Another week, another San Francisco 49ers loss. A week after embarrassing themselves against the Cleveland Browns, the 49ers lost to the Cincinnati Bengals by a final score of 24-14. They showed some life late, but it was not enough. The 49ers dropped to 4-10 with the loss, and are tied with the Baltimore Ravens, Dallas Cowboys and San Diego Chargers, with the 4-9 Detroit Lions playing on Monday.
This game played out like quite a few home games have played out. The defense showed up better than we saw last week in Cleveland. They did a great job containing Jeremy Hill and Gio Bernard. Hill had a pair of goal line touchdown runs, but the Bengals strong run game was not there this week. AJ McCarron completed 15 of 21 passes for 195 yards, but the Bengals focused on the ground game, and the 49ers were able to contain them.
Of course, the Bengals did not need to do a whole lot of passing in this one. The 49ers turned the ball over four times, including three interceptions and a fumble. Only one of the three interceptions really was Blaine Gabbert's fault. The first two came with Vance McDonald bobbling catchable passes, and letting them fall into the hands of Bengals' defenders. The third interception was on Gabbert, as he waited too long to throw to Jerome Simpson in the end zone late in the game.
This game reminded me of
The 49ers will travel to face the Detroit Lions next weekend for their final road game of the season. Whether or not the Lions beat the Saints, 49ers-Lions will be an important one for draft positioning. The 49ers have struggled on the road, and it will be interesting to see how their Jekkyl-and-Hyde defense performs against the playmakers in Detroit. The Lions have the ability to lay an egg of their own, so this game is a bit unpredictable.