49ers REACTION: How Mac Jones, Brock Purdy, George Kittle looked | Good News on SF’s math

49ers REACTION: How Mac Jones, Brock Purdy, George Kittle looked | Good News on SF’s math

Some good news for the 49ers. Brock Pury is back out on that practice field for the second straight day. Looks like there’s plenty of zip on his passes. I will tell you though that M. Jones is likely to start on Sunday against the Atlanta Falcons. That’s just based on the division of labor that I see at practice. It seems to be similar to what we saw before week three against the Arizona Cardinals when M. Jones did indeed start. Now, there’s a chance that Brock Perie is either QB2 or emergency QB3 for the 49ers. In fact, I’d say that the possibility of that is growing throughout the week as Pertie does reapproach 100%. The 49ers strategy here is simple. We got to get Brock Perie back up to 100% or as close to it as possible to have an elite offense. That is the pathway to contention for the 49ers this year. Again, I mentioned it on the live earlier. There are no elite teams in the upper right this season. It’s all about teams just straddling either the X or the Y- axis. The Y-axis about good defense, the X-axis about good offense. There’s nobody in that firm upper right where the 49ers found themselves in 2022 and 2023. So, in this NFL of parody, there is opportunity. Even though the 49ers are beaten up defensively, they just got to move their dot to the right. And to do that, they they need an offense with as high of a ceiling as possible. That’s only going to happen if Brock Perie returns fully healthy and stays that way, which is why they’re playing the long game in this instance. Now, good news regarding M. Jones is that that he’s feeling good. You can see here M. Jones even playing some receiver for the 49ers. Christian McCaffrey is the one playing quarterback. McCaffrey to Jones to Adrien Martinez. Nice little trick play for San Francisco. Uh, another piece of news is that Dominic Puny was back out at practice today. The right guard was out of Wednesday’s session with a knee issue, probably related to the knee issue that traces all the way back to week two of the preseason and obviously one that has slowed Dominic Pun’s play this season. So, he was able to take the day off on Wednesday. We’ll see if that helps him in his performance in the game on Sunday. I assume that Dominic Puny is on track to start for the 49ers since he was at practice on Thursday. No Ricky Pierol. We didn’t expect him this week based on how it all started on Wednesday. I would expect Ricky Pieraw. I I did have a chance to chat with him briefly. He said he’s feeling a lot better. I would expect him to be back the following week against the Houston Texans, a team that plays really good defense, not so good on offense. So it might be good for the 49ers to return some weapons for that game against the Miko Ryans in Houston. No YouTuber Gross Mats, not surprising dealing with the hamstring. And you know, somebody posted yesterday that that 49ers pass rush was one of the best in the league week one when this all started. I mean, RIP to to that pass rush, but they had Bosa on one edge, they had Bryce Huff on the other. We’re just talking about lightning package, NASCAR package stuff. U Gross Matoss in the middle and Mikel Williams also rushing against the inside. I mean those guys that that group that foresome closed out two games in two weeks, right? Nick Bosa week one against the Seattle Seahawks, Bryce Huff week two against the New Orleans Saints. I mean to deliver in crunch time that is the measure of a really really good offensive line. And the 49ers had two closes in two weeks. They’re Mariano Rivera twice in a row. And and now it gross Matoss is out with his hamstring. Nick Bosa’s obviously done for the 49ers. They’ve still got Mike Kell up there and you know they they still have Bryce Huff and those are two players who who I think have done some really good things for the 49ers this year, but it is a far cry. We hardly knew ye a hard far cry from the initial 49ers four-man pass rush of this season. Which is why uh we’re going to be watching the Bengals game tonight. not to see Trey Hendrickson, who won’t play due to his injury. He He was daytoday this week, though. So, I I I think that he should be available soon, but but to see if the Bengals lose, they’re five and a half point underdogs to the Pittsburgh Steelers, division rival. If the Bengals lose, that’ll be five straight defeats for them. And even though they’ve been talking a big game about wanting to contend, it’s going to be really hard to