media on the 9ers game…Really, Rams?! Really?!

PFF: LA-SF grades: 49ers’ cornerbacks lead the way in shutout
Highest-graded players and top takeaways from the 49ers’ Week 1 shutout win over the Rams.

https://www.profootballfocus.com/pro-la-sf-grades-49ers-cornerbacks-lead-the-way-in-shutout/

San Francisco 49ers 28, Los Angeles Rams 0

Here are the biggest takeaways and highest-graded players from the San Francisco 49ers’ 28-0 victory over the Los Angeles Rams on Monday night.

San Francisco 49ers

Quarterback grade: Blaine Gabbert, 48.1

Blaine Gabbert leaves too much on the field

Gabbert struggled with his accuracy at times, as he was off target on more than one easy short throw. He did pick up some yards with his legs (84.2 run grade), which will make the 49ers’ run game more effective going forward.

Top offensive grades:

LT Joe Staley, 83.7

TE Garrett Celek, 74.6

WR Jeremy Kerley, 74.5

TE Vance McDonald, 70.3

RB Shaun Draughn, 65.1

Joe Staley earns third-highest grade among NFL OTs in Week 1

The 49ers’ offense wasn’t highly effective Monday night, even though they managed to score 28 points against the Rams. The big plays and consistent execution were missing, and they will need to generate more plays to beat teams better than Los Angeles. The play of Joe Staley and recent addition Jeremy Kerley were the biggest bright spots for the 49ers’ offense. Staley didn’t allow a single pressure on 44 pass-block snaps, and Kerley caught 7 of 11 targets.

Top defensive grades:

CB Tramaine Brock, 91.7

CB Jimmie Ward, 87.1

S Eric Reid, 86.6

LB NaVorro Bowman, 85.9

DI Quinton Dial, 82.6

49ers’ cornerbacks lead the way in shutout

This was a poor display of offensive football from both teams, but the 49ers never really allowed the Rams’ offense to do anything. San Francisco’s defenders on all three levels graded very well against L.A., but expectations of similar performances will have to be tempered, as the Rams have one of the league’s worst offenses. Tramaine Brock was the 49ers’ highest-graded defensive player; he was targeted eight times in coverage and yielded three catches for only 16 yards, and Case Keenum’s QB rating when throwing into Brock’s coverage was just 45.8.

Los Angeles Rams

Quarterback grade: Case Keenum, 43.4

Case Keenum underwhelms in season debut

Case Keenum spent most of the game Monday night staring at a tablet screen, wondering what went wrong. He only completed 3 of 10 passes that were targeted 10 yards or more downfield. Keenum’s QB rating when blitzed by the 49ers was 4.9.

Top offensive grades:

RB Todd Gurley, 74.4

WR Kenny Britt, 73.7

LG Rodger Saffold, 71.7

RG Jamon Brown, 49.8

WR Brian Quick, 49.5

Solid debut for Todd Gurley, but no support from Rams around him

The Rams’ offensive line failed to generate much push in the run game, and allowed 19 pressures on Keenum. L.A. dropped six passes against the San Francisco. Running Back Todd Gurley forced seven missed tackles on his 17 rushing attempts, but other players are going to need to step up for the Rams’ offense, or this is going to be a long and ugly season for the team.

Top defensive grades:

DT Aaron Donald, 93.3

S T.J. McDonald, 86.8

DT Michael Brockers, 83.1

S Maurice Alexander, 81.9

LB Alec Ogletree, 78.5

DT Aaron Donald continues his disruptive ways

Aaron Donald was our top player in the league last season, and looks to once again be playing at a ridiculously high-level, as he was dominant before his ejection. Donald earned a 94.0 pass-rush grade and a 84.8 run-defense grade against the 49ers as he continued to get into the backfield so quickly that plays were almost instantly doomed.

PFF Game Ball Winner: 49ers CB Tramaine Brock

Zooey wrote:

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/rams-set-football-back-100-years-49ers-pitch-28-0-shutout-6-things-to-know/

Will Brinson @WillBrinson
Final updated Rams drive chart. This is not a joke nor a drill:

PUNT
PUNT
PUNT
INT
PUNT
PUNT
PUNT
PUNT
PUNT
PUNT
INT
PUNT
TURNOVER ON DOWNS
10:19 PM – 12 Sep 2016

That’s not accurate , they ended the game kneeling in victory formation….losing 28 to 0

This made me laugh.

I mean, this is from an opposing player.

I dont even know what to say about this. I mean, he almost sounds disappointed :

“We came out expecting the Rams to play better than they did,”

49ers’ NaVorro Bowman.

wow i thought grob played well. didn’t even get a mention in the pff grades.

“Yeah, it’s definitely embarrassing,” said Keenum. “I’m a winner. I know Todd is a winner. Everyone in that locker room is winners.”

