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00:00Yeah, this is a very reasonable take from the 6-5-0.
00:05Gents, the Niner coaching staff's been gutted since Sala left.
00:10Gutted.
00:11I mean, how many defensive coordinators have they had under Kyle?
00:17Well, D'Amico, Sala, Wilks, Sorensen.
00:22Was Sala the first one?
00:25Or did they have somebody before Sala?
00:27I can't even remember.
00:28Well, the bottom line is you got Bosa, you got Fred Warner.
00:32Now, I know Ward is, you know, him and Lenore are somewhat holding it down.
00:37But Hufanga, who all of a sudden, Stiney, now when he's not hurt, it's kind of like,
00:42ah.
00:43Well, he's hurt now.
00:44Yeah, but when he's not, he's like, get caught peeking and not in the right place.
00:48Just overly aggressive, but players make the coordinator, right?
00:55Players make the coordinator, right?
00:58Yeah, I would say that's got something to do with it.
01:02All right, let's go out to the River Islands guest line.
01:06All guests on 95.7 The Game appear on the River Islands guest line.
01:10Is it a time for you to discover the islands, River Islands and Lathrop?
01:14Joining us right now, Ben Solak, NFL analyst at ESPN.
01:18You can also see him every other Thursday on the Mena Keim Show.
01:22Ben, thank you so much for joining us.
01:24Really appreciate it.
01:25Thank you, Matt.
01:26Good to be on.
01:27Yeah, let me, let's start out with the 49ers offense and the fact that this team's two
01:32and three and it's kind of catching a lot of 49er fans by surprise.
01:37Are you noticing or have you noticed, let's say, any difference between their offense
01:42this year and what they've been doing traditionally under Kyle Shanahan?
01:45You know, it's very different, especially if you look at the time frame in which they
01:51had Christian McCaffrey, the middle of the 2022 season to now.
01:55You know, we, we've talked a lot about, look, Kyle's good at what his bread and butter is.
01:59Oh, under center.
02:00And they go play action.
02:01They get yards up to the catch and he's been evolving away from that for quite some time
02:05now.
02:06But even still in the previous years, they were a pretty heavy yards up to the catch
02:09team.
02:10At this point in the season, no quarterback has fewer yards up to the catch than Brock
02:12Purdy does.
02:13Brock Purdy is also leading the league in what we call a dot average depth of target.
02:18When he throws the ball, he's throwing it further downfield than all other quarterbacks
02:21in the league.
02:22So he's become a spread drop back and isolation passing offense.
02:26That's kind of what, what their attendance, how they're attacking teams right now.
02:29It is not dissimilar to the change that Sean McVeigh made when he had Matthew Stafford
02:34as quarterback.
02:35And he said, okay, we're going to go and gun a little bit more.
02:36We're just going to kind of get five in the concept that we're going to expect our quarterback,
02:40our wide receivers to be able to beat their guys.
02:42So there's been a, a big stylistic change in a way that this offense attacks the passing
02:46game.
02:47And there's been some really cool moments from that.
02:49And there's been some drawbacks to that as well.
02:51Why do you think that is?
02:53Is it because he Kyle maybe is trusting Brock Purdy more than he ever has, or is it out
02:58of necessity because McCaffrey hasn't been there?
03:01I think it's six of one half dozen of the other, right?
03:03I think that this was always an evolution that you wanted to be able to take as an offense.
03:09Kyle is so good at getting training wheels on an offense, but every single coach in the
03:13league wants to be able to trust their quarterback with a grown up offense, but with fewer and
03:17fewer training wheels.
03:18So you can put those little bells and whistles back on now, pre-snap motion and play action
03:23when you need it, when you have a matchup, you like when the defense is weak to it.
03:26But it's nice to be a versatile, be multiple and be able to grow up and be that big boy
03:31offense when you need to be.
03:32So I think some of it is trusting Brock and deservedly so Brock's been excellent over
03:36the course of his career and is getting better and better week over week.
03:38But I do think that a big, big, big part of it is the absence of McCaffrey.
03:42McCaffrey was just on that a, the amount of stress that that guy put on the defense just
03:47by being in the huddle.
03:48Right.
03:49And you didn't know if they were going to come out with how you check on a dot on the,
03:52you know, uh, I formation and McCaffrey dot in the eye and they're going to put Kittle
03:56in the formation.
03:57And Dwan Jennings is going to block.
03:58We're going to be condensed.
03:59We're going to run the ball.
