Super Bowl Recap: Offense

Deebo doing Deebo things [Scott Strazzante / The Chronicle]

In many ways, our offense in the Super Bowl was reminiscent of our offense throughout the season: a dominant run game, massive misdirection springing big plays, explosive scoring drives that made us look unstoppable, and a methodical underneath passing game.

However, the pass protection issues that we’d seen glimpses of throughout the year gave way to the Chiefs’ late blitzes, and that — in conjunction with a few plays that I’m sure Jimmy G would have liked to have back — led to that underneath passing game stalling out at the worst possible time. And with it, went our offense.

Since then, there’s been a lot of finger pointing, but — just like on defense — it was a combination of many little things that led to our undoing.

Edge Play. As expected, we gashed the Chiefs’ defense on the ground, proving we were simply too fast to the edge for them to stop. Even when the Chiefs did a good job of stringing our stretch plays out past the numbers, we’d still find ways to cut up field and plug for 4-6 yard gains with regularity. And when the defense really started to over pursue, we punished them regularly with end arounds to Deebo.

Eliminating Jimmy G’s single scramble and his kneel to end the first half, we racked up 139 yards on a whopping 6.95 yards per carry. And while you can say some of that is skewed based on Deebo’s 3 carries for 53 yards (17.7 ypc), both Mostert and Coleman averaged over 4.6 ypc on the day with matching long runs of 17 yards. We were explosive but we were also consistent.

The one place where our running game struggled was with our gap runs, which we didn’t turn to often. Now part of that dip in production could be attributed to the fact that we didn’t go to these runs until later in the game (when the Chiefs were down and selling out against the run), but a number of our gap runs involved someone losing their 1-on-1 matchup and a stop for little gain. And that lack of an interior counter punch hurt us in the late game.

Matchups in man. Also, as expected, the Chiefs’ linebackers and safeties got routinely abused by our backs and tight ends in man coverage. Their linebackers got repeatedly worked by our backfield, with Niemann getting beat by everyone from Juice down the field to Jeff Wilson on angle routes. “Dirty Dan” Sorensen gave up A LOT of yardage. While it never seemed like he fully blew an assignment, he was always a step slow or out of position, whether it was guarding Kittle down the field on a “push off,” guarding a slot receiver, or marking up Juice on play actions.

The work with Juice was particularly impressive, with Shanahan dialing up inside play action passes off of cross blocking action, hitting the Chiefs in the alleys when they were expecting a full bootleg look, and making Kansas City’s second-level box defenders continually wrong in regards to run vs. pass.

Eventually — whether it was because of how ineffective the linebackers were in coverage or simply as a means to generate pressure — Steve Spagnuolo started sending them on blitzes, rushing 5 or 6 on seemingly every down late in the game. To his credit, this strategy worked well. Although it wasn’t what I would call a full strategic victory as it left a number of people wide open.

We’ll get to that later.

YPA. As is almost always the case, we were the superior team in terms of yards per play (6.5 to the Chiefs’ 5.3) but wound up with 21 fewer offensive plays than Kansas City. That 6.5 ypp mark is excellent and would have been good enough for tops in the NFL across a full season. And that’s including our inefficient and ineffective last few offensive drives. So, theoretically, when you look at that offensive output, you’d think we’d have been able to get more than 20 points and a victory.

But this wasn’t the first time we’d dominated YPP yet found ourselves in close games. We out-gained the Ravens by 50 yards at a 6.4 YPP to 4.6 clip but lost on a last second field goal. The week after, we out-gained the Saints by 50 yards at an absurd 8.2 YPP (to the Saints’ also great 6.8 YPP), but would have lost if not for some George Kittle fourth down heroics. And in week 17 against the Seahawks we (yet again) out-gained our opponent by 50 yards on an absolutely ludicrous 8.3 YPP (to the Seahawks’ 4.9) but needed a goal line stop to preserve the win.

We somehow averaged three and a half more yards PER PLAY but still almost lost.

Game Flow. I talked about this a little after the last Seahawks game, when I pinpointed game flow as the single biggest reason why Seattle was in every game late despite a point differential that pointed to more of a .500 team, but that wasn’t a very lengthy nor in-depth discussion…

And this won’t be either. I’ll have to look more at film to try and break everything down (game flow is a LOT of things, some of which are luck), and will try and include a better analysis of the factors that make up a game flow advantage when I look at our ability to close games later this spring, BUT — despite our dominance — it did seem like we were typically on the wrong side of game flow this year.