I think, technically, one needs to win in order for this statement to be true.

Whicker: The LA Rams took 22 years to come back and weren’t ready when the bell rang

Mark Whicker, LA Daily News

http://www.dailynews.com/sports/20160912/whicker-the-la-rams-took-22-years-to-come-back-and-werent-ready-when-the-bell-rang

SANTA CLARA — The San Francisco 49ers played their 2015 season opener on a Monday night, too. They had a new coach, Jim Tomsula, and a boatload of apprehension. But somehow they drew courage from their night on stage and beat up on Minnesota, 20-3.

At season’s end the Vikings were in the playoffs and the 49ers were 4-12 and Tomsula was asked to surrender his parking pass.

In 2013 the Chargers played a Monday Night opener at home against the Houston Texans, who were feeling postseason vibes. San Diego rolled to a 28-7 lead. Then Matt Schaub and the Texans sensed how uncomfortable San Diego can be under those circumstances and roared back to win, 31-28.

Houston beat Tennessee the next week in overtime and lost every one of the remaining 14. Schaub became such a pick-6 dispenser that he nearly got hired by Powerball, and then got hurt. The Chargers picked themselves up, won four of their last five games, and even won a playoff game in Cincinnati.

So Week One is no fortune teller. But some truiths are self-evident.

The Rams strutted back into Los Angeles this year, sold uniforms and T-shirts by the truckload, bared their souls and their vocabulary on HBO’s “Hard Knocks.” Given their first chance to validate that with some football that counts, they whiffed.

They did almost nothing right in this loss to San Francisco, 28-0. If they don’t find their way soon, like on Sunday against Seattle, the honeymoon will be more contentious than the divorce.

They did their best to remind us how placid and fulfilling these past 22 years have been.

Their first half could not have been more brutal. Their deepest penetration was to the San Francisco 33-yard line, which is where Todd Gurley decided to fling the ball at the 49ers’ Tremaine Brock to earn an unsportsmanlike conduct call. Otherwise they had five first downs, seven completions and six punts, a department in which they led the NFL last season.

There will be kneejerk criticism of Case Keenum, who was never going to make the fantasy-league participants happy, and, no, he wasn’t very good. In the third quarter he stopped the Rams’ most serious drive with an interception to Ray-Ray Armstrong. But the offensive line was outquicked all night, and the 49ers went all-out to stop Gurley, whose longest run in the first half was five yards.

More worrisome was a defense that has been living on tomorrow for several years now. It rarely even endangered Blaine Gabbert in the first half, and gave up 40 yards rushing to the former Jaguar when it kept vacating the middle of the field. By then the Rams were snake-charmed by Carlos Hyde, one of the better make-you-miss guys in the NFL. Hyde got sublime blocking from Zane Beadles and tight end Garrett Celek on his first touchdown of the half, and then Shawn Draughn darted around end for his second. There were no edges being set by anybody on the Rams’ defense.

San Francisco, which doesn’t care about time of possession in Chip Kelly’s drag-race football, ran 10 more plays than did the Rams in the first half and rushed for 123 yards, at 5.3 per attempt. The 49ers also had 16 first downs to the Rams five.

Maybe the defensive players that the Rams shed, for economic reasons, were hard to replace after all. Chris Long looked fine at New England Sunday night, and Jim Laurinaitis was the Saints’ second-leading tackler. Rodney McLeod is in Philadelphia, Janoris Jenkins with the Giants.

Los Angeles’ ineffectiveness was matched only by its distemper. Joyner picked up a defensive holding penalty right before Draughn’s touchdown, and later dropped a football that Gabbert absolutely stamped and delivered right into his hands. Aaron Donald had a roughing-the-passer penalty. Trumaine Johnson recovered a fumble by Draughn, then got into it with the 49ers’ Torrey Smith and was lucky he wasn’t flagged for that.

It underlined how crucial Johnny Hekker is to the operation. He led the NFL in punts last year, with 96, and had nine in the Rams’ first 10 possessions Monday night.

But it won’t tamp down the tension and controversy about the quarterback position, an old story with the Rams, going back to Bob Waterfield and Jim Hardy. They must have known how unprepared Jared Goff would be for NFL play-calling and nomenclature. They still dealt away a chance for three solid players to pick him first in the entire draft, and now he’s the No. 3 quarterback. Anybody who thought the Rams are One Quarterback Away from NFL prominence is not dealing in reality.

Ozoneranger wrote:

Can we move this to the SF Game thread? I brain farted again.

“Move” is malfunctioning at the moment. So here’s what we can do. You can copy it and then paste it in a new post in the game thread. Once that’s done I delete it here.

Deal?

EDIT: see below, newer response to you.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by zn.

