© Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
That was a gut punch.
So much confidence started to bubble to the surface prior to Monday night’s game. There was a belief that the high the 49ers were riding from a season-saving win over the Los Angeles Rams would carry into their new home debut in Arizona. They would beat the Buffalo Bills.
Why not? The gameplan was supposedly stellar. They supposedly knew exactly what Buffalo threw at them.
“I think that’s probably the worst part, is that we knew exactly what they were running,” said Dre Greenlaw. “From head to toe. And we just came up short. It’s just a weird feeling.”
That gameplan, that optimism? It didn’t quite pan out. Not at all, really.
Josh Allen, after a stumble on a failed fourth down conversion early, started to pick apart San Francisco, and concluded his day 32-of-40 for 375 yards and 4 TD. The California native had a joy of a time against his childhood team, with a Dion Jordan sack fumble perhaps the only occasion he felt true pressure.
There were moments, like the quick-fire, five-play touchdown drive at the end of the third quarter—a couple passes to reawaken a dormant Deebo Samuel, a 49-yard trebuchet fling to Brandon Aiyuk, and a 6-yard Kyle Juszczyk receiving touchdown to finish it—which verified the 49ers’ confidence before the game.
And there were other moments—the busted coverage to allow Gabriel Davis a 28-yard waltz into the end zone early in the fourth quarter, Brandon Aiyuk’s bobble-turned-interception, the failed Kendrick Bourne touchdown turned Nick Mullens false start turned Nick Mullens interception—which assured that confidence to be misplaced.
We can get granular about what went wrong, or just realistic.
The facts are, Josh Allen had the time of his life against a 49ers defense which only pressured him occasionally, and only once it was too late. That defense, which has been the backbone of this browbeaten team, finally bent, and simply could not hold down in coverage against Stephon Diggs, Cole Beasley, or even Davis. God forbid if John Brown was available.
And on the other side, you had a 49ers offense which couldn’t get on the field, and when it did, simply wasn’t incisive in the way Buffalo was. By the late third quarter, Deebo Samuel had one touch of the ball, and it was a three-yard rush lined up as a running back.
If you are asking Nick Mullens to win you a gunfight, you might as well surrender.
This team, this year, whether with Mullens or Jimmy Garoppolo, has never been able to counter in games where they trail. They are built to get up early and bully teams with their running backs. They couldn’t do that on Monday night.
Now, the 49ers sit at 5-7. They lean closer towards being a team who will draft in the top-10 than one which will pull a playoff berth out of their rear, but they really lean, once again, towards no-man’s land.
The 49ers are not in control of their own destiny anymore, but there is a path to the playoffs.
Obviously, it means winning out, and getting some help.
San Francisco’s remaining schedule is: Washington (H), Dallas (A), Arizona (A-same as a “home” game), Seattle (H).
If the Rams were to lose out, that would obviously punch San Francisco’s ticket, but that’s not happening. The real path is getting help from the Cardinals… and now the Vikings, too.
Arizona’s remaining schedule: at New York Giants, vs. Philadelphia, vs. San Francisco, at Los Angeles.
Minnesota’s remaining schedule: at Tampa Bay, vs. Chicago, at New Orleans, at Detroit
There are a host of tiebreakers that come into play, but if the 49ers win out and these two teams go 2-2 in their final four games, the 49ers are in. That’s what they have to hope for.
But that’s sort of the point. San Francisco is relying on what roughly amounts to a Hail Mary, and they’re not built to just accept the absurdity of it all and acknowledge that this simply is not their year.
It wasn’t their year at any point.
Not when Patrick Mahomes and Tyreek Hill conspired to end their Super Bowl hopes. Not when Joe Staley retired, necessitating the shipping off of a 2021 third- and 2020 fifth-round draft pick for Trent Williams (a fantastic trade, but left their draft options thread bare). Not when Nick Bosa and Solomon Thomas tore their ACLs a couple plays apart and Dee Ford’s back decided to give out on him. Not when Garoppolo and George Kittle, and more than half the team were unceremoniously relegated to injured reserve.
This season worked in very obvious ways against this team. This team won’t just keel over, but it is right about time to throw in the towel and assess what the future looks like, because this team sure as hell is not making a playoff run.
Richard Sherman says he’s unlikely to come back. What does that mean at corner? Trent Williams, Kyle Juszczyk, Jaquiski Tartt, K’Waun Williams and basically the rest of the secondary are up for new deals. How do you spend that money?
These are all points of order that have loomed larger and larger as this team has inched closer to playoff irrelevance; an impending internal audit.
But after a game in which coaches and players truly thought they would win, the vibe has shifted. This team got shipped off to Arizona and it was alright for the week, because hey, they still had playoff hopes.
Beat Buffalo and this dumpster fire of a season will all be worth it. The trudging through endless injuries would all be worth it.
But they lost to Buffalo.
Sometimes, a loss is just a loss. But Monday’s loss felt like it cut deeper. Players were as dejected as they have been at any point this season since the Jets game, and this team may be recognizing they’ve pushed their limit as far as it can rightfully be expected to be pushed.