San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan spoke to reporters following Friday’s practice, providing final updates ahead of the team’s Week 15 matchup against the Tennessee Titans. Here’s everything he said.
Transcript provided by the San Francisco 49ers Communications staff.
Opening comments:
“The injuries for the game: we’ve got [LB] Tatum Bethune will be out, [DL] Sam O [Okuayinonu] will be out, [LB] Nick Martin, out, [DL] Yetur [Gross-Matos], out, and [QB] Kurtis Rourke, out. Go ahead.”
RB Christian McCaffrey is full-go?
“Yes.”
Did he just have a bug yesterday or is it something he’s battling?
“I didn’t really ask him more about it. I know he wasn’t feeling well, but he looked good today.”
Was Christian full-go today?
“Yes.”
I don’t know if you addressed this earlier in the week, but concern coming off a Bye? You got a lot of rest and you’re ready for the push for the last few games. Concerns this could be a quote unquote trap game where you’ve got a team that has nothing to lose coming in?
“I don’t really look at it that way. I think there’s no difference in this game than the next three games, personally. I think when you come off a Bye it’s always a challenge as a coach because your goal is that everyone gets fresher by resting, which is the best thing, but you also get extremely rusty by not practicing. So, I felt that way early in the week, but getting the work in on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday of all full speed, getting walk-through and basically half speed today, I think we knocked the rust off. And then I look at it as a full advantage going into Bye Weeks now, following Bye Weeks.”
DL Clelin Ferrell‘s put up some pretty big numbers the last month. Is he on a heater? Is he a late bloomer? How do you explain what he’s doing right now?
“I think Cle played at a really high level for us the last time he was here. I didn’t study him too much his year-and-a-half at other places. But, when he came back here, the first day of practice he looked like the same guy. I think when you do get sacks and stuff like that it brings a lot of attention so it seems like something drastically is different. But, I think Cle seems like the same guy he’s always been, a really good player.”
Your teams have a really good record after the Bye through the end of the season. Is there any message that you send to them going into the Bye or coming out that maybe gets them to reach another level?
“No, I don’t think there’s really any message that anyone ever does that gets people to another level. I think practicing, working and getting better at things is what takes teams to other levels. So, you hope the more you practice, which happens the longer a year goes, you hope you gradually get better at things by just working at it more. As you do that, you’ve got to overcome injuries and all those things. There are so many setbacks. Bye Weeks, you know, allow guys to be fresher and not have to battle through so many injuries. But you know, you try to motivate guys to work and things like that but to me it comes down to the work you put in each week and never thinking, ‘hey, we’re to November, we’re through December, we don’t have to practice now.’ Once you stop practicing, you get worse.”
Do you talk to WR Ricky Pearsall when he is not getting the ball, or any player when they’re not getting the ball, and remind him that you still have confidence in him?
“I only talk to people when they’re not getting the ball when I know how much you guys are hounding them for not getting the ball. Those are the things that I don’t need to tell a guy that, if I go up to a guy and say, ‘hey, don’t worry, I still have confidence in you,’ if someone comes and says that to me, I’d be like, ‘I wasn’t worried you didn’t, what the hell happened?’ I hope my wife never tells me that for no reason. I think she genuinely likes me. So no, I don’t do that at all. But, I do feel for guys, big time, in this day and age and just how that stuff goes, that they’ve got to answer to a lot of stuff and all about stats and everything, and this is a different sport. There’s 22 people on the field and stats get a lot of people attention in a good way and they also give people the attention in a bad way. But, when it comes to our world, the football world, and what we do in these rooms and watching film, there’s no need for me to explain anything. He understands it.”
A lot of your fast guys, WR Jacob Cowing, WR Jordan Watkins and WR Brandon Aiyuk have not played this season. Does that have a big bearing on the passing game, on the whole offense, not having a burner out there?
“Yeah. The more speed on the field you have, the better. So, when you’re missing a lot of guys who can run, those are guys that you’re possibly counting on, that definitely effects everything. When you look at just some of the things you said as a whole, I think our pass game has done a lot of good things numbers-wise and things like that and help us win a bunch of games. But, it’s not just offense either. It’s the defense also. When you’re missing guys who can really run, that does have an effect. If you have all guys out there who can just fly around but they’re not that physical, then you’ll see some huge effects the other way. To be successful in this league, you need a little bit of everything.”
As far as Cowing, is he back to full health? I realize that there’s no spot for him on the 53 right now, but is he at least close?
“As soon as he is back to full health, we’ll open up his window. So he is not quite there yet, but he’s getting close. He’s got to pass a few more markers.”
How has RB Jordan James handled this year really not being able to get on the field week-by-week but trying to chip away at practice?
