The Ringer NFL Show - Anatomy of a (Potential) Super Bowl Champion: San Francisco 49ers | The Play Sheet

Episode Date: February 7, 2024

The Ringer’s Ben Solak breaks down what makes this year's San Francisco 49ers team a potential Super Bowl champion. Subscribe to the 'Ringer NFL' Youtube channel or listen on Spotify to catch more Super Bowl preview content from The Ringer this week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Howdy, I'm Ben Solack. This is Radio Row. We're here live in Las Vegas for the Super Bowl. We've already done our schematic preview for Niners Chiefs upcoming on Sunday. You can watch that here. I've always wanted to do the point to where a YouTube video thing is. I don't know if I'm doing the right side. We're also doing two episodes live from Vegas. And those are on the anatomy of the teams that are here, the Niners and the Chiefs. We want to talk about how these teams built themselves to get to the Super Bowl run. What was necessary for them over the course of this season to arrive here and critically, if there are any lessons the rest of the league can glean from the Niners and the Chiefs. We're starting today with San Francisco.

Any story of the 49ers Super Bowl run starts with the emergence of Brock Purdy, one of the most unlikely, if not the unlikeliest Super Bowl quarterback of the last like two decades. The ex-Mr. Irrelevant has elevated the 49ers offense in meaningful, measurable ways since he took over for Jimmy Garoppolo after his injury in the middle of the 2022 season. Now has been a ton of Brock Pretty discourse over his time as the starting quarterback. We've participated in that discourse here on the play sheet. insert look at video part two. The current discourse is about Purdy the game manager.

They're kind of dumping this title on him as a guy who doesn't elevate the offense in any way. He's just there to manage it. This is not accurate. Anybody who watches Purdy film, we talked about this. So the first episode we did, he had like six total NFL quarters. He clearly brings something to the offense. He brings explosiveness. He brings creativity.

Unlike Jimmy Garoppolo, he is willing to push the football down the field. He is physically capable, quick enough to scramble, to get outside of the pocket, to beat pressure. So even if we have criticisms of Purdy's game, and we also know that he's like super helped by the supporting cast around him, calling him a game manager just isn't accurate. Let's go to play action.

Live play action. Here we go. Let's talk Purdy, the creator, the game changer. This is a very common formation for the Niners this year. Brandon I, Youke, Debo Samuel, tight, right? They're close to the offensive lines. It's very narrow formation. Christian McCaffrey, the single back, they're under center.

In years past for the Niners, this would be like, all right, play action fake, right, you get a bunch of zone flow. going one way and then you go, okay, Brandon Ayuk on the clear out and Debo Samo on the dig. Like, that's what they would run in years past. This year, what they're doing more of is just dropping Purdy straight back from under center. Nope, action. It's kind of weird.

Concept-wise, we're going to get Brandon Ayukes can go vertical. We're going to get Debo Samo going vertical. We're going to get late releases here from Ushik, late release from the tight end. Christian McCaffrey releasing through the line of scrimmage. It initially looks like he has an option route, right? Maybe an option outside, maybe the option to go inside. But I think they're bluffing that. It might really be an option.

I'm not sure. Regardless, McCaffrey ends up being a vertical player outside the numbers, right? They're going to throw this to him down the field. So this is a long developing play, but that's what they want to access. Run the film. Immediate pressure on the interior, right? I mean, Brock is pressure before his dropback ends. You can already see him, though.

He's wheeling out, right? He's going to turn his back and wheel out from this pressure. Watch the quickness of the young man, Brock Purdy. Oh, run and get around, and then rolling to your left, flip your hips and throw. Yes, it does take Christian McCaffrey to the ground. but he's so wide open that it's still a touchdown. Why was he so wide open? Well, once you break the pocket like this, right?

You're outside of the pocket. Beat in pressure. It changes the geometry of the defense, right? And so player here is responsible for McCaffrey, sees Purdy Wheeling and thinks, okay, there's a potential run here, potentially going to throw this. There's going to be scramble drill routes coming this way.

I'm going to take this area. Somebody else back here is going to pick up Christian McCaffrey for me, right? I don't have to worry about that as much. Well, lo and behold, Brock's able to make this throw. on the move. Again, rolling left, right-handed quarterback, not an easy throw, and he makes it. He's an elastic athlete.

