Taking a look at Eli Harold, Corey Lemonier against the Cowboys

When I set about making gifs of the preseason matchup between the San Francisco 49ers and Dallas Cowboys, I was mostly interested in seeing what guys like Eli Harold and Corey Lemonier were able to do, especially given the situation with Ahmad Brooks. As you probably noticed yesterday, I did get quite sidetracked by undrafted rookie Marcus Rush and wound up writing about how he's now on my radar and I'm pretty excited to see what he has to offer the team

But I did manage to capture a bit of what Harold and Lemonier accomplished. I thought Harold looked fast and alert in that game, a lot more "game ready" than I was led to believe by the pre-draft hype machine. Harold didn't have many huge plays, but he tracked the ball well, showed off some solid pass-rushing moves and ultimately looked like he had a higher motor than the guys around him.

Lemonier also played well, I thought. He also tracked the ball well, and I thought he did well in not getting pushed around in the running game, but he also didn't apply much pressure on the quarterback. He doesn't seem to be using his long arms super effectively, but he's certainly looking better than he has in the past.

I did make some gifs of them, though there wasn't anything major there were some nice plays. Here's Harold combining with Quinton Dial for a sack, something we could realistically see in the regular season this year:

Pay no attention to Lemonier tripping and falling on the left side ... I actually didn't notice that until I uploaded this gif but in a post that was supposed to look at the positives of these guys, Lemonier falling down while Harold secures a sack probably wasn't the best thing to show. But hey, these are the 49ers, you know? This is what they are!

I did actually go and watch ever Cowboys short gain, sack or incomplete pass and I don't think there was a ton more from these guys but there were some things worth pointing out.

There wasn't a lot Harold can do on this play, but he did time his rush pretty perfectly, and if that throw is any less quick, he gets a sack or maybe even a sack fumble which would have been excellent. He's fast off the snap, and that's good to see. Let's hope that quickness doesn't translate to offsides or encroachment penalties given the guy he's likely to replace in the starting lineup.

I really like what Quinton Dial does on this play on the right side, but I also thought Lemonier also looked solid. He kept his hands active, and while he wouldn't have gotten the sack on his own, he wasn't engaged enough to the point for the Dallas quarterback felt comfortable, and ultimately got outside to chase him down and force the throw. It wasn't an amazing play by any stretch, but a solid one overall.

There's not a lot here also, because it's another quick pass and the Dallas quarterback steps up into his pocket, but both Lemonier and Harold do get the better of their guys initially, Harold especially. The tackles redirect like they're supposed to, but that ball might have come out quicker than the Cowboys initially wanted due to that pressure. Again, nothing incredible here, but still something worth looking at, right?

Again, I thought Harold and Lemonier had solid games overall. I wanted to capture a few plays here and there just because these guys are both super important going forward, so we need to see how they're looking even if there's no highlight reel here. Plus there's also this:

I wanted to embed that one, because ya know, why not? I also put together a gif of the Shawn Lemon sack, which you can find here, and also a few others involving Lawrence Okoye and the like that we probably won't write about, but that I'll probably Tweet out, so give me a follow, yeah?