Kurtenbach

The Warriors.

Yes, as the 49ers head down to Miami to try to bring the Bay Area another championship in Super Bowl LIV, they’ll be guided by the principles and teachings of the most recent Bay Area champions.

“I just have always been a fan of them. Even before I got here, just watching how they play” Shanahan said. “I remember saying in Atlanta… that I wanted our receiver group to be similar to the Warriors.”

At the time, Shanahan wanted his team to emulate Golden State’s “Strength in Numbers” motto, which was first dubbed by Warriors coach Steve Kerr when he came to the Bay in 2014.

The idea behind “Strength in Numbers” is that, unlike so many other teams in the league, the Warriors wouldn’t be reliant on one player to lead

the way on a nightly basis. No, Kerr wanted the Warriors to utilize the power of the collective.

But in the act of trying to make his receivers more unselfish, more like the Warriors, Shanahan, whose Atlanta offense was the best in the NFL in 2016, tapped into a larger truth. In order to be unselfish, you had to be versatile. It’s no good to be willing to do anything for your team unless you are capable of doing anything for your team.

And when he came to San Francisco, Shanahan built the 49ers with that as the guiding principle.

In turn, Shanahan’s Niners have become the vanguard of an irreversible movement around the NFL, just as the Warriors were in the NBA.

Watch an NBA game today, and the influences on the product are obvious, almost heavy-handed. Five years later, everyone is trying to play like the 2015 Warriors.

Those Golden State

teams were playing positionless basketball. The point guard was a shooter and the center was the main distributor of the basketball. The versatility and unselfishness of the Warriors’ five made them unpredictable, and that unpredictability made them ever-so-dangerous.

The 49ers are doing the same thing in football.

“He’s created a positionless offense,” said Alex Rollins, who breaks down 49ers plays on his popular YouTube channel. “You get five skill position players on every play: tight end, running backs, wide receivers, and in his offense, any of those guys can play any of those positions.”

And the man who moves around most often is fullback Kyle Juszczyk — the Draymond Green of the Niners.

He’s not a two-way player like Green — those don’t exist in the NFL anymore — but on the offensive end, Juszczyk’s smarts, jack-of-all-trades play, and willingness to do

the dirty work makes him indispensable to the 49ers in ways that other teams couldn’t quite understand. That’s just how it was for the Warriors with Green.

Fullback, a position that was fading from the passhappy NFL in recent years, is typically used as a lead blocker in the run game. Juszczyk certainly does that; he’s an elite blocker. But he also presents a mismatch to the defense on all passing plays, lining up all across the field and taking on every role imaginable. Statistically speaking, he was the 49ers’ most effective receiver this year, though he only caught 20 balls.

“We call him the offensive weapon for a reason,” said backup quarterback Nick Mullens.

All those roles and responsibilities can be too much for some players, but Juszczyk, who was one of Shanahan’s first signings for the 49ers, has taken it all in stride.

“We put a lot on him, and we haven’t put too

much on him yet,” Shanahan said. “He’s been able to handle it each time. I’ll say that’s because of his Harvard education, but he’s a hell of a football player who doesn’t get nervous about anything.”

It’s not just Juszczyk. Tight end George Kittle is the 49ers’ best (and most willing) run blocker, and San Francisco’s best rushing plays this year have been when wide receivers and tight ends carry the ball. Rookie wide receiver Deebo Samuel, in particular, has become a key rusher in Shanahan’s offense as of late — he’s averaging a cartoonish 14 yards per carry since Week 13.

The multiplicity of the 49ers is such that they will often run the same plays, but with the same players in a different position. Does the defense key in on the man, or the formation? I couldn’t tell you, but neither can every defensive coach in the league.

The 49ers, despite not being part of any conversation

about “the league’s most talented offenses” were second in the NFL in points this year.

The Niners even have a motion-style offense like the Warriors.

Shanahan loves presnap movement. No one in the NFL uses it more, and it’s not even close. On nearly 80 percent of the 49ers plays, there’s a Niner moving around the field in a predetermined way. This forces the defense to show its hand, in one way or another.

“I don’t know why every other team in the NFL isn’t doing it,” Rollins said. “It’s free information.”

But seeing Shanahan’s success, the rest of the NFL is starting to come around to his way of thinking. It’s a copycat league, after all.

And given the success of the Warriors and how they captured the Bay Area — and the entire world’s — imagination, it’s clear that the 49ers, under Shanahan, have the kind of offense we want to see, too.