set to return in a matter of days, not months.
Around the time of the Niners’ Week 10 game against the Saints in New Orleans on Nov. 15, the team is expecting to welcome cornerback Richard Sherman, running back Raheem Mostert, centers Ben Garland and Weston Richburg, and defensive linemen Jullian Taylor and Ronald Blair back into the fold.
That’s a lot of firepower. Enough to think that if the Niners can merely be at .500 by the time those players return to the field, San Francisco will be in a strong position moving forward.
Nick Bosa might not be returning this year and their quarterback play might not be elite, but these Niners keep finding ways to win. If they can keep scrapping and clawing for a few more weeks, they could well have a roster that’s better suited to do more than scratch and claw down the stretch.
The Niners have a November that will test them in ways that almost seem unfair, but if they can simply pass that test and find a way to stop losing a new player or two to injury every week, they could well enter December as one of the most dangerous teams in the NFL.
It’s hard, no doubt, but strip away the context of everything that’s already happened his year. There are seven playoff spots in the NFC. The Niners close the campaign with games against a surprisingly beatable Buffalo team, Washington, the down-and-out Cowboys, and then two division games vs. Arizona and Seattle.
If the Niners can just hang on — if they can find a way to win one more game by Thanksgiving, they’ll have a slew of impact players rejoining the fold and a slate, starting with the Rams on Thanksgiving weekend, that will allow them to not just squeak into the playoffs, but likely compete for a high seed and so much more once the calendar flips to 2021.