justify two and five. and then maybe they lose to the 0 and6 or maybe even 0 and7 Jets by the time the next week rolls around. Probably not. But it’s not looking good for the Bengals. They’re one of the worst teams in football. If you go back to the XY chart that I put up a little bit earlier, they’re in the same spot as the Titans. It is absolutely brutal for Cincinnati. So watch closely tonight because Trey Hendrickson, Miles Murphy, couple edge rushers the 49ers would be interested in on that Bengals team to try to spruce up this pass rush which has lost so much. But you guys know me, I train regularly. I have to so I could do all my swims in the San Francisco Bay to Alcatraz and back. And I’ve got to fuel myself properly in order to accomplish all of this. Well, it’s important to ingest the right protein. And that’s why I’m so excited to team up with Transparent Labs because their grass-fed whey protein isolate has made it really easy for me to hit my protein goals in a clean and healthy way. Trust me, this stuff works. 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You will be very, very happy with the quality of this product and you’ll be happy with the diversity of flavors. QR code on the screen, link in the description. Make sure you check it out. We didn’t see Marquez Valdez Scantling at today’s 49ers practice. Supposedly a calf issue for Marquez Valdez Scantling according to Matt Barrows. Jordan Watkins though, the rookie back out there and it increasingly seems that that he might make his NFL debut for the 49ers the on Sunday against the Falcons in prime time. Now Sky Moore with the ankle injury was back out at practice today. So we’ll see where the 49ers are with him as the punt returner. I know they’re not happy about him fielding the punts inside the 5yd line, but when he missed Wednesday’s practice, it looked like Watkins might have a little window on special teams. And maybe he still will if he does return for the 49ers, but you know, rookie punt returner in in prime time career debut. Maybe that’s not something that the 49ers are willing to do. We’ll see. The Eddie Pinero article that I wrote, I think you have to read this just to understand the way that the math has changed for the 49ers. They they’re plus seven expected points, 6.8 to be exact, in special teams against Tampa Bay. And it is such a cool story because Eddie’s dad, Eddie Senior, had a heart attack a couple months ago. Was finally able to watch him play because Eddie bought his parents a house in Miami a few years ago. So they were able to drive to the game because Eddie Senior has yet to be cleared following the heart attack to fly. So Eddie felt a lot of pressure to deliver in front of his parents and deliver he did. But when you normally, you know, a story like this, you talk about kickers and uh it’s just a fun side story, right? But this actually has real impact on the 49ers playoff chances. Like Eddie has come in made 15 of 15 field goals and totally changed the equation for San Francisco when we look at the expected points per game. I mean plus 6.8 in a game against that kept the game against Tampa close because I mean they got their asses kicked on on offense and and defense. In other games the 49ers special teams like the one against Arizona is actually what what pulled it out for for San Francisco. So, as long as you can get any given row on the EPA chart to add up to some over zero to be in the positive, you’re probably going to win that game. And special teams shows us if they can get plus a couple points at least or in in the case of Sunday, plus seven points on special teams, what the 49ers have to do is just not be horrific defensively, which I don’t think is that tall of an ask. I mean, they have lost Bosan Warner, but just find a way to patch it together. They still have Robert Solah leading the show. They’ve got some rookies that they really like. Just stabilize there and then let the offense, this is back to the top of the show. Let the offense do its job be as elite as possible. Top five offense combined with a number 20 defense, something that’s just bad but not horrific. Something that a little bit below average combined with Eddie Pinero and a really solid special teams in a league of parody. That’s something that could actually keep the 49ers in contention up until the very end. And that’s all you can really ask for. And then of course, I mean, earlier today, we talked about the potential Fred Warner return. That’s just something to just casually mention at this point. I will say that Jay Rice in 1997, tore his ACL week one, was back by week 16. He did