Well, that was certainly interesting. The San Francisco 49ers just won a penalty-laden game (can you guess who the penalties were called on?) over the Detroit Lions and moved to 5-1 on the season. It was ugly, but what's different about this ugly game was that it was hard-fought between two teams who deserve to be 5-1 right now. As opposed to what we've seen in the past ... an ugly game, an ugly loss, and not much good.
But there was plenty of good, I have a few more bullet points to touch up on. But first ... did you happen to catch the postgame? Jim Harbaugh was excited, jumping around, very enthusiastic ... came to Jim Schwartz, shook his hand and slapped him on the back. I concede that he was a bit too enthusiastic, and Harbaugh said in the press conference that he shook his hand too hard.
But Schwartz suddenly turned into a man possessed, ran down Harbaugh for 40 yards, got in his face, and had to be restrained by Anthony Davis, Vernon Davis, and a 49ers PR person, if you can believe it. Schwartz said that Harbaugh offered up an obscenity, any guess as to what it was? Perhaps a "WHAT THE FRENCH, TOAST?" Who knows? Below is the video of Harbaugh's handshake and celebration, and Schwartz's reaction. Here's a link to the beginning of his reaction, which seems to be cut out. And after the jump, some bullet points.
- The high passes from Alex Smith to Michael Crabtree need to stop. Aside from the big completion, which needed to be thrown high for it to make it to him, Smith seriously looked bad with most of his Crabtree targets. He had an interception on one of them, and totally missed Crabtree wide open down the seam in the fourth quarter. I don't know if they decide they want it like that, but it's bad.
- As for the Schwartz stuff, it is much ado about nothing. It's not going to go anywhere and nothing will happen of it, but I find it hilarious how Jim Schwartz responded. Come back and beat Harbaugh next time if he hurt your feelings.
- I do have to question Harbaugh's play-calling a little bit. After that big completion to Crabtree, they came out and passed it again a bunch of times, and were forced to punt. At that point, Frank Gore had around seven rushes and 120+ yards. One reader commented how you can't start playing the clock, but running the football is not playing the clock. Especially when you have 120+ yards via one of your two hot running backs.
- Outside of the brain-dead penalty on special teams, I like the play of Chris Culliver. I won't lie, I got extremely nervous, my butt may have puckered a little bit, when I saw him covering Calvin Johnson alone on that deep ball, but it was fine.
- Aldon Smith. That is all.
- Also, Andy Lee.
- Plus David Akers.