He's got flexibility to him. End zone view. Watch the pressure. Watch the rollout. Immediate win. Bail out of the pocket. Find McCaffrey. Flip your hips.

Accurate pass. That is something that Jimmy Garoppolo flat out was not capable of for the 49ers. That's an example of game changing. When people call a game manager, they're trying to use it to, like, besmirch him, right? I've turned to use it to criticize him. Game manager isn't about the quality of your play.

It's about the nature of your play. It describes the characteristic of quarterbacking. Purdy looks for shots downfield. He looks for opportunities to create outside a structure. That's not game managing. It's game changing. People also use the game manager thing to talk about his supporting cast. And there there's no argument.

Purdy has an unbelievable supporting cast. He has arguably the league's best supporting cast. When this was just Kyle Shanahan and Debo Samuel and Brandon I, Yuk, and George Kittle and the offensive line, It already was one of the league's best office of supporting casts. And then they added Christian McCaffrey. Not enough is being made of McCaffrey's season this year. If this were like five or ten years ago, this guy actually would have won MVP.

Instead of just having like, oh, he could be MVP. What if he was MVP season? Like they legit would have given the dude the award. Incredible next Ben stat. Actually next gen stats, but I call it next Ben stats. McCaffrey led the league in yards before contact this year. And then he also led the league in yards after contact this year, which is not how that is supposed to go. And it's a testament to the quality of blocking and the running scheme that he gets

here in San Francisco. But it's also a testament to how good McCaffrey is at turning five-yard runs and a 10-yard runs, turning 10-yard runs into 20-yard runs, so on and so forth. McCaffrey, explosive touchdown number two, this time running play against the Green Bay Packers. Formation should look similar, right? Tight to the core, tight to the core. This time we have a full back in the back field instead of the tight end. But this narrow formation under center, this is what the Niners been living on this year. This is going to be outside zone. Ever heard of Niners run it all the time, right? We're just going to get zone flow, zone flow, zone flow all the way across the board. Because this is a four down front, what the Packers are looking to do is they're

looking to crash this right here, right? Build a big wall with this edge and then turn this run to the inside, right? Make it work in the interior. They don't want to let McAfrey get outside of them, but that means that these interior gaps, that's where McCaffrey's going to be reading. That's where the Packers are going to plug up. So this is the formation. I want to show you the run from the end zone view. End zone view, snap the football. All right, we're tossing this and And what are we looking for? Like initially this looks like, all right, we wanted to get this block right here. Brandon Ayuk is just coming into screen right here, take this DB, and then Kyle Ushik will lead outside, lead on that C gap, and McAfree will follow him, right? That's how this

presents. But because you get this strong flow right here and then a beautiful cutoff block, Jake Brando's center climbing to the second level, you develop an alley right here, Chris McAfrey, with vision takes it. It's going to be one man to beat in that alley. That is Darnell Savage, the safety. Let's watch what happens to Darnell Savage the safety. And then that, right there, you don't see it because the offensive line is in the way. When we see it from the Packers perspective, other end zone view, other end zone view, two end zone views. I'm a rich man.

I have two end zone views. Watch Jake Brendle, the center on the cutoff. Beautiful. All right, so there's our alley. And now beat Darnel Savage in space. And then while he's, he does it so fast, it looks so regular. It's not regular. Watch his right leg, right?

We're going to beat this tackle. His eyes right here on this incoming player. he's going to land on his right leg and then cut. Without getting his feet down, he's going to be able to dodge this contact and he doesn't even see this, but he also avoids this player,

keeps his balance, retains momentum going up field and scores. This, that's freaky. That's not freaking regular. This is how you lead the league in your arts after contact. Heck is that? Look at him as he goes by.

I don't understand how he survived all this, but he did he scores a touchdown. He's incredible. That's McCaffrey the rusher, and he's unbelievable. But what is really like be the difference for the Niners this season, the reason this 2023 offense made it, like led the league in EPA, when other offenses were great but not quite Super Bowl caliber. It has to do with McCaffrey the receiver.

