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The San Francisco 49ers backfield should look a lot different in 2020 than it did in 2019. Many expect the team to move on from both Jerick McKinnon and Tevin Coleman to free up some much-needed cap space heading into free agency. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a bond at the position. Running back Jeff Wilson spoke to NFL Network’s Steve Wyche on Wednesday to discuss how close the players are.
First, Wilson answered how a team gets over a Super Bowl loss. This was fresh off him having to sit through a video of Jimmy G and Patrick Mahomes shaking hands. Not cool, NFLN:
It’s hard. I feel like knowing where we came from in our season, previously, before this year, and knowing where we want to go. That’s going to help us. Obviously, the game didn’t turn out the way we wanted it to. But that fuel, I feel like it’s going to give us what we need this offseason for younger players and older players to give them that juice or that extra oomph this offseason and let’s make another run.
Wilson was asked if he looked back on the Super Bowl and wished he could have done anything differently:
If you do that, you’ll watch film and be all day. Everything that’s happened, I feel like it happened for a reason. We just have to go in, look at the tape, and figure out what we have to do ourselves this offseason, and come back and be ready and not make the same mistakes.
Wilson, on if the criticism of Jimmy Garoppolo and Kyle Shanahan is fair:
No, it isn’t. We in the Super Bowl. Both of those guys got to the Super Bowl. With all the criticism, ‘they’d be 4-10, they won’t win this amount of games. They won’t do this, won’t do that. But we got to the biggest stage there is. No matter if we win, lose, or tied, they got there. Those two guys helped us get there. They played a big role in that. I feel like the criticism; they shouldn’t have that at all.
Wilson was asked how the running back room dealt with having to share touches this season:
“In our room, if you check, all of us have a similar background. We all come from undrafted past or the past where we had to take the back road. And all that helps us because we all know what each other is going through because one person’s been through it, one person’s going through it, and like me, I’m just now entering into it. All those guys have been through the same similar situations, so we feed off each other, and I feel like that alone has helped our bond become stronger. And then you add guys like Tevin Coleman, Jerick McKinnon in the room; there’s obviously good, high draft pick running backs. That just helps the room that much more.”
We’ve seen the unity of this team all season. It’s a bond unlike anything I’ve seen, which is why it’s easy to root for this team.