HUGE San Francisco 49ers News Going Into BIG Game vs. Texans - What The 49ers Must Do To Win Again

HUGE San Francisco 49ers News Going Into BIG Game vs. Texans – What The 49ers Must Do To Win Again

This is the San Francisco 49ers report. My name is Chase Senior. Thanks for hanging out here with me. Coming up on the show, my keys to the game between the Niners and Texans. Matchups to watch, what the Niners must do and accomplish to win this game, and I’ll give you my prediction. Key to the game number one, the 49ers losing Bryce Huff to this hamstring injury over the next couple of weeks is a huge bummer. You’re already without Nick Bosa. You’re already without Fred Warner. Going into the year, Bryce Huff was your number two edge rusher. Without Bosa, he had elevated to that top pass rusher spot. He had been playing really well. And in that game against Atlanta, he dominated. And now the Niners do not have a lot of healthy bodies at the pass rusher spot. Wouldn’t surprise me if they make a trade this week. Huff this year. He’s been fantastic under Robert Solz. They’ve reunited from their Jet days. He didn’t work out with the Eagles. He’s working out with the Niners. Overall PFF grade of 82.3, pass rush grade of 81.4, run defense grade of 65.7. He has tallied 19 pressures, 15 hurries, four sacks. He has nine stops. And all of that has come on 135 pass rushing snaps. The bend that he has, the twitch and the explosion that he has coming off the edge allows him to win a lot of matchups. We’ve seen that all year. And the Niners have been counting on him more and more in recent weeks without Bosa. And he’s passed the test. So without him, Robert Salah once again going to have to get very creative, very exotic and aggressive with how to generate pressure on CJ Stra. Which brings me to key to the game number two. What I thought Robert Solid did an awesome job with against Atlanta when the Ners pressured Michael Penn all night and pushed the pocket, collapsed the pocket and got to him. Robert Salah caught a lot of timely blitzes in some really key situations. This Texans offensive line stinks. And I know I’ve been criticizing this Niners offensive line for a little while. It’s much better than this Texas offensive line, which is one of the worst in the NFL. And hopefully the Niners found something here with their pass rush because against Atlanta as a team, they were able to generate 22 pressures and two sacks with the Seahawks going up against the Texans on Monday night. CJ Strad was lost because he was under siege with all of the exotic looks that Mike McDonald called and presented that Texans offense with his Seahawks defense. So without Bryce of you’re going to miss and be without your top pass rusher at the edge spot. He had five pressures and a sack against Atlanta. Samokuanu had five with the sack. Alfred Collins had three. D. Wyinners had two pressures. Jordan Elliot with two. Kevin Given two. Tatum Bethune won. Chase Lucas Mel Williams also added one. You’re going to need that collective effort again from this Niners defense to once again cause havoc and for this Sunday game beat the Houston Texans. Key to the game number three. Did the 49ers find something with their ground attack? Up until that Sunday night game against the Atlanta Falcons, they had been one of the worst rushing teams in football. 32nd in yards per carry, 30th in rushing yards per game. But the last two games, we’ve seen some improvements, and this is because Kyle Shanahan has made some scheme adjustments. The Ner’s have run it less as far as their zone running scheme. The 49ers zone rushing percentage weeks one through five 61.2%. But in the last two games we’ve seen less zone running 42.6% and more power and gap scheme from Kyle Shanahan. And that led to Christian McCaffrey turning back the clocks looking like the player who he was in 2023 when he won offensive player of the year. It led to this Niners ground attack having its best game of the season. And this Kyle Shanahan offense is at its best when the ground game is humming, when there is balance with this offense because if you can run it successfully, you dictate the pace, the physicality, the flow, the complexion of the game, and it helps out the quarterback and the pass game. Now, with Matt Hennessy replacing Jake Bindle, the NerS because of injury may have found something here as well. Hennessy very well might be an upgrade from Brendle who I will say prior to hurting his hamstring against Atlanta was playing pretty well in that game but Hennessy might be a smaller player but he’s a quicker more agile player and we’re not talking about some journeyman slouch here like Hennessy was a third round pick out of Temple by the Atlanta Falcons and you saw some of the ability against his former team on Sunday night 20 pass blocking snaps Zero sacks allowed, one pressure allowed, zero quarterback hits given up, pass blocking efficiency of 97.5, pass blocking grade of 79.2, run blocking grade of 64.1. And Christian McCaffrey looked incredible on Sunday. Kyle Shanahan went in having a game plan of wanting to run it a lot. Well, Christian McAffrey got a lot of touches. 24 carries on the ground, a buck 29, two rushing touchdowns, 5.4 yards per carry. That number by far his best of the year. Key here to the game number four and another key matchup here. The Niners offensive tackles Trent Williams and Colt McKivvitz will be tested. And Trent Williams is probably coming off the best game of his season because he was excellent on Sunday. Did not give up a single pressure. Colt McKitz has been pretty damn solid all year. But the edge rusher combination for Houston, one of the best in the NFL. Denil Hunter this season, fresh off that contract extension, four sacks, six quarterback hits, four TFLs, and 16 tackles. And then his running mate is the youngster out of Alabama, Will Anderson. He too has four sacks. So Hunter and Anderson have combined for eight sacks this year. Anderson also has seven quarterback hits, seven TFLs, and 22 tackles. Key to the game number five, beware of Derek Stingley. Now, I have certainly cooled on some of these pro football focused grades. They lost a lot of key employees a couple of years ago. Last year, it was up and down. This year, their grading system has been horrible. For instance, they had Gino Smith who had 64 passing yards as a higher graded quarterback this week than Patrick Mahomes. The Raiders got shut out. At one point, the Chiefs had 30 first downs or yeah, 30 first downs to the Raiders 30 plays. Like how does it happen that Mahomes is a lesser graded player than Gino Smith? So when you look at the PFF numbers for Derek Stingley, another recently paid superstar, it doesn’t look all that good. But this is one of the top lock down corners in the NFL. And obviously you have Patrick Certan who’s up there. I think Quinan Mitchell has been playing at that high level. There are some other quarterbacks who are in that tier. Derek Stingley is in that tier. He’s a stud. He does such a great job of reading the receiver, reading the eyes of the quarterback. He’s very opportunistic with the opportunities that present themsel to him. And if you throw it his way and you’re inaccurate or you telegraph your pass, he’s going to make you pay. And I wonder who he’s going to cover in this game because obviously the Niners have been very short-handed at the wide receiver spot. That’s also led to why you’ve seen M. Jones throw the ball really quickly and get rid of it. It’s a formula that it’s crazy that it’s working out that effectively this year, but it’s worked for M. Jones because of the lack of juice at wide receiver. Predict the score. Ner’s Texans. This is a huge game for both teams here in week eight. I think this game is once again going to be low scoring because the Niners haven’t scored a lot of points all season long because they’ve had so many injuries and they’ve been so banged up on offense. So, I think the Niners win this game. I think San Francisco lists their record to six and two. I do think it’s close. The Texans are in desperation mode in a loaded AFC that is really just jumbled up right now. And you keep in mind the AFC South, not a lot of people were expecting the Indianapolis Colts to be as good as they’ve been this year. The Jags better than expected. The Texans worse than expected. So they are playing for their playoff lives. But I just think the Niners are the better coach team, the better team. They’re rolling right now. And I think San Francisco wins.

San Francisco 49ers news and San Francisco 49ers rumors are on the slate for this edition of the 49ers Report. What the 49ers must do in order to beat the Houston Texans as part of our 49ers vs. Texans preview on the show.