49ers final scoring drive after further review
by David Fucillo on Sep 15, 2009 1:00 PM PDT
in San Francisco 49ers News
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PrintAs we all know, up until that final touchdown drive, the 49ers offense had struggled rather mightily. There were a couple nice passes to Bruce and Morgan, but other than that there wasn't much of anything all day long. So then why did the offense suddenly turn around on that final scoring drive to win the game? Well, I recorded the game on my DVR so I thought I'd take a look back at that drive and consider the reasons for the late success.
Hill struggled much of the game, but he managed to put something together on that 4th quarter touchdown drive. He was 9/13 for 72 yards and a touchdown on that drive, so something had to have changed from the rest of the game. A review of the drive makes it pretty obvious. I've pasted the drive play-by-play after the jump so feel free to check that out if you want.
The biggest difference on the drive was the implementation of the passing game. That's not shocking, but for folks who missed the game, I wanted to point it out. Excluding a penalty, the team ran 16 plays and only two of them were rushes. Of those 14 passing plays, 6 came out of the shotgun.
What stood out to me was the team's performance against the blitz. It did not appear as though the Arizona Cardinals were running a prevent defense on this drive. With plenty of time on the clock and a small lead, that's perfectly reasonable of course. On the drive, the Cardinals sent at least one extra blitzer on 9 of the 14 passing plays. It's notable that the 49ers responded well in all but one of those plays. That success is due to a combination of the offensive play-calling and the offensive line performance. Both areas received an intense amount of (deserved) criticism throughout the game, before and after this single drive.
The very first play of the drive saw the Cardinals send two guys on the right side and Hill throw it into the ground in front of Isaac Bruce. Not pretty. However, after that the 49ers did everything right against the blitz. This meant that either the offensive line picked up the blitzers and gave Hill plenty of time, or the 49ers utilized quick pass plays to prevent sacks. Four times the team used a quick pass and four times the offensive line (and occasionally running backs) picked up the blitz and kept it at bay.
Obviously this was only one drive. The team still did not provide any semblance of a running game, as much as they wanted to bang their heads against the wall to prove. The 49ers cannot average .8 yards a carry (or even Gore's 1.4) and win on a continual basis. It just doesn't work that way. The answer to that is of course further developing the passing game. The team certainly can't expect to pass 14 out of every 16 plays as well. It's all about the balance. A 60/40 run ratio would be nice, but sometimes other aspects of the game are successful.
I guess we'll have to wait until Sunday to see if the offense mixes things up a little more earlier in the game, or if they continue to bang their head against the walls for 3+ quarters.
| San Francisco 49ers at 14:52 | SFO | ARI | |
| 1st and 10 at SF 20 | (14:52) (Shotgun) S.Hill pass incomplete short right to I.Bruce [K.Dansby]. | ||
| 2nd and 10 at SF 20 | (14:50) S.Hill pass short left to I.Bruce to SF 26 for 6 yards (A.Wilson). | ||
| 3rd and 4 at SF 26 | (14:11) (Shotgun) S.Hill pass short middle to V.Davis to SF 45 for 19 yards (R.Johnson). | ||
| 1st and 10 at SF 45 | (13:29) S.Hill pass incomplete deep right to I.Bruce (D.Rodgers-Cromartie). | ||
| 2nd and 10 at SF 45 | (13:23) (Shotgun) S.Hill pass short right to V.Davis to 50 for 5 yards (K.Dansby). | ||
| 3rd and 5 at 50 | (12:42) (Shotgun) S.Hill pass short left to I.Bruce to ARZ 45 for 5 yards (K.Dansby). | ||
| 1st and 10 at ARZ 45 | (11:59) S.Hill pass incomplete short left to V.Davis. | ||
