First off i want to say how excited i am about our win against the defending NFC Champions on their home turf.  It could well be a defining victory for our franchise and our new head coach.  But we must remain grounded in our expecations and realize that it is just one game no matter how important it may have been.  In fact this game means absolutely nothing if the 49ers lay an egg and lose to Seattle in the home opener.  ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!!! Let me take the optimistic approach for a second.  Frank Gore ran the ball 22 times for 30 yards and we still won the game.  The sign of a good team is still being able to win when your stars don't produce and the strength of your team isn't apparent.  Teams that end the season in the playoffs find a way to win these games no matter how ugly they are.  Also do any of us expect Frank Gore to be bottled up like that again in 2009?  I don't!!!

                     Secondly,  the 49ers hit Kurt Warner 8 times,  sacked him 3 times and pressured him 22 times.  These are numbers that our defense have not seen in a few seasons.  Granted Warner is the most immobile QB in the NFL,  but multiple times i saw our defense push their line back and that is a great sign.  We expect what we saw from Justin Smith and to some extent Parys Harrelson,  though he was just a monster all day.  But Manny Lawson,  although not recording a sack did pressure Warner a few times.  Now to the secondary.  Wow is all i have to say about their play, it was absolutely stunning.  Nate Clements,  Shawntae Spencer, Dre Bly,  Michael Lewis, Dashon Goldsen and yes even Mark Roman played a whale of a game.  Clements looked like the CB we signed from Buffalo,  even more so he looked incredibly improved from his first 2 seasons with the 49ers.  But i have always had faith in him as a corner.  The huge surprise of the game came from Shawntae Spencer who shoed shutdown ability,  yes you heard me right,  shutdown ability.  He blanketed Fitzgerald,  Moray and Bolden all game long.  In fact when matched up with Fitzgerald and Bolden he only allowed 3 receptions.  That is simply stunning for a player none of us really paid much attention to before Singletary named him starter.  If he can be that shutdown guy that will make our secondary that much better.  Of course it's easy to look good when the front 7 is putting pressure on the opposing QB all game long.  Patrick Willis,  well i will just say one thing "One of the best defensive players in the game,  he has the chance to be one of the best ever"

                 Now the bad,  Our offense looked predictable and stagnent all day up until that deciding drive.  David Baas played an absolutely horrible game and Adam Snyder looked overmatched at time.  Rachal and Staley were their usual solid selves.  One saving grace is that we do have Tony Pashos waiting in the wings to take over for Snyder at anytime and Tony Wragge has proven to be a solid guard when in the game so we are not without options.  "happy feet" Hill as i will call him looked really really really bad at times, like he didn't even belong in the NFL,  he missed wide opened receivers by not taking his eye off the #1 option,  staired down receivers at least 8 times.  When pressured it seemed he paid more attention to the defenders then the receivers and that is just not acceptable.  But the W is all that counts and he came through big time when it mattered.  22 rushes for 30 yards (Frank Gore),  well that cannot be blamed on him as stated above two of our offensive linemen looked lost all game and they must improve in order for our offense and team in general to be successfull

                  This was a big win for the 49ers,  but we have to put it in perspective.  We are a good team but our margin for error is slim and we must play better then that if we expect to win the division this season,  i expect us to play better in the coming weeks.  You only have to be better then your opponent on any given day and we were better then Arizona on Sunday.  The coming weeks will tell weather this team is ready to contend.  This is why.  We have three winnable games coming up in the next three weeks.  at home against Seattle and St. Louis and on the road against Minnesota.  The Seahawks as reported earlier on this site are going to be without Leroy Hill as well as Walter Jones and Marcus Trufant, Three of the teams best players. Of course the Seahawks looked good against St. Louis but c'mon so would my high school team LOL.  Which brings me to that game,  there is absolutely no reason why we cannot control that game against the Rams.  Minnesota looked beatable against Cleveland on Sunday well until AP broke loose like he usually does.  But our run defense is solid because of Willis and Spikes.  If we can contain Peterson to some extent (90-110 yards) then we have a good chance to pull off the upset against Minnesota.  The key to that game is ball control,  no mistakes and a good running game which will be hard against the Williams wall.  The point of this is to show that it isn't unreasonable to believe the 49ers can be 4-0 going.  If we end the first quarter of the season 2-2 then that will show that this team isn't ready for the big time in the NFC.  But if we can somehow pull out a 4-0 or 3-1 record then the rest of the NFL will have to pay attention to this tough,  passionate and solid team