“Yeah, I think he’s taken a step forward these last two weeks. I think it goes to, did you say Jordan James or Jordan Watkins? Jordan James. All right. Sorry. The Js confuse me. They’re both similar answers, but I think he’s looked really good going on about six weeks in a row right now to where it’s, we have two guys really running the ball. We have [RB] Isaac [Guerendo] who’s there if one of those guys go down, especially in like a third-down pass role, who does help at special teams. He kind of missed his window throughout training camp in the beginning of the season to really have one of those spots, and then we traded for [RB] Brian [Robinson Jr.]. Brian to me, like his last seven games have probably been his best game seven times in a row. I think he just keeps getting better. I’ve been real pumped with him in practice, and it would be awesome to get four guys up, but you’re only using really two on offense. So, it’s got to make sense with the rest of the roster. I think that’s a tough thing about this league because I’m really excited about him. I’m really excited about him on the practice field and I would really love for him to get up because he deserves to be, but it’s not at the expense of someone else that’s doing something at a high level too and got to make sure it’s the right thing for our whole team and our whole roster.”
There was a report earlier this week that defensive coordinator Robert Saleh turned down like a lucrative contract with the Raiders to potentially also be their next head coach down the line. What does that say about him that he wanted to come back to this organization and then also his name’s floating around there now for a head coaching job?
“I think Robert had a lot of opportunities to be D-Coordinator. I think that was definitely one of them. So just talking to that whole thing and he got close to I think a couple head coach jobs in the time too. So, he was definitely our first choice, and we were hoping that we would be his, and that’s what he told me early on. So, I was glad he stuck with his word or we would’ve had beef. Saleh has done a lot in this league, and when you’ve done a lot, especially what he did here, but when you go do it at another place, the way their defense was in New York, that’s a hot commodity. The way he carries himself to how he is, I hope for us he’s not a head coach next year. But, I also know when you have the talent that someone like Robert does, it’s only a matter of time.”
It seems like managing the end of the first half has gotten harder between the kickoff rule and the long kicks, scoring is up in the last two minutes, the last 30 seconds of the half. Even when teams get the ball in their own possession in their own territory like in Cleveland. How have you had to adjust the way you balance trying to score and score-prevention at the end of the first half?
“You try to do it the same way. It is just heightened because of the new touchback rule and everything. Since 2019, we started really trying to always finish with the ball in the second quarter. Our goal is to score, but not at the expense of giving the other team the ball last. That’s been kind of our philosophy for a while now. And that’s only gotten stronger now that, I mean you score, but there’s a minute left, we’d still rather score. But, them getting it at the 35 as opposed to the 20 is a huge different deal. So, you want to take a lot more time if you can. You don’t just do it not to score, but you’re not going to sit there and be so risky trying to do that because of how quickly you can get a field goal on the other side.”
This isn’t necessarily the best team you’ve had here, but given all the injuries you’ve had, is this the season you’re most proud of as a head coach? Personally?
“No. (Laughter). I mean, I’m proud of a lot of seasons. I was really proud of us having the second pick in the Draft in ’18, being a 4-12 team, starting 8-0, being the one seed and getting really close to winning a Super Bowl in ’19. I was really proud in ’21, I think I might be wrong, where we had to win like five out of the last six games to get the seventh seed and get us all the way to the NFC Championship with a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter. I was proud of that. I was proud of our ’23 team of getting down to our third-string quarterback and win seven in a row to get the two seed and to go to Philly and have a chance to go to the Super Bowl. I was really proud of our ’23 team going to the Super Bowl. I’m really proud of this team this year.”
Special teams coordinator Brant Boyer seems to have a presence, obviously he’s doing a nice job. What has he added to your football team this year and do you see him as a future NFL head coach potentially?
“I think Boyer’s awesome. Love the guy. Was a huge fan of him as a player when he played. I love the question you ask him as a head coach. I haven’t thought about it because he’s like a professional fisherman and loves Montana too much probably. But no, Boyer can do anything he wants to do. So, if that was something that he ambitions for, I wouldn’t hold him back for anything.”
Did you hate the 2017 team?
“No, I haven’t hated any team, but when you go 6-10 in your first year, you’re hoping that you can improve. So no, I didn’t enjoy going 4-12 the next year, but I did enjoy getting [DL] Nick Bosa with the second pick in the Draft.”
Can you talk about how much more difficult it is to get the team and the guys and the coaches to have that laser focus as the season wears along? Now you’re in December after a Bye and you’ve got to push through the last few games and hopefully get the number one seed or at least the highest seed you can.