| 2nd and 10 at ARZ 45 | (11:52) F.Gore left tackle to ARZ 42 for 3 yards (G.Hayes). | ||
| 3rd and 7 at ARZ 42 | (11:07) (Shotgun) S.Hill pass short left to I.Bruce to ARZ 29 for 13 yards (B.McFadden). ARZ 22 injured on the | ||
| Timeout at 10:45. | SFO | ARI | |
| 1st and 10 at ARZ 29 | (10:37) S.Hill pass short right to A.Battle to ARZ 19 for 10 yards (K.Dansby). | ||
| 1st and 10 at ARZ 19 | (9:55) S.Hill pass short left to V.Davis to ARZ 20 for -1 yards (C.Okeafor). | ||
| 2nd and 11 at ARZ 20 | (9:10) S.Hill pass short left to V.Davis to ARZ 8 for 12 yards (C.Okeafor). | ||
| 1st and 8 at ARZ 8 | (8:30) F.Gore up the middle to ARZ 7 for 1 yard (C.Campbell). | ||
| 2nd and 7 at ARZ 7 | (7:39) S.Hill pass incomplete short right to D.Walker (A.Wilson). | ||
| PENALTY on ARZ-D.Dockett, Defensive Offside, 4 yards, enforced at ARZ 7 - No Play. | |||
| 2nd and 3 at ARZ 3 | (7:34) S.Hill pass incomplete short left to I.Bruce (K.Dansby). | ||
| Timeout #2 by SF at 07:29. | |||
| 3rd and 3 at ARZ 3 | (7:29) (Shotgun) S.Hill pass short right to F.Gore for 3 yards, TOUCHDOWN. | 19 | 16 |
| J.Nedney extra point is GOOD, Center-B.Jennings, Holder-A.Lee. | 20 | 16 | |
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Player Calls on Defence
What i saw from watching game is when Warner was changing his plays then we get pentalized for play calling to change a possible Defensive play that could have possibly caused us the game luckily that 80yard drive saved us.
We have all ways had play calling changes in the Defence is that going to be are new Referee system now when the Offence changes there play we get a pently on Defence for changing ours for unsportman like conduct that is toataly wrong and the leauge need to look in on it if it continues. The teams should be able to play and not get a stupid penelty.
by True 49ER Fan # on Sep 15, 2009 2:29 PM PDT reply actions
Play calling to confuse the Offense
I believe the ruleling was that they said our guys were “calling offensive signals” to confuse and our disrupt the offense which is illegal I don’t believe they penalized us for calling defense signals.
by WC-Ninerhead on Sep 15, 2009 4:17 PM PDT up reply actions
For once I agree with you....
Our offense needs work if we’re really going to win in a 60/40 run campaign as Jimmy tells us. More on that in a minute. There are a few things I want to point out that actually proved this team (at a minimum) is going in the right direction which was pleasant for me as I’m still skeptical that we truely have a competitive team. Also-I’m discounting all the garbage about the Cards being victims of the SB Curse. They’re a pro football team in the business of winning. I guarentee you Wisenhunt did everything in his power to fire up his team for week one. We beat them, plain and simple.
My observations:
**We won the game. Step in the right direction.
**We won the game on our own. Our defense shut down Warner and took the game from the Cardnals. I can’t remember the last time I’ve personally watched our team take a game from the literally anyone by sheer defensive might. Very impressive. This is not to be mistaken for the Niners of the past seven seasons who won games by miracles, flukes, or another team beating themselves.
**Singletary huddled the defense up in a circle. This was done on the field mind you, during a time-out in a defining moment in the 3rd quarter. Even the announcers said they had never seen a head coach (nor have I) take the entire defense in a circle by himself in an attempt to motivate. So it’s safe to say what we hear is true: he leads by inspiration. That is not lip service becuase:
**What ever he said…worked. Warner was just starting to get the Cards into an all to familiar offensive rythem where we as fans can actually see the niners losing in advance. At least thats my take from the last seven seasons. But this was very different…we played like a well coached, fundamentally focused team, and the defense stepped up and halted the drive.