04:00We're going to be physical.
04:01And then the very next play with the same personnel, they could be in five wide, they
04:04could be an empty McCaffrey's motioning and he's breaking off corners and linebackers
04:08on routes like that.
04:09That level of unpredictability is impossible, impossible to replicate with Jordan Mason
04:15back there.
04:16Mason just does not catch the football run route the way that McCaffrey does that hurt
04:20Debo.
04:21Right.
04:22Cause now Debo is getting less targets by inline scrimmage.
04:23Debo is getting less of the easy stuff because they're not screwing around with him in the
04:26backfield and McCaffrey out wide that hurt Kittle cause Kittle's not getting the same
04:30free releases on these little delayed, you know, uh, all it's a running play and I'm
04:34going to leak out to the flat and run for 35 yards.
04:37You took a, you took a very critical piece out of that Jenga tower and it's starting
04:40to shake a little bit.
04:41So I do think it's both explanations are valid.
04:43I lean a little bit heavier towards the McCaffrey side.
04:46Wow.
04:47Ben, a lot of good stuff.
04:48I want to, if you don't mind, pick up right there because I've once called Kyle Shanahan
04:51in regard to play calling and design a genius, uh, no McCaffrey.
04:55I get it, but I think Brock is, he's got a blank check waiting for him.
04:59But when you have a $30 million receiver and Brandon Iuke Kittle, well, I feels like he
05:04needs to be featured more cause he can catch a, you got Debo, as you mentioned, and you
05:08got the emergence of Jawan Jennings and a baby Marshawn Lynch.
05:13People get mad at me.
05:14When I say that, does that, is that, is that suffice for nine for 22 being 30th in the
05:19red zone being, is it just, Oh, there's no McCaffrey.
05:23That's why they're nine for 22.
05:26You brought up the red zone numbers.
05:27The red zone numbers are the most important ones where I think they really, really feel
05:30the absence of McCaffrey because red zone defense is a lot of like, all right, you know,
05:36we don't have to pack the zones deep downfield, 20 yards, 30 yards down the field anymore.
05:40So we can really get seven guys with eyes on the quarterback, eight guys, eyes on the
05:43quarterback.
05:44They can all relate to one another.
05:45We can condense some of this space and the solution for that for Kyle for the last year
05:49and a half was okay.
05:50I'm going to throw the ball to McCaffrey or Debo early in the down, and I'm just going
05:53to expect them to break tackles on you.
05:55And we're going to be able to, to brute force this thing in with the running game with quick
05:58passing game.
05:59And with Mason back there, they're just, they're, they're a little bit worse in those tight
06:02areas.
06:03You're not the same runner that McCaffrey was.
06:04He's a good player, but he's not as good in the tight spaces, making the right reads kind
06:07of surviving through contact like Christian was.
06:10And then their, their path game in the red zone is, is really, really rough at this time.
06:13They're a lot better at this stage, scoring from explosives, scoring from further out
06:16than they are right now, scoring when they get a little bit, a little bit tighter in
06:19there.
06:20And so I think that the, the, the red zone deficiency is really where I'm looking at
06:23Kyle and being like, man, you have to come up with, with, with some more clever stuff,
06:28some more stuff, catch teams by surprise, some more Debo out of the backfield this time.
06:31The other thing, cause you got to be able to get seven and not three in these instances.
06:35And obviously they're coming off a bad Niners game and you know, the Mason bubble down there
06:39really soft and ball security inside of the pen.
06:41Like you don't want to overreact much to this thing, but I really think the fact that they're,
06:45they're at times struggling to punch it in when they, when they start again to the red,
06:48even the high red, it matters a lot, but seven instead of three, and then it really matters
06:51when you got the kicker question, but then that's at three, isn't it?
06:54You'd like for that three to be, I think they're losing some edges there for sure.
06:58Ben Solek joining us on 95, seven, the game is an NFL analyst on ESPN.
07:02You can see him every other Thursday on the mean a kind show.
07:06I mean, and I think I, I think I know your answer from the way you previously answered,
07:11but do you view, let's say a red zone offense completely differently than you evaluate the
07:18offense outside the red zone?
07:20Like I struggle with, you know, I think teams that struggle in the red zone are probably
07:25teams that largely struggle outside the red zone and vice versa, but it, it sounds to
07:30me like you do make a distinction there.
07:33Yeah.
07:34So, I mean, I want to think about it like, like a play sheet, right?