“That’s what I say the big benefit of having this Bye in December is. I mean no matter what, even when we were the number one seed and we’re trying to maintain it back to ’23 it seems like you’re playing for everything so you’ve got the focus and stuff, but the mental stamina that you need to do this seven days a week to prepare the right way just for three-and-a-half hours to really to be judged on. All that matters is those three-and-a-half hours. But to be successful in those three-and-a-half hours, the focus you need for seven days straight to give yourself a chance to do that, to do that 17 weeks in a row, it becomes a grind. I was talking about it before the Cleveland game that you do all this stuff, but really everything that we work for since February is going to be decided over the next 15 hours. And that’s what I mean by whatever, you go four times three-and-a-half, should be somewhere around there, but that’s really all it comes down to is Sundays. But, how much you have to work to stay focused, have a chance to play at a high level there and that’s what gets exhausting for guys. And yeah, it was nice to rest our legs and stuff, but to be able to get away for five days or whatever it was, your mind’s a little bit fresher and when you can see four games right there to try to get to your ultimate goal, I think that helps a lot with your focus and things like that. And that’s what I could kind of feel from our team a little bit this week.”
In past situations, it seems like second-and-eight you’d usually pass, but you want to run clock and so maybe you wouldn’t do that. Have those kind of decisions where it seems a little counterintuitive and you’re balancing now because you’ve done it since 2019, is it more second nature? Are those still difficult?
“No, to me the difficult stuff is when you have a philosophy, but any philosophy you have isn’t right 100-percent of the time. So, you’ve got to go against that all the time. You know how hard it was for me in the second quarter versus Cleveland going into the wind first time in probably maybe my career, I can’t remember, but we started with the ball, and I did it solely because we could avoid the wind in the fourth quarter and we had that wind in the second quarter which means that field goal range is the 25-yard line and I’m trying to think of what the odds of us are going this far to get inside the 25 throwing into the wind, which means we can’t really go far down the field, we can’t kick along field goal and so we’re going to have to drop back to do all this stuff and we’re going against one of the best pass rushes in the league. What are you doing? Let’s run the ball. And that’s what I’m thinking and then all of a sudden, it’s third-and-10 and I’m like, ‘screw it, I’m going to try one.’ And Ricky makes a big play on third down. You guys should give him more points for that, it was only one stat for you guys, but it was a huge play. And we get a first down, then we throw one quick pass to [WR] Jauan [Jennings] the next play and it’s like, ‘alright, screw it.’ And we throw a far one to [TE] George [Kittle] and it gets caught in the wind, which is why you can’t throw that way. But he turns, does an awesome job, spins over his left shoulder, catches it, gets us to the eight-yard line. And then because of the wind, our kicker hits the upright and it goes in. And I’m like, ‘I’m glad we tried for it, but damn that could have been real stupid too.’ All you need is one strip and it was like, ‘what the hell was I thinking we could pull that off for?’ And so, that’s sometimes you’ve got to go with your gut and know nothing’s an absolute and live with the consequences.”
Was Ricky the number one in that progression in that double move?
“He was, yep. Usually it’s a two-hitch throw, in those conditions and stuff, it was a double move so you can’t get out of it quite as fast and Brock was waiting and he actually took four hitches. It was an unbelievable route that it actually wasn’t what I was hoping for because the original route would’ve been open and he still got them on the double move. But, if he would’ve told me that he needed four hitches for that, I would’ve been like, ‘is our quarterback alright?’ And our O-Line gave him those four hitches. And so, I’m like, ‘alright, well it must’ve been not into the wind, but it was.’ And so, all stars aligned on that play and that’s what made it good.”
OL Colton McKivitz seems like he’s having a really good season. How much has he improved over the six years that you’ve had him?
“Every year. Colton’s been unbelievable. Colton’s one of my favorite stories here. We cut Colton before. We didn’t want to, but it was a roster thing and he was at the end and he was competing with another position. We ended up cutting him and took a big risk. When you cut someone, you might lose them and he came back on the practice squad. I remember trying to get into the playoffs versus the Rams in Week 17 and we were thinking [T] Trent [Williams] was going to go because he did everything he could, or maybe it was the playoff game, I forget, and right before Trent is like, ‘I can’t do it.’ And we just looked over to Colton who had just come off practice squad, I’m like, ‘you ready?’ And there was zero hesitation in him. You always knew the game wasn’t too big for Colton and he went out there, played at a high level. I think the next year, I want to say the next year, is when [Denver Broncos T Mike] McGlinchey went and everyone was wondering who was going to be our starting right tackle. You still look for people in the Draft and if it would’ve fallen the right way, we possibly could have taken someone. But, we did believe in Colton that he was going to continue to get better because of the type of guy he is and the ability he has and he has gotten better. I mess with him all year, but he called his shot and said he was going to be a Pro Bowler this year so he better play like one and I think he has.”