San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Looking to beat Seahawks, elements
‘It’s different’: 49ers face team that dealt longtime nemesis QB Wilson
The San Francisco 49ers were probably the NFL’s second most-stoked team when the Seattle Seahawks traded quarterback Russell Wilson to Denver in March.
“I was happy,” 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan said.
“‘Man, great,’ ” All-Pro linebacker Fred Warner recalled of his initial reaction. “Him not being there anymore? Hey, I’m not mad about it.”
And defensive tackle Arik Armstead also wasn’t upset when he heard the 49ers wouldn’t have to keep facing their longtime antagonist twice every regular season after 21 mostly painful meetings since 2012.
“He’s a future Hall of Fame quarterback,” Armstead said. “And he’s caused a lot of problems.”
For the first time since Dec. 24, 2011, when the 49ers beat Seattle and its quarterback, Tarvaris Jackson, the 49ers won’t face a Seahawks team headlined by Wilson when they meet their NFC West rivals in their home opener Sunday at Levi’s Stadium.
Wilson has a 17-4 record against the 49ers, including a win in the NFC Championship Game in January 2013, while throwing 37 touchdown passes and 10 interceptions, posting a 100.4 passer rating and turn
ing endless would-be sacks into broken-play daggers.
“It’s different,” Pro Bowl pass rusher Nick Bosa said of prepping for the Wilson-less Seahawks. “But they just beat Russell Wilson. So obviously they’re still a good team.”
So while the 49ers have celebrated Wilson’s departure, they aren’t celebrating before kickoff. Not after the in-transition Seahawks upset the Broncos 17-16 on Monday night in Wilson’s Denver debut. And not after the 49ers were upset by the Bears 19-10 in Chicago. The Seahawks no longer have Wilson and All-Pro linebacker Bobby Wagner. But they still have head coach Pete Carroll — 71, in his 13th season — whose players channel his sideline energy on the field.
Armstead, whose 12 career games against the Seahawks are second most on the 49ers’ roster, said the new-look Seahawks’ intensity was unchanged Monday night.
“It’s a testament to the culture they’ve built with Coach Carroll being there all those years,” Armstead said. “They still want to play with great energy.”
Still, they won’t play Sunday with a great quarterback, although well-traveled Geno Smith, 31, did a fair impression of Wilson for two quarters Monday night.
Smith, making his sixth start since 2014, completed 17 of 18 passes for 164 yards, threw two touchdown passes and had a 141.7 rating in the first half. He did return to
Earth in the final two quarters: He completed 6 of 10 passes for 31 yards, and the Seahawks were held scoreless.
“He played a great game,” Warner said. “That first half was as good as it gets with being efficient with the football, getting those throws down the field and putting the ball where it needed to go in playmakers’ hands. He looked really good.”
Quarterback Trey Lance hopes to look better than he did against the Bears. After completing 13 of 28 passes for 164 yards and an interception, however, he might be forced to throw a slick ball for the second straight week.
The 49ers’ season opener was played on waterlogged Soldier Field and ended in a deluge that left miniature lakes on the grass surface. The Sunday forecast in Santa Clara calls for afternoon showers, with about a quarter-inch of rain expected to fall throughout the day.
Lance acknowledged he would like to avoid a repeat of the season-opening conditions.
“There were some ugly (passes) out there on Sunday, for sure,” Lance said. “And I’m not blaming it on the (wet) ball. … But hopefully we’re not playing too many games in those conditions like there were in the fourth quarter.”
The 49ers are heavy favorites for the second straight week. They are a nine-point favorite against Seattle, which is their biggest spread against the Seahawks in their 47-game history. They were 81⁄2-point favorites in a 31-24 win against
Seattle on Dec. 1, 2002, according to Pro Football Reference.
That’s partly a reflection on the absence of Wilson, who is waiting for the 49ers in Week 3 when they visit Denver. First, though, they’ll face the team that just managed to do what the 49ers did so rarely over a decade-long span: beat Wilson.
“Everyone knows what Russell meant to that place for a long time,” Shanahan said. “But they’ve got a good team regardless, and that’s why it’s still going to be a huge challenge. And I think they showed everyone that last week.”