07:36Play.
07:37She's got a lot of play calls for first and 10 place.
07:38She's got a lot of play calls for third down place.
07:40She's got a lot of play calls to red zone.
07:41Those are separate on the actual sheet.
07:43So we are, we are dealing with different constraints that the defense is putting on us.
07:47Right.
07:48I talked about in the red zone, red zone.
07:49I don't have to, if I'm a deep safety, I don't have to worry about the 30 yard bomb going
07:53over my head.
07:54Cause that's out the end line.
07:55Right.
07:56We ran out of fuel, right?
07:57The geometry of the field changes, which means the style of, of plays that you can run change,
08:01right?
08:02So I've been running the bread and butter college and hand pass concept over the last
08:05two years.
08:06I've been running somebody down the seam or on the big post, then running that deep dig
08:09in behind it.
08:10I guess what you can't do in the red zone, cause you can't run that deep post camera
08:13on that scene.
08:14You can't clear out that safety.
08:15You can't run that bread and butter concept.
08:16Right.
08:17So your red zone designs are inherently different.
08:19Now they're going to be linked, right?
08:22Especially like in the running game, right?
08:24If I've shown the same different, you know, run looks from the same formation three or
08:27four times on a drive.
08:28All right.
08:29Well that matters when I get down to the red.
08:31Now I can show that formation and maybe run a play action off it.
08:34Maybe I can do something.
08:35I'll wrinkle up what I did last week, but there's still going to be connective tissue.
08:39There always is right.
08:40It's the same 11 players out there on offense, 11 players out there on defense.
08:42You can get some guys, but yeah, the, the, the geometry of the field changes.
08:46And so I think the niners are really successful in moving the ball between the twenties.
08:49And I think that again, like the explosive path has been a big scoring aspect for them.
08:53Dwan Jennings Allen up against the Ram 35 yard bomb, you know, brand my youth, big catch
08:57and run.
08:58Like they've had their, their explosive path scores.
08:59But when things are getting tight right now, they're really missing the Capra.
09:02So it's in the running game and in the design passing game, they should have some solutions.
09:06I think that you saw, you know, Kittle winning above the rim against the Cardinals that he
09:11had there was a two weeks ago.
09:12Like you have a tight end.
09:13You can target, like there, there are some solutions there.
09:15I expect them to find it, but it's been, it's been herky jerky to start.
09:18Yeah.
09:19And on the other side of the ball, Ben, I don't have to tell you last year, Steve Wilkes,
09:22he lasted one year when it was all said and done.
09:25I thought the defense performed well enough to win in the super bowl and they were a top
09:29five defense.
09:30But this year under Nick Sorensen, Ben, I don't recognize this team.
09:34I know there's no green law, but can you share with us why the Arizona Cardinals and the
09:39Minnesota Vikings were, were, you know, basically just running the ball down the Niner's throat
09:44and there's Bosa, there's Warner out there, but share with us what you're seeing and can
09:48this thing be fixed?
09:50Yeah.
09:51So I was, I was starting to be really worried about that Niner's defense late down the stretch
09:55last year, even with Will.
09:56And I thought they played a lot better in that chiefs game than I anticipated.
09:59But I think you started to see some of those run defense issues pop up down the stretch.
10:03I remember talking about them coming into that lions, NFC championship game.
10:07I thought lions were going to win that game.
10:08And it was good over the last five, 10 weeks of the season, I was doing like a bottom five
10:12run defense.
10:13And the reality is, man, it's hard to keep good personnel on the field and whenever it
10:18gets expensive, like that's, that's, that's the nature of things, right?
10:21When it's Robert Solomon, it's D'Amico Ryan's out there.
10:23He's also a year as your chief third linebacker and Jimmy Ward is still in his prime, right?
10:29And you, you, you, uh, you got like, uh, you know, Kinwald's coming off the bench here
10:32and you have a deep cadre of edge rushers, right?
10:35You just like, you have so many guys on the margin, we just help make things work for
10:38you as a defense.
10:39And okay.
10:40So our defense is good.
10:41We can bring that to the bank every single year.
10:42Niner's defense is great.
10:43And all of a sudden over the course of a few years, you know, you've kind of put a couple
10:47different safeties out there who fondly gets hurt, you know, a couple of different corners
10:51out there.
10:52And the linebacker depth isn't what it used to be.
10:54And all of a sudden, yeah, we're still got Warner and Warner's great.