That disadvantage can’t be attributed to turnovers, as all four of the games referenced above ended with a turnover margin of 0. It can’t be attributed to poor passing performances as Jimmy G was near-perfect against the Saints and the Seahawks, including in both fourth quarters. Nor can it be attributed to poor rushing performances as we averaged 151 yards rushing across those games.

I have some theories as to why we sometimes struggle with game flow, but I’ll wait until I do the necessary research to share any of them. But for now, know that it’s probably a thing. How big a thing? And how much should we worry about it moving forward? That remains to be seen.

Mathieu and Clark: Both talked some shit after the game but neither did much in this contest. Clark had a sack on the fourth-and-long following the overthrow to Sanders, but that was his only stat of the game (other than another QB hit that happened on the next drive when the game was already over). The idea that he “finished” the past three games with a sack is a cute tidbit — albeit not an accurate one — but each of those games were with double digit leads and teams desperately trying to claw back. He was a non-factor otherwise.

Meanwhile Mathieu totaled six tackles but was largely nullified by Shanahan’s game planning and even — at times — targeted in man coverage. His versatility and instincts make him an integral part of this Chiefs defense, but the many Swiss army knife weapons we had at our disposal proved troublesome for him at times.

With the remaining players on the defense largely replacement-level talent, Mathieu and Clark’s quiet games meant that the only way this defense was going to perform was from role players stepping up. And/or from a monster game by Chris Jones.

Which… well…

Chris Jones: While Mahomes took home the MVP, in a world where Super Bowl MVP voting was even remotely accurate, there’s an argument that Jones should have been given the award instead. Because despite recording only a single assisted tackle on the stat sheet, I think we drop 40 on this Chiefs team without him.

First off, the attention the Niners had to give him allowed the Chiefs to have success elsewhere in their pass rush. There were many instances where a double team on Jones let another defensive lineman win one-on-one somewhere else, or — more noticeably — where the attention Jones got allowed the Chiefs to dial up the delayed linebacker blitzes that were so effective late in the game.

When Jones did get one-on-one looks, he mostly succeeded, blowing by Person in the second quarter to get a hand on Garoppolo and force him into the hands of Mike Pennel (who also played a good game). This pressure would result in Jimmy G’s ugly pick to Breeland and a major momentum swing.

Yet even when Jones wasn’t getting home with his rush, he was still disrupting our passing game with three batted balls, all in the back half of the fourth quarter, all on big-time plays (which we will, unfortunately, get to later).

While not as splashy or incredibly obvious as the dominant showings that Aaron Donald and Grady Jarrett had against us, Jones’ and Pennel’s performances against our interior line were an unfortunate reminder of the worries that we had from that position group entering the post-season. And the reason why that’s an area where we could see some additions this off-season.

Shanahan’s Aggressiveness. Much of the talk after the game has been about Shanahan’s aggressiveness or lack thereof, and how that “lost us the Super Bowl.” The primary two critiques are:

(1) That he was too conservative at the end of the second quarter and should have called a timeout to give the offense another shot at points

(2) That he was too aggressive at the end of the game and should have ran the ball more.

So let’s break down both critiques, piece by agonizing piece.

Argument #1: Shanahan was too conservative.

Re: that weird end-of-half sequence of events, I would have liked to see Shanahan call a timeout and give our offense the time to see what we could do. But it appears there were plenty of people around the league who agreed with (or at least understood) Shanahan’s decision to let the clock run.

Per Mike Sando from The Athletic:

“People will kill Kyle for the end of the half, but if he takes the timeout and then Kansas City downs the punt deep, then Mahomes is getting the ball at midfield with around 50 seconds left in the half,” another coach said. “He played it safe. We would be killing him if he calls the timeout and Kansas City downs the punt.”

The Chiefs should have downed the punt inside the 5, but they did not play the ball very well, allowing it to bounce into the end zone for a touchback. About seven percent of punts from that general area of the field pin the opponent inside his own 5. About 30 percent pin the opponent within his own 10.

Based on those percentages I’d agree that — based on field position — it was a harder decision than many people thought. But I’d still call the timeout and take the shot.