**And then a bigger abnormaility-to Foochs point-our quarterback led a drive that made our team look like we actually belong in the NFL. We executed on the simple things: The O-lIne protected Hill, a 49er quarterback stood in the pocket and completed passes that were actually planned, we hit our beloved Vernon Davis a few times on short patterns over the middle, Hill even managaed the clock well, and we scored on a run, because the fear of the pass had finally returned!!! Hoooray!!!
So here is my main concern: This was the ONLY drive Hill looked like a pro. We need everyone of our drives to count if this team is actually going to win games legitimally, if at all. And further, we will have no “Jimmy Raye” style run offense if none of our opponents respect the pass. The cards shut the running game down most of the day. It just so happened that the one time the cardinals coundn’t stop us, was a game winning drive by a team that looked like we had won games before. A team I so badly miss. We looked good on this drive folks and we need to mirror that formula.
It’s so nice to even mutter those words again. Say it with me: A game winning drive for the 49ers. Ahhhhhhh.
Was the final drive actually watched?
“And then a bigger abnormaility-to Foochs point-our quarterback led a drive that made our team look like we actually belong in the NFL. We executed on the simple things: The O-lIne protected Hill, a 49er quarterback stood in the pocket and completed passes that were actually planned, we hit our beloved Vernon Davis a few times on short patterns over the middle, Hill even managaed the clock well, and we scored on a run, because the fear of the pass had finally returned!!! Hoooray!!!” by: Forttyner4life
The final drive was not a well executed one by hill. He had five incomplete passes, that were completely due to the fact that he is below average, when going thorugh the checkdowns. One the goal line, he missed gore wide open in the flat twice, before the timeout was called. The niners ran the sam route with gore, and believe or not, for the third straight passing play, gore was wide open in the flat. Hill knew it too, because he looked at gore right away, meaning that in the timeout, someone told him he F’d up twice before, by missing the wide open reciever. Hill is an unacceptable qb, if niners expect to contend for the playoffs at all.
I understand he is not expereiced in many game situations, but he has been around for a long time, and that the O-line was horrible. They couldnt assign blocks and couldnt pick up blitz(the best blockers were in the backfield!!!!!) But if this (S.Hill) is the solution for the niners at qb, for this season, and next……….
It will be a sad waste of a great defense…. A great LB-Willis, and CB-Clements, two of the best at their positions in the league.
by Flying2boston on Sep 15, 2009 6:49 PM PDT up reply actions
For a wk 1 game there is Wayyyy to much analysis!!!
Yes we have a lot of work to do but so does every other NFL team NFC or AFC.. So before everybody in the Niner Nation gets there collective panties in a bunch lets all just settle down and put things in perspective. Every other team is going to look at their wk 1 performance and make changes, adjustments, and fix what they think needs to be fixed. DAMN I do love a win and no matter how ugly or weak this was, lets not get to far ahead of the team and the game. Look forward to Sunday look forward to 2-0 overall and 2-0 in the Div..
GOOOO NINERSSSSS.
by WC-Ninerhead on Sep 15, 2009 6:58 PM PDT up reply actions 1 recs
Cards Defense
The Cardinals game plan was to stop the 49ers running game and make Shaun Hill complete a sufficient number of short to midrange passes under pressure to win. They stacked the box and utilized run blitzes to stop momentum anytime we had anything going. The adjustment made on the last drive using relatively quick release short to midrange passing ended in a successful scoring drive. Oh yes, it was great to see Vernon Davis come thru in the clutch.
They need to continue to use Vernon and Delanie a LOT more.
I feel they are arguably the best threat on our offense after Gore. Both big and Ridiculously fast.
Clearly we will need a ballance attack plan
that will use the pass to set up the run. If you have good success with a mid to long range passing attack then you cause the defense to spread out more and guard against a possible pass there by allowing the offensive line run block more effectively. The opposite is true as well, by having a potent running attack you force the defense to think run and not defense just the pass. Also having a mobile QB that can play fake and pump fake effectively will also freeze the the LB’s just enough to open up the passing attack as well.
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