10:56I mean, Warner's playing unbelievable ball this season, Nick healthy right now, Nick
10:59looks excellent.
11:00We got, we got Nick out there.
11:01You still have your star, you get your tent poles, but a lot of the supporting cast just,
11:05it ain't what it used to be.
11:06Right.
11:07And that's, that's the cost of doing business.
11:08You gotta go pay trend.
11:09You gotta go play.
11:10You gotta go pay Diva.
11:11You gotta go pay everybody from that offense and you just start to lose the margins a little
11:15bit on defense.
11:16I, uh, I think that the switch to Nick Sorenson, uh, was, was a lot of, you know, kind of going
11:20back to a defensive system that we're familiar with, kind of know the strengths, you know,
11:24the weaknesses of it.
11:25We feel like we can work around it, but the reality is that personnel wise, like they
11:28are just, they are so challenged, especially at safety and linebacker, some of the injuries
11:33they've had and some of the departures that they've had, that it's a lot tougher to survive
11:37in that system, the way that they used to.
11:39And so I don't know, especially now that Hargrave's out for the season, if I'm the opposing team,
11:43I'm looking at the Niners on a Sunday, my, my, I'm sending my whole Tuesday, my whole
11:47Wednesday is figuring out ways to run the football on them.
11:49I really, really think that I can beat them that way for four quarters.
11:52You're listening to 95.7 The Game, KGMZ FM and HD1 San Francisco, always live on the
11:57free Odyssey app, Twitch and YouTube, powered by First NorCal Credit Union.
12:00We're talking to Ben Solak, NFL analyst at ESPN, some, some, uh, some really good stuff
12:06that you, you said that you would think about a way to run on the 49ers.
12:10I'm looking at the Seattle Seahawks who they play tomorrow.
12:13Why the heck did Kenneth Walker only run five times, uh, on Sunday?
12:19Yeah, right now, Ryan Grubb, who's the OC there came out of college system, right?
12:23He and Mike McDonald, they're, they're pretty back happy.
12:25Uh, they, the, the Seahawks lead the league right now in drop back rate over expectation,
12:30which means when we, when we adjust for scoreboard, right, the score deficit, when you adjust
12:34for down in distance, the Seahawks are calling more passes than any other team is in like
12:39kind of neutral script and neutral rate.
12:41I think that some of that is Grubb background, the college approach really thinking you could
12:45throw it on guys.
12:46I think some of that's good.
12:47Gino's playing great.
12:48Gino's your life out so far to start the season.
12:51You're kind of, you're letting him control the game at the line of scrimmage, getting
12:54into calls that he likes and you're trusting him to avoid the negative plays and go from
12:58there with that said, they, they should be running the football more.
13:02They should have ran the football more against the giants.
13:04I know that your Dexter Lawrence is very scary young man, run the football against, but still
13:08you gotta be able to establish it a little bit.
13:10And I think that you're going to see them try to run the football against the niners
13:12as well.
13:13They're not great at getting additional bodies in the block, right?
13:16They're kind of a very traditional 11 personnel team.
13:19They have DK Metcalf, Tyler Lockett, Jackson Smith, and Jigbo.
13:22All those guys are receivers.
13:23There's no Dwan Jennings on the team that wants to get in there and block, right?
13:26This is three true White House.
13:28And so they're a little bit of what they can do, but I think they want to have more, they
13:32want to have the kids tied up instead of the, they had a deep break and now the deep break.
13:37Hey Ben, Ben, we, uh, your connection just got real funky.
13:40I'd love, I wonder if we can get a better connection.
13:43Yeah, you're, you're breaking up.
13:44It was hopeful.
13:45We'll reach out right away because we want to keep you on for another minute or two because
13:49probably going through a tunnel.
13:50Yeah.
13:51Yeah.
13:52I like him.
13:53I like him too.
13:54But what stood out to me, Stiney, is he saw something in this defense in week 10 of last
13:59year and thought the Lions could do what they did when I didn't.
14:03But you know, you go to that halftime of that playoff game that they were able to come back.
14:07I just, I was just going to throw it to him, Stiney asked about Aaron Rodgers, but also
14:12where's he at?
14:13Can, can, can they fix this as a collective?
14:16Because there's things going on on both sides.
14:18The special teams is inadequate.
14:21Yeah.
14:22Defense is inadequate in the offense.
14:24All right, let's head, uh, we got Ben back, Ben back.
14:27Okay.
14:28We got Ben returning.