I know Shanahan has leaned more heavily on his defense this season than in years past because of how strong it’s been, but I think — in this situation in particular and against this offense in particular — we should be playing to maximize scoring opportunities. Which means never giving up a possession.

Yes, you get the ball at the half and it’s currently a tie game. Yes, you know that — unlike the Chiefs — you don’t really have the capability to just drop back and huck it all over the field. But, based on the Chiefs’ ability to get red hot on offense at any moment, I don’t think you can throw away any chance to potentially score points. Regardless of the score.

So with that in mind, I do think the Niners should have called a timeout before the punt. And even if they didn’t take a timeout then, then after the punt was a touchback and they knew their field position, they should have used the timeouts as they attempted to drive down the field.

I also think that — in following with the mindset of maximizing each possession — the Niners should have at least played with the idea of four down territory once they got inside the Chiefs’ 30 on the opening drive of the second half. That doesn’t mean they had to go for it instead of kick the field goal, but I think if they’d opened themselves up a bit more to the idea that they could go for it, this game could have been put out of reach.

While I like to poke fun at the NFL’s newfound obsession with analytics and the belief that you can succeed with a Dave Roberts-like football coach who is a puppet of percentage points and statistical charts, I do agree with the movement on certain things. And one of those things is going for it more often. Especially given the strengths (and weaknesses) of our offense.

But this email is long enough and the next section is about to be gigantic, so I’ll save that discussion for a later time.

Argument #2: Shanahan was too aggressive

Okaaaaaay. So if the going argument is that Shanahan should have ran the ball more and — if he did — the Niners would have won, let’s put that to the test. Here’s every single play call from the 49ers’ offense after picking off the Chiefs with 11:57 left in the fourth quarter while up 20-10.

At this point, our goal is to put the nail in the coffin. The worst possible outcome is a short drive that does nothing in terms of yardage, but we’re also 12 minutes out from the end of the game, so there’s far too much time left on the clock to think about milking it.

1-and-10, SF 20: Mostert power lead for 6 yards. Nice.

2-and-4, SF 26: Pass to George Kittle for 12 yards. Play action stretch with an end around look over the top opens up the middle for Kittle.

1-and-10, SF 38: Mostert power lead for 1 yard. On this play, this was the Chiefs’ defensive front.

A six man front with — Including the press CBs — eight defenders at the line of scrimmage. Plus an additional two in the box and a free safety creeping down. Coming out in this front is tantamount to saying “we know you want to run so we’re going to bet you continue running, even though we’re lining up in a front that makes running nearly impossible.”

The Chiefs are selling out to stop the run and, after Garland whiffs on Jones and Sanders can’t dig out Sorensen on a crack block, we get stopped for one yard.

2nd-and-9, SF 39: Incomplete pass to Deebo. Could we have run the ball here, especially since they had softened up the box? Sure. Shanahan may have even called a run, but — as pointed out by Bill Barnwell…

Second-and-9 in the fourth quarter. Garoppolo checks to a pass versus a KC blitz. Pressure from Hitchens forces him to sail the throw. Swing pass was wide-open but not sure if that was hot. pic.twitter.com/tj5zrIJapH

— Bill Barnwell (@billbarnwell) February 3, 2020

Two guys open but Jimmy doesn’t deliver the ball while under intense pressure.

3rd-and-9, SF 39: False start on Joe Staley. For a Super Bowl, it was oddly loud in that stadium. At different times, both teams had to use a silent count. This contributed to a few false start issues late, including on the next play…

3rd-and-14, SF 34: Jimmy G scrambles for 3 yards. On this play, the refs missed a clear offsides, but they also missed it due to what was a less clear potential false start, so… whatever? I guess?

The Chiefs score on the next drive. Now it’s 20-17 with 6:06 left in the fourth.

1st-and-10, SF 20: Mostert stretch for 5 yards. Nice.

2nd-and-5, SF 25: Incomplete pass to Kittle. Batted at the LOS by Chris Jones.

When asked after the game, Shanahan said that up three with ~6 minutes left in the game, you are not in clock killing mode, you are in first down getting and potentially scoring mode. Which I agree with. Yet this is the play that people have critiqued the most heavily. We just got good yardage on the ground. Why not go to the ground again on second down?

Let’s look at the Chiefs’ alignment first.