Five Takeaways — Rams at 49ers

Myles Simmons

http://www.therams.com/news-and-events/article-1/Five-Takeaways-%E2%80%94-Rams-at-49ers/31474b47-2477-4330-9c20-306fa24761c2

The Rams started the season on a sour note, losing 28-0 to the division-rival 49ers on Monday Night Football. Los Angeles will have a short week in preparation for Seattle in the club’s home opener. Here are five takeaways from the first week of the season.

1) Poor offensive production

Whenever a team does not score, it’s clear there was poor offensive production. The numbers bear that out, as the Rams’ offense experienced many of the same issues that plagued the unit in 2015.

Los Angeles had only 185 total yards, 10 first downs, and finished 3-of-15 in third-down efficiency — a clear indication the club could not sustain drives.

“Obviously, disappointed in some of the lack of offensive production,” head coach Jeff Fisher said after the game. “The third-down efficiency, scoring, and the run game was not there tonight. I’ll credit their defense. But, those things were problematic for us last year. I believe we’ve improved in those areas, we just didn’t show it. And we have to show it.”

‘According to quarterback Case Keenum, the 49ers mixed up coverages well, particularly on third down. Those looks gave the Rams issues throughout the contest.

“They did a really good job mixing up, especially on third down, a lot of looks that we haven’t seen before,” Keenum said. “And, you know, it’s no excuse, though. We’ve still got to convert.”

2) Defense starts slow

Los Angeles’ defense came alive in the second half, forcing four three-and-outs to begin the third quarter. Fisher said the unit made some key halftime adjustments that worked well.

But the unit still allowed 28 first downs — the 49ers highest output in a game since 2012.

“I was a little disappointed with the defense early, but the defense — we made adjustments at halftime, settled down. Got numerous, back-to-back three-and-outs, and gave us an opportunity to get some drives started offensively,” Fisher said. “We just couldn’t get points.”

Niners quarterback Blaine Gabbert gave the Rams trouble with his legs, rushing nine times for 43 yards. He was able to slip out of the pocket a few times, scrambling for first downs on three third-down situations.

“Coming into the game, Blaine was a concern of mine — just his legs,” Fisher said. “Obviously, he showed us what he can do. He can pull it down and run and break your back.”

Linebacker Alec Ogletree said San Francisco didn’t necessarily do anything unexpected, instead Los Angeles’ defense simply did not execute the way it needed to.

3) Too many penalties

The Rams were flagged 10 times for 102 yards — too many for one game.

Two of the most significant offenders were two of the Rams most important players, running back Todd Gurley and defensive tackle Aaron Donald. Gurley was flagged for taunting after converting a 4th-and-1 into a first down with a three-yard run. That penalty moved L.A. back 15 yards, despite a first down.

Donald was ejected after two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties later in the contest.

“I let emotion get the best of me,” Donald said “No excuses — I can’t make mistakes like that to hurt my team.”

Those fouls were uncharacteristic for both Donald and Gurley, and will likely be corrected right away.

4) “This isn’t us”

If there’s a silver lining, it’s that this game came in Week 1. Oftentimes around the NFL, teams make significant improvements between the first two games of the season. And Gurley brought up one comparison in particular that may bode well for the team’s fortunes.

“It’s a long season,” Gurley said. “You look at last year, [the 49ers] played Monday night against the Vikings [in Week 1]. They beat the Vikings pretty bad. The Vikings still went on to the playoffs. So, we’ll shake this game off. And, like I said, it’s a long season. We’ve still got 15 more games to go.”

Both Gurley and Keenum used the refrain “This isn’t us” to describe the offense’s performance.

“I see it every day at practice,” Gurley said. “I know this is not us. This is not us at all. I don’t know what we did, but like I said, we’ve got to do something right and go out there and execute next week.”

“We’re fighting. And, I’ll tell you, everybody in that locker room hates not winning,” Keenum said. “And it’s frustrating when you’re not doing it. So we just have to go out and fix the problems and do us. Be us. Offensively, that wasn’t us.”

L.A. will need to get back on track with better execution against the Seahawks next week.

5) Extra points

— Middle linebacker Alec Ogletree led the Rams with 12 tackles, according to the press box stats.

— Safety T.J. McDonald had four tackles for loss to lead the team in the category. In all, Los Angeles had eight tackles for loss.

— In his regular-season Rams debut, defensive tackle Dominique Easley forced a fumble that cornerback Trumaine Johnson recovered for the Rams’ one takeaway of the game.

— Wide receiver Kenny Britt led the club with four receptions for 67 yards.

— While Cody Wichmann got the start at right guard, the Rams rotated at the position, splitting the reps between Wichmann and Jamon Brown almost evenly. Wichmann had 29 snaps, Brown had 32.