Both games stunk, but the clash between the San Francisco 49ers and the Los Angeles Rams was a real doozy.
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49ers head coach Chip Kelly, don’t get too excited.
Of Los Angeles’ 13 possessions on the night, the Rams punted 10 times, were intercepted twice and had one failed fourth-down conversion late.
Coming off an efficient, encouraging preseason in which he handily beat out No. 1 overall pick Jared Goff for the starting job, Keenum looked overmatched against a 49ers defense that doesn’t project to be anything special. “He’s a very rare athlete in that there aren’t many people that are that accurate throwing the football, that can run as well as he can run and have that size”.
The Rams lost the ball on a turnover and couldn’t capitalize when they forced one.
However Monday night saw a welcome break from boring broadcasting protocol when one man chose to invade the pitch at Levi Stadium, San Francisco. Neither player even dressed for the opener. Coach Pete Carroll expects him to play this week.
Sometimes the offense works and sometimes it doesn’t. This time a year ago, former 49ers head coach Jim Tomsula had his first win of the season, in the same stadium, and on the same night of the week.
Carlos Hyde jukes to his left and goes straight up the middle on this run, thanks to 49ers tight end Garrett Celek’s (88) TD-sealing block on linebacker/safety Mark Barron (25).
In theory, it’s easy to preach alignment and assignment to your pass-rushers and ask them to stay disciplined, but that’s where the tempo enters into the equation, as the constant hurry-up forced mistakes by the Rams.
Kelly called the win a team effort, praising the offense, defense and special teams. However, it was the 49ers first shutout victory since a 2012 34-0 win over the New York Jets. Goff was inactive as the third QB for the Rams and Garnett is buried on the depth chart in San Francisco. The team didn’t seem ready but with next week’s game at home against the Seattle Seahawks the team better get the A game ready.
The 49ers’ defense isn’t the Broncos, but it has enough to make life potentially troublesome for Cam Newton and company.
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Rams Coach Jeff Fisher said last week that after all the moves his team made in the last few months – to Oxnard, to Irvine and finally to Thousand Oaks – other teams would not care. And while that in and of itself wasn’t all that great-why do people continue to do this when they know they’re going to get arrested and fined for doing it?-it took a pretty great turn when National Football League play-by-play radio broadcaster Kevin Harlan chose to have some fun with it by narrating the guy’s every move.
