Hamilton the key to stopping superstars
Safety tasked with helping to contain 49ers’ playmakers
No team in the NFL forces a defense to pick its poison more threateningly than the San Francisco 49ers.
Do you keep all eyes on Christian McCaffrey, every bit as dangerous catching a screen as he is bouncing outside the tackle, or are you more focused on Deebo Samuel and George Kittle, turning little plays into big ones in the middle of the field? Or maybe it’s Brandon Aiyuk on the outside who keeps you up at night?
If the Ravens are to maintain a handle on these four potential All-Pros when they visit the 49ers Christmas night, second-year safety Kyle Hamilton will have to be their all-purpose counter.
“He’s one guy that if you cloned 11 of him, he could play every single position,” cornerback Marlon Humphrey said. “He’ll be big
Ravens at 49ers Monday, 8:15 p.m.
TV: ABC, ESPN
Radio: 97.9 FM, 101.5 FM, 1090 AM
Line: 49ers by 5 ½
for this game, whether it’s guarding Kittle, guarding Deebo, making tackles on McCaffrey, getting to the quarterback on pressures — I think it’ll be a really big game for him just based off the things he can do and the way this team attacks you.”
Humphrey recalled general manager Eric DeCosta gushing that Hamilton could be a “unicorn” before the Ravens drafted him. Two years in, teammates and fans have grown used to seeing him take on every role imaginable in the course of a game. His flexibility might be called upon like never before against the 49ers’ historically efficient offense.
Hamilton sees this breadth of responsibility as affirmation from defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald and his staff, who delight in using him as a point man for their creativity.
“It’s a little tiring at times,” he said, grinning. “Mentally and physically. But I appreciate the coaches for putting that trust in my hands, allowing me to do separate things and coaching me to the level where I can do them both well.”
NFL Stats noted Wednesday that he’s the only player in the league with at least 10 passes defended and at least 10 tackles behind the line of scrimmage, a snapshot of his varied impact.
Hamilton is not thinking about the 49ers making him or the Ravens look bad, even if
that’s a fear expressed by fans on social media as they anticipate a rare showdown between the AFC’s best and the NFC’s best.
“It’s an opportunity for everybody on our defense to really showcase what we’re about against a great offense,” Hamilton said. “Props to those guys over there. There’s playmakers all over the field and a solid front line. I think we’re just the guys to go handle it.”
The 49ers average the most yards per play, 6.8, and the Ravens allow the least, 4.4. So there won’t be any lack of belief on either side.
Panic ensued after Hamilton took an awkward step in the Ravens’ Dec. 10 win over the Los Angeles Rams, aggravating a knee injury he suffered early in that game. He wanted to play on but watched the remainder of the game from the sideline, convinced by trainers that discretion was the better part of valor.
The Ravens awaited an MRI, facing the very real prospect of entering their most difficult stretch without Macdonald’s most versatile chess piece.
But the test brought good news and there Hamilton was, running through drills with a brace on his knee as the Ravens began preparing for the Jacksonville Jaguars and a chance to clinch a playoff spot. Though he was listed as questionable for last Sunday’s game, he played all 62 defensive snaps and led the team in tackles, with one of those stops coming behind the line scrimmage and another right at the line. He also broke up a pass.
It was typical Swiss Army knife stuff from the second-year safety, who’s likely headed for his first Pro Bowl, but the circumstances, given his injury and the importance of the game, were atypical.
“That guy is a warrior,” linebacker Roquan Smith said afterward. “The way he came up there and everything he’s been going through this season and just the way he forgot about it all and just said, ‘Hey, I’m going to put it all on the line for us.’ When you think about that, that’s the ultimate teammate that you want in the locker room — a guy that’s willing to sacrifice himself for the betterment of the team, knowing if he was good enough to go, he was going to go.”
Hamilton said he felt some pain when he tested his injured knee before the game, but, “my parents always raised me, ‘If you can go, go.’”
Teammates pick on him in a mode reserved only for the most promising young players. He joked that for Smith’s “one good comment, I’m going to have 100 bad ones, so I take it in stride, but I appreciate him for it.”
“I have the utmost respect for him, but you can’t tell him every time,” Smith, the vocal leader of the defense, said. “You have to keep the young guy going and at base, in a sense. But the guy — the way he prepares week in and week out, the type of questions he asks you and just how versatile he is, whether you want to have him at safety, at nickel or on the end of the line of scrimmage — I’m happy he’s a part of my team.”
Now, it’s on to the 49ers, the greatest tactical test Hamilton and his defensive mates will face during the regular season and one they might encounter again if they achieve their goal of playing in the Super Bowl. San Francisco has one of the best outside receivers in the league in Aiyuk, the top yard-after-catch threat in Samuel, the No. 1 tight end in Kittle, and oh, the league’s most versatile, productive running back in McCaffrey. Not to mention an accurate, mistake-averse distributor in quarterback Brock Purdy.
If the Ravens are to hold these varied nemeses in check, Hamilton, with his gift for morphing from snap to snap, will almost surely be a major reason. He’s big enough to cover the 6-foot-4, 250-pound Kittle, quick enough to shadow McCaffrey sideline to sideline and aggressive enough to drop Samuel before he can turn a mundane catch into a home run.
The world has started to take notice of the former Notre Dame All-American’s broad impact on a Ravens defense that has outplayed preseason forecasts. Analysts routinely list Hamilton as not just a Pro Bowl (he’s the leading vote getter at strong safety) but a first-team All-Pro candidate. NBC analyst Cris Collinsworth raved about him during the Ravens’ victory over the Jaguars.
“It’s cool,” Hamilton said. “I’ve always wanted to be that. To this point now, I feel like I’ve done pretty well this year. But there’s still a lot I can improve on. I don’t feel like I, personally, have had a satisfactory year. I’ve had a good year, but I feel like I hold myself to a high standard.”
The 49ers will present him a high-stakes chance to keep reaching.