As you can see, the Chiefs have six men on the LOS and two more in the box. It’s quite similar to the defensive front they showed just last drive when they stuffed our power lead. They also have Sorensen and an extended CB playing the edge opposite Mostert, giving them numbers to that side.

So Shanahan dials up a play action pass.

Deebo goes across formation then back to the twins receivers in orbit motion as a coverage indicator. He’ll swing out wide on the snap, while both Kittle and Juice will fake a stalk block like it’s a run play then try and settle around the sticks in the vacated space of the linebackers when they bite on the fake.

The play opens up perfectly. Even more so because the Chiefs send one of their linebackers as a blitzer while the other crosses formation to lock up a blocking Mostert in man. But Suggs, who was lined up as a DE, drops into coverage to undercut Kittle. Obviously this isn’t going to work, but it does stall Jimmy’s release just enough so that…

Jones can bat the ball down at the line of scrimmage. This is a screenshot from the exact moment Jones hit the ball. Look how open Kittle is. That’s at least a ten yard gain and a first down. Based on the space in front of him that’s probably at least 20 yards. And based on the overall size/athleticism advantage Kittle has on the two guys down the field, it could have been much much more than that.

This is a high percentage play action pass to the side of the formation with a potential numbers advantage. It also has a built in check down in case of pressure. And it opens up perfectly if not for a batted ball at the line of scrimmage.

Against an eight man box, it’s hard to say that play call wasn’t the right one.

3rd-and-5, SF 25: Incomplete pass to Kendrick Bourne.

Based on down and distance we need to throw here, and we assume the Chiefs will be locked in on Kittle (especially since he just ran free the play before). But, against man coverage and two blitzing linebackers, Shanahan frees up Kittle AGAIN. In almost the exact same spot as the play before.

I’ve put Kittle’s path in pink here just so it’s a bit easier to see.

They motion him from the bottom of the frame to the opposite side of the formation into a bunch trips alignment. Mathieu follows him, showing that it’s man coverage (unsurprisingly, their top DB is on our top wideout on third down). The bunch alignment and route combinations are made to clear out space and create two natural rubs for Kittle and/or to force a switch between Mathieu and the cornerback on Bourne.

On the snap, that switch occurs. The corner takes Kittle while Mathieu takes Bourne, and Jimmy — perhaps seeing the leverage Bourne naturally has on a comeback route versus a high and inside Mathieu — locks onto his receiver. Which is unfortunate because…

Kittle is wide open. Like wide wide wide open. And if the last play would have been at least a 10 yard gain, Kittle catching this one on the run is at LEAST 30 yards. Honestly — given the fact that every single defender is turned away from him except one that’s already been dusted and another who is gonna have to tackle Kittle in the open field after he gets a twenty yard head start — a touchdown is the most likely outcome.

Instead, Garoppolo never comes off of Bourne, throwing an incomplete as Niemann delivers a helmet-to-helmet hit that isn’t called (because why would you call roughing the passer on third down). The Niners have to punt on the next play.

The Chiefs score on the next drive. Now it’s 24-20 Chiefs with 2:39 left in the game.

1st-and-10, SF 15: Mostert gun stretch RPO for 17 yards. Fuck yeah.

1st-and-10, SF 32: False start on Emmanuel Sanders. The called play was a run. Shanahan is clearly trying to get runs in here before the two minute warning.

1st-and-15, SF 27: Pass complete to Kittle for 8 yards. Simple quick out on loose coverage.

Two Minute Warning

2nd-and-7, SF 35: Pass complete to Bourne for 16 yards. On a play that is sniffed out relatively well, Bourne and Jimmy G show some nice improvisational skills, with Jimmy tossing the ball high over a linebacker who has lost track of Bourne, and the receiver not only securing the pass but getting out of bounds.

1st-and-10, KC 49: Incomplete pass to Deebo. Batted at the LOS by Chris Jones. Goddamn you Chris Jones. Deebo had shook his corner but — even with his incredible ability in the open field — it only would have been a modest gain underneath, even if it was completed.

2nd-and-10, KC 49: Incomplete pass to Bourne. Also tipped by Chris Jones, this ball was an intended slant that the safety jumped and batted down. While it certainly could have been an interception, it would have been a very tough one as the safety dove horizontally to bat it down.

3rd-and-10, KC 49: Incomplete pass to Sanders. This was ultimately the ball game and was actually a brilliant concept that Shanahan dialed up to attack the very coverage that he knew Spagnuolo would use.