14:29Uh, Ben Stolz.
14:30Ben back.
14:31NFL analyst at NFL.
14:32Everything.
14:33All right.
14:34ESPN.
14:35Uh, go ahead.
14:36Uh, Gu, ask, uh.
14:37No, Ben, I was just telling my partner here, you know, it's kind of fascinating.
14:41The signs you saw about the Niners run defense last year, and then that, that game at halftime,
14:46that prediction where you felt like Detroit would have won if I would have called it half,
14:50you'd have been like, man, I'm a profit with all that said, and what, you know, what they're
14:54missing or what they're lacking.
14:56Has that changed your views of this team and how far they can go as a whole?
15:00I know it's early, but I'm worried.
15:03Yeah, I was, um, I was, you know, low on the Niners this preseason.
15:08I was kind of expecting this, this division to be a, a close one down the stretch.
15:12I'm still there.
15:13I think that I, this is even before they lost McCaffrey and I think since losing McCaffrey,
15:16you can see some of the holes in this offense.
15:19Here's the nature of things.
15:20It's the NFL.
15:21It's not for long.
15:22That's what the letters stand for.
15:23It is so hard to be good year over year.
15:25And then Niner fans know this because Kyle's been excellent and the offense has been great,
15:28but they have these eight and eight years, they have their injury years where they go
15:31four and 12.
15:32Right?
15:33Like it's just, it's really consistent.
15:34It's really hard to go to the Superbowl blues and then just be back at the top of the NFC
15:39the very next year.
15:40Like the, the elite quarterbacks can do it, but if you don't have an elite guy, then it's
15:44just really challenging.
15:45You know, some, some cracks are to show in the facade a little bit.
15:48So for me, uh, I think the Niners are a playoff team.
15:51I don't think there are an NFC powerhouse and I think that the NFC is largely a mess
15:55right now.
15:56I don't know if any, I mean, it's an NFC powerhouse, so maybe they, they get hot late down the
15:59season and make another run, but this isn't the same team that they were, I think last
16:03year or a couple of years ago.
16:04I think that you're starting to see just the attrition of, of trying to hold together one
16:07roster and pay everybody.
16:08You're starting to see that accumulate on them.
16:10Wow.
16:11Been a lot of good stuff.
16:12Hey, if you don't mind, I gotta be careful here.
16:13I want to ask you about the situation that went down, uh, in New York with Robert Sala
16:17and I'm not here to tell you Sala was Bill Belichick, but being, I just feel like he
16:21got a raw deal.
16:23You're playing for first place this week.
16:25The defensive side of the ball is doing their thing.
16:27They're a top four defense.
16:29And for Aaron Rogers, I don't know if you saw today being to come out on the Pat McAfee
16:33show and say he had nothing to do with the firing.
16:37Can you just run us through your thoughts on, you know, Sala and did he get a raw deal
16:41in Rogers part in this when he's not holding up his end of the bargain?
16:45Yeah.
16:46Sala absolutely got a raw deal.
16:47He's a defensive head coach.
16:48The defense was doing great.
16:49Offense has been a problem for him.
16:50Now listen, NFL is a results driven league.
16:51You got to win ballgames as a head coach.
16:52You don't win ballgames, you're going to lose a job.
16:53That's the long and the short of it.
16:54Right.
16:55And he was 20 and 36.
16:56Now I think a lot of that wasn't his fault.
16:57I think a lot of that was his fault.
16:58I think a lot of that was his fault.
16:59I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:00I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:01I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:02I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:03I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:04I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:05I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:06I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:07I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:08I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:09I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:10I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:11I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:12I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:13I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:14I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:15I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:16I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:17I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:18I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:19I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:20I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:21I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:22I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:23I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:24I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:25I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:26I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:27I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:28I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:29I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:30I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:31I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:32I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:33I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:34I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:35I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:36I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:37I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:38I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:39I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:40I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:41I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:42I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:43I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:44I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:45I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:46I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:47I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:48I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:49I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:50I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:51I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:52I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:53I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:54I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:55I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:56I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:57I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:58I think a lot of that was his fault.
17:59I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:00I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:01I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:02I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:03I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:04I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:05I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:06I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:07I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:08I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:09I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:10I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:11I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:12I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:13I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:14I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:15I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:16I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:17I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:18I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:19I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:20I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:21I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:22I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:23I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:24I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:25I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:26I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:27I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:28I think a lot of that was his fault.
18:29I think a lot of that was his fault.