reinjure his ACL against Mike Shanahan’s Denver Broncos. Kyle might have been at that game or Ky maybe Kyle was already in college at that point. Ky I think Kyle was in high school at that point. It was a candlestick though. Jerry Rice caught a touchdown and that’s where he reinjured his his knee. But if Fred Warner can come back for the Super Bowl might be willing to take on some some risk of reinjury for for the legacy. We can talk about that further down the road. The 49ers need still need to talk to the doctors following Fred Warner surgery at Stanford. It’s going to happen a little bit later this week. On to the Falcons, who I mean, the same team that lost 30 to nothing to Carolina went out and beat Buffalo by 10. And I don’t think the game was even that close. I think it wasn’t competitive at all. They rushed for 6.8 per carry against the Buffalo Bills. You’ve got Bejian Robinson at the running back position, Drake London at receiver. Big catch radius for Drake London. Sticky hands. Ronaldo Green was back at practice. I know you’ve been limited with the neck issue and the 49ers worked out three corners the other day. Turns out that that they didn’t sign any of them, which means they probably have confidence that their outside corners are going to be healthy, but but they’re going to have a big big challenge against this excellent Atlanta receiver in Drake London. Now, last week the 49ers didn’t do a bad job against the Mckabuka. He only had two catches for 24 yards before he exited with an injury, but they had issues everywhere else. And it it’s you know that that was the thing Tampa even with a skeleton receiving crew. No Ibuka, no Evans, no Godwin, they picked on the 49ers with the tight end position and and receivers further down the depth chart like like Tez Johnson and and Cameron Johnson. Those are the two guys that scored the the long touchdowns. The 49ers couldn’t bring down Baker Mayfield, so he was able to pick up the most key first down of the game himself. Bottom line is is the 49ers, even if they shut down Drake London, have to be much better unitwide without Fred Warner in their checkown pass defense, in their zone pass defense. And to start all that out with their pass rush, cuz Michael Penn Jr. doesn’t move very well. That’s really the one weakness I see here. Jake Matthews, the left tackle for the Falcons, is now hurt. So, opportunity should abound for the 49ers defense to look much better this week than last week. That might surprise you based on how good Atlanta looked against the Buffalo Bills, but but there’s a reason why the 49ers are actually favored by two in this game. There’s also a shorter week and a long cross country flight that Atlanta’s going to have to bounce back from. Ultimately, the 49ers right now, especially as they’re trying to find ways to stabilize the defense because a trade is not going to happen in time to to add somebody before Sunday’s game. It’s about offense and special teams, especially special teams because Perie probably won’t be back, but it’s about those two phases of the game being the locomotives that pull the train. Hog the ball. It’s going to be a lot easier with George KD back and KD looked good at at practice again today because George, you know, the 49ers run game hasn’t been what it should be. I mean, it’s it’s ranked damn near the bottom of the league. We’ll see what KD can do to open things up. I talk about him as a big leverage piece. I know the 49ers have to be better on the interior line. We’ve talked about that all week. Let’s focus on what the KD variable can do positively for the 49ers this week. Let’s see if it can help them hog the ball against the Atlanta Falcons. No Pierce Saul yet, but I mean Kendrick Bourne has been playing really well. Jawan Jennings, he’s a week further removed from the fractured ribs. They’re still fractured, I’m sure, but maybe he gets a little bit more involved. He seemed to be in a better mood standing out on that practice field today. He’s actually had a chance to practice this week, which is huge because in prior weeks, Jawan had just gotten in there on Fridays and, you know, that’s a slow practice. It’s more of a walkthrough. So, maybe he’s going to be more involved in the 49ers game plan. And then they set the table for Ricky Pieraw to come back the the week after that. So, slowly but surely, 49ers offense is healing. Maybe they see Brock Perie on the cherry on top of everything, the guy to drive it all once they head to Houston to face Diko Ryan. All right, that’s the report here from the facility.

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