So Dennis Erickson thinks it was a bad situation when he came to San Francisco. Uh yeah, only that situation would hire you when coaches are backing out and you went up in flames up in Seattle. The fans were against it from day one (bye-bye, Bill Walsh offense), the salary cap hamstrung the team, and the personnel needed to run Erickson's system just weren’t there (go from west coast to...well, whatever the hell Erickson ran).
He is right that he came into a bad situation though, as his radio interview suggests. Not much you can do when your owner has never run a football team before, among other things.
Still, the 49ers looked terrible when he coached. I said this about Tomsula and I’ll say it about Erickson: It wasn’t that the 49ers were losing, with all those issues and the injuries, losing was a foregone conclusion, it was how they were losing. Regardless if you're putting in your system, lacking players or whatever, the 49ers were a walking Days of Our Lives. This was when Jeff Garcia said “We cannot let the sickness spread” and Terrell Owens showed up to practice in a surgeons mask. This was virtually the same team that went to the playoffs the year before and they finished with a crowd pleasing 7-9.
Ugh.
Erickson wasn’t the problem with the 49ers, but he definitely was a part of it. There really isn't someone to point the finger at for that mess but it was a group-effort in becoming awful and getting that first round pick. He wasn’t the smartest one in the room on that regime, no one was.
Let’s get to the links!
Chip Kelly intends to deploy Hyde in 49ers' pass attack (Patra)
49ers Jeff Hafley Teaching The Art of The Press-Cover Cornerback via Fundamentals (Sakamoto)
Colin Kaepernick sets improved sight on 49ers’ starting QB job (Barrows)
Kaepernick ready to compete for 49ers' starting job (Maiocco)
Video: Hawk Recalls facing Kaepernick in 2012 (NFL)
49ers guard Joshua Garnett gets into action (Barrows)
Colin Kaepernick trying to improve flexibility, vision (Dragon)
Thoughts on each position group following 49ers offseason program (Biderman)
New Colin Kaepernick says it’s time to restart with 49ers (Grant Cohn)
49ers expecting Shady-like things from Hyde, who won't stop running through people (Biderman)