Per Ted Nguyen of The Athletic:

On third-and-10, Spagnuolo once again called for two double-teams. With Kittle in the backfield, the Chiefs doubled Samuel and Sanders. They called a “cut” on Sanders, which meant the inside defender played shallow and the outside defender played deep. Shanahan seemed to know that this is how the Chiefs would line up because he called the perfect play to beat this coverage — he had Sanders run a deep post. With the insider defender playing shallow, Sanders had the speed to get on top of him and run away from the outside defender.

With the only deep defender playing outside of Sanders, he got wide open in the middle of the field.

However, Garoppolo overthrew him by nearly 5 yards. This throw isn’t easy but with how much separation Sanders created, if the ball was thrown anywhere near him he would have had a great chance at bringing the pass in or drawing a defensive pass interference.

There’s two things I’d add to that breakdown. (1) Sanders was much more open than that picture indicated, as he had multiple steps on both defenders before he slowed up at the last second realizing that he couldn’t run under that ball. (2) Jimmy G also had the option of going to Bourne on the dig route for a sure first down (he is very open; as you can see in the first image above).

I don’t hate the shot that Jimmy took. When you get a receiver with that kind of separation on a potential Super Bowl game-winner, you generally take it.

But alas, Jimmy G couldn’t make the throw. So what could have been an easy pitch and catch to Bourne for the first down or an epic touchdown bomb to Sanders became a fourth-and-long. And the game was pretty much over at that point.

The next play the Niners would keep seven guys back to block, running three wideouts into five DBs in deep coverage. And while Kittle would eventually open up on a delayed release underneath, Jimmy G never saw him, as he was already sliding into what would end up a game-ending sack.

The idea that Shanahan “blew another Super Bowl in the fourth quarter cause he can’t hold a lead” was always going to be too easy and too clean of a narrative for the nonsensical talking heads to avoid. They had to jump on it. It lets them yell things with angry expressions on their faces while repeating whatever their equivalent of “I told you so” is until people stop paying attention. Which, unfortunately, they don’t.

And while it is totally understandable to have felt that way about Shanahan in the rage of the hours following the Super Bowl, a closer look at the film paints a much different narrative.

TLDR; in the fourth quarter, Shanahan called a better game than most people thought. Jimmy G played worse than most people thought. And the Chiefs’ blitzes — despite successfully pressuring Garoppolo — left a lot of dudes open. But just like how our defense faltered due to a few bad breaks (or bad calls, cough cough), it was the few missed receivers that lost us the game on offense.

It’s certainly plausible that if a single one of those turning point plays on offense or defense goes our way, the Niners are coming home with their sixth Lombardi Trophy.

So yeah, that sucks.

But while losing in the Super Bowl is a bummer, it’s important to keep a few things in perspective.

The Niners have the 11th-youngest team in the league, with their average age of 25.7 only half a year older than the first place Dolphins. We only have five starters (including our kicker) over the age of 28.

Jimmy Garoppolo has 26 career regular season starts. In the past twenty years, Super Bowl winning quarterbacks have an average of 100 starts. And during that time, only three have won with fewer starts than Garoppolo: Ben Roethlisberger (25), Kurt Warner (16), and Tom Brady (14). Three Hall of Famers.

Garoppolo didn’t play well at the end of the game, but he’d been slicing and dicing through the second and third quarters after he threw that pick. He’ll get better.

Kyle Shanahan just turned 40 and is in his third season as a head coach. In the past twenty years, the average Super Bowl-winning coach is 56 years old with 10 years of experience. He’ll get better too.

There are only two coaches younger than 40 to ever win a Super Bowl, and in the three years before they were hired, their franchises had a combined five playoff appearances, one Super Bowl championship, and a 67% winning percentage. In the three years before Shanahan, the Niners’ winning percentage was less than half of that (31.3%).

Three years ago, Chip Kelly was running zone reads with Blaine Gabbert, Jeremy Kerley was our leading receiver, and we had (quite literally) one of the worst rushing defenses of all-time. What our staff and players have been able to accomplish since then has been nothing short of remarkable. Now the Niners are contenders again, and they did it a year ahead of even the most optimistic of projections. The leadership and the talent is in place for a sustained run.

And hopefully, another Super Bowl next year. This one with a better outcome.

Go Niners 👍🏈