See, this year the Niners are running more empty sets, empty formations than they ever have in the past. And they'll do that in the traditional sense, where they just take their five eligible receivers and line them up out wide. But they also do it in this like weird, quirky, foolish way where they start with McCaffrey in the backfield, and then just motion him out of the backfield and snap the ball with him like five yards behind the line of scrimmage.

That is, I think, the coolest schematic innovation that we've seen from the Niners this year. And to be clear, like, the Dolphins do a similar thing, the Rams have stolen this a little bit. Other Shanahan tree guys are doing this. But fundamentally, the Niners, with McCaffrey, usually in a way that other teams don't. Here's Kyle Shanahan talking about that motion.

The point there is just to keep them empty, but then get them out in space a little bit. Yeah, I mean, when you move guys in the backfield from right to left, we call it bump. and sometimes it's the which is from the right tackle to the left tackle. Then if we want him to keep going, we say bumper. So he just keeps going and you're basically an empty, but no one treats it as empty. So you get a couple different looks and there's different depths of how to run routes.

So it's just a little unusual to how they normally practice stuff. So empty formation without empty checks. Let's take a look at what that actually means. Niners' Rams. This is clearly not an empty formation, right? We got two tight ends. We have the Y, Y, Y, wing action, top of the screen. We got two wide receivers, tight again.

and we got Christian McCaffrey in the back field in the pistol. You very easily hand the football off, run this ball, right? Like, that is available for you in this formation. Well, we're going to, right before we snap it, Christian McCaffrey just bouncing out. They snap the ball right here. This is not empty. Two tight ends running back.

This is not what empty formations are supposed to look like. And so it doesn't for the Rams. Like they're not going to put personnel in the field expecting to see a formation like this. They're not going to put coverage on the field expecting to see this. They end up in a spot where they drop this edge and then they blitz this linebacker. But think about it, the Niners are snapping the ball right now. He's not ready to rush.

Like he's not in a position where he's gonna be able to impact the play. The other thing is that because McCaffrey ends up in the concept, like the geometry of the Rams defense is ruined, right? He ends up into his route. Look at this. Look at, look at, look at, look. That's not good.

It's not how in that, with, that's a big problem, right? And so when you get five in the concept, From what was initially a pistol set with two tight ends, the spacing on defense becomes very challenging. If you're not ready, all the defense, like all seven defenders to go, okay, we're our empty coverage now. Like, quick, get to empty. If you're not prepared for this, it gets the jump on you.

And so I don't know who's wrong here. I can't tell. Like, this feels like, you know, okay, it's like quarters here. Like, maybe this was supposed to be cover three and he's down. Obviously, Ernest Jones was supposed to be in the middle of the field. Like, I cannot tell you what defensively was supposed to end up here. All I know what ends up happening is Brandon Iuke is wide up.

in the middle of the field for the easiest completion that you've ever seen your entire life. And that's because the Niners walked out with a pistol formation. They're going to run the ball in and like a half second later we're an empty. That's weird. It's crazy. And I love it. Using McAfree as like a legitimate receiver running route. So we saw in the first play, big touchdown catch.

But then also as just like a field tilter as a source of gravity, a guy who you can just move around and threaten in a ton of different places. It just creates more space for Brandon, I, you can divo Samuel and George Kittle. And you hand in the ball and it better maximize this. the blocks of Trent Williams and Aaron Bakes and Jake Brendel. Like, he, McCaffrey's been exactly what they traded for. And we don't, we don't talk about this enough. Trade deadline, second round pick, third round pick, fourth round pick for Christian McCaffrey.

And he has just dramatically affected the geometry of the Kyle Shanahan offense. He is the whole kit and caboodle. He is the MVP of the team as far as I'm concerned. So it's worth wondering, right, Niners win the Super Bowl. Chris McCaffrey gets Super Bowl MVP is unbelievable. It's worth wondering if McCaffrey's effect on the Niners will change the way the league thinks about running back, a position they've clearly been devavis. valuing over the last few years. Remember this offseason, we saw Seyquan Berkeley, Josh Jacobs,

Jonathan Taylor, Austin Eccler all go through various holdouts and contract disputes and get extensions, get one year extensions, contract restructures. Running backs are fighting tooth and nail for their value. There's no better single player argument for running back value right now than Christian McCaffrey. The problem is that while we often talk about running back three down value, like, oh, use your running back as a receiver, they'll be more valuable. We talk about that, but there's really very few running backs in the league who can actually line up at wide receiver, run wide receiver routes, and get wide receiver production the way Christian McCaffrey does. When we look at running backs who are lined up at receiver, like those downs in which they're actually lined up out wide,

as McCaffrey's been on these reps, it's been like weird backfield motion, but it's still like wide receiver alignments. McAfri is second only to Kyle Eushik in total number of routes run, and he is first in targets, he's first in receptions, he is first in yards, and he is first in first downs. Like McCaffrey affects the game as a receiver in a way that it's just upper echelon to everybody else. This doesn't really scale to the running back position as a whole. This also brings us back to Purdy. Look at the success of Purdy's Samanthropic a quarterback. Okay, is there anything the league can learn from this? The reality is like probably not. No matter what you think of Purdy, game manager, game changer, top 10 quarterback, top 20 quarterback, top 30

quarterback. You can't argue that the environment in which he landed has been a massive part, The key part of his success as a late round pick. Purdy plays for the best offensive coach for football with some of the best offensive weapons in football in a notoriously quarterback-friendly scheme. Like the bedrock could not be softer, could not be better for quarterback development. So if there's a lesson to be learned,

it's not like, oh, go get a quarterback in the seventh round. It's going to be great. The lesson to be learned is fill the coffers, right? Fill the cabinets. You've got to get wide receivers in tight ends. You've got to get a scheme. You've got to be able to run the football success. You've got to get a Christian McCaffrey.

You have to build the offense such that when you drop your quarterback in it, He can actually develop, grow, and be successful. And remember, it took a lot of misses for the 49ers to get here. They traded first round picks for Trey Lance. They drafted Joe Williams, Turing Davis Price. They didn't get anything out of these guys. It is not easy to build this foundation as they have. You kind of need a Kyle Shanahan to do it,

and there ain't any Kyle Shanahan's free on the streets right now. But there is one thing that Kyle Shanahan does that the 49ers have invested in that I think other teams can learn from. And that is the fullback. Shanahan runs more two back sets than any coach in the line. league and other offenses rely on this as well the dolphins Mike McDaniel has Alecangled out in the field give the Ravens with Patrick Ricard so the fullback is present on some other offenses as well but in general across the league where there's

five eligible receivers they tend to go one running back one tight end and then three receivers put the slot receiver out there and when they want to go heavy personnel when they want to run the football instead of taking that third receiver off the field for a fullback they'll do it for a second tight end instead but for shanahan it's always been the fullback the fullback is essential the first free agent that Kyle Shanahan signed in 2017 when he took the Niners job, Kyle Ushik, taken from the Ravens, the fullback that's still playing today. Why is the fullback important? For Shanahan, it allows him to dictate the terms of offense to the defense.

If you don't have a fullback in there, and there's just certain things defenses can do where you have to throw the ball or you're going to be outnumbered and everything you do, guys can hit you in the backfield. So having a fullback always protects that. It doesn't mean you're going to do it, but it allows you to do it if you want to. So you never have to, you don't have to audible as much. you don't have to change things that the defense puts you in. So that's kind of why we like it.

Football innovation often comes as like a pendulum, right? It's a lot of zgging and then zagging where everybody else zigs. And so we've seen the lead become pass happier. We've seen the lead become pro slot receiver. And that's cool. The zag of the fullback, though, gives defenses looks that they're unfamiliar with, personnel that they're not really well equipped to match. Zagging can be bad, right?

Arthur Smith and the Falcons were trying to zag. They put a fullback on the field. Ask them how that went. So you have to do it with intention. You have to do and understand kind of the levers that you're pressing and the dials that you're turning. But in general, I do think we could see a little fullback renaissance in the NFL. I would go far as to say the fullback is fully back. Cory McConnell liked that one.

Cory McConnell liked it. And that'll do it for us here on the play sheet. Thank you so much for watching. This was our Niners Anatomy of a potential champion. Tomorrow, we're going to be coming out with the Chiefs episodes. Watch out for that. We're on the new feed, the Ringer NFL YouTube feeds. Make sure you watch that and subscribe that.

Make sure you thank Corey McConnell for producing. Make sure you thank Ronik also for producing. We'll catch you tomorrow.