SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Kevin and Tara Stinson have waited five years for Levi’s Stadium to feel like home. When they had season tickets at Candlestick Park, where the San Francisco 49ers played until 2013, the tailgating was livelier, the stadium was noisier and the fans were family. In the half-decade since the 49ers moved to Silicon Valley, the Stinsons, who bought season tickets here, too, have watched a merry-go-round of coaches, quarterbacks and losing teams that won just 25 games in the past five seasons. The team’s marketing slogan, “Faithful Then, Faithful Now” seemed like more of a question than a statement.
Now the 49ers are in the midst of a turnaround season, atop the N.F.C. West and destined for the playoffs, and Levi’s Stadium is decidedly different from its early years. Tailgaters are lining up hours in advance to get into the parking lot, season ticket holders are using their tickets instead of dumping them on StubHub and the buzz inside the building rivals the old days.
“It has the feel of Candlestick,” Tara said, who drives two hours from Modesto with her husband to tailgate before games. “Winning changes everything.”
The winning continued on Sunday as the 49ers blew out the Green Bay Packers, 37-8, in a potential playoff preview. The 49ers, who clinched their first winning record at Levi’s Stadium, are now 10-1, one game ahead of the Seattle Seahawks and New Orleans Saints for best record in the N.F.C. After going 4-12 last season, the 49ers are in position to host a playoff game for the first time in their new home.
“Our guys are pumped where we’re at, and really pumped about the possibilities for where we can go,” the 49ers coach, Kyle Shanahan, said after the game.
Their victory on Sunday showed off all the team’s strengths: A relentless pass rush, a solid run game and a passing game that features quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo hitting a variety of receivers. On the Packers’ first drive, quarterback Aaron Rodgers was sacked and fumbled the ball, which Nick Bosa of the 49ers recovered deep in Green Bay territory. On the next play, running back Tevin Coleman scored to give the 49ers an early lead that grew to 23-0 by halftime.
The Packers punted six times and had just 60 yards of offense in the first half.
The 49ers benefited from the return of tight end George Kittle, who caught several key passes, and rookie receiver Deebo Samuel, who scored on a 42-yard pass at the end of the second quarter.
The Packers finally scored with about four minutes left in the third quarter, when Rodgers hit Davante Adams with a 2-yard shovel pass. But Garoppolo hit Kittle with a 61-yard touchdown pass two plays later, ending any possibility of a comeback. In the fourth quarter, the Packers, with their backs to the wall, went for it on fourth-and-8 at the San Francisco 27-yard line. Rodgers was sacked for the fifth time of the game.
The stifling pass rush and balanced offensive attack was a blueprint drawn up by Shanahan and general manager John Lynch. When they arrived in 2017, they focused on building around a quarterback and the guys who knock them down.
The first piece of that puzzle was a gamble. In 2017, they acquired Garoppolo from the Patriots for a second-round draft pick. Garoppolo started only briefly in New England, but played well when he arrived in San Francisco. He sat out most of last season with a knee injury.
This year, Garoppolo’s addition finally paid dividends, with 2,731 yards and 20 touchdowns, including two on Sunday. He also gets rid of the ball quickly. His average time from snap to throw is 2.6 seconds, tied for fifth best in the league.
Unlike San Francisco’s great teams of the past, which were built around Hall of Fame players like Roger Craig, Joe Montana and Jerry Rice, this edition of the 49ers is filled with unsung players on offense. Fourteen players have scored touchdowns; tight end Kittle, a fifth-round draft pick, is the team’s leading receiver; and Matt Breida, an undrafted free agent, leads a rushing trio by committee. Still, heading into the game, the 49ers had the fourth best offense in the N.F.L., with 386.6 yards per game.
The team has also used their fullbacks and tight ends in a variety of locations on the field to outfox defenses.
“With so few teams using a fullback, it’s a very difficult offense to defend every week,” said Mike Tannenbaum, an analyst for ESPN who has worked for the Dolphins and Jets.
The bigger story is the 49ers defense, which has given up the fewest yards per game in the league. Some of the teams’ vaunted defensive front arrived before Shanahan and Lynch did, most notably DeForest Buckner, who was drafted in 2016. He has been joined by Solomon Thomas, a first-round draft pick in 2017, Bosa, who was taken in the first round this year, and Dee Ford, who was acquired in a trade with the Kansas City Chiefs.
Given the strictures of the salary cap, winning teams are investing heavily in a handful of players and relying on young, inexpensive players to fill out the roster. On the 49ers, only seven players on the roster will be paid more than $5 million this year, lead by Garoppolo. Breida, Bosa, Kittle and Samuel, among others, have salaries below $1 million this season. This mix sets the 49ers up for several years of success.
“It’s a cycle where they drafted well in the down years and ended up with one of the best defensive fronts,” said Steve Young, the former 49ers quarterback who now works for ESPN. “They have a window of opportunity that can really expand without having to spend heavily to get top draft picks.”
This window comes as the Oakland Raiders prepare to leave for Las Vegas next season, ceding the Bay Area to the 49ers. The team has been running community initiatives around Oakland to win over a new generation of young fans and lure back fans angry that the team left San Francisco, which won’t be a hard sell if the 49ers keep winning.
“When they moved, there wasn’t a lot of heart and soul” at Levi’s Stadium, said Andy Dolich, who was an executive for the A’s, Warriors and was chief operating officer of the 49ers from 2007 to 2010. This year, “you couldn’t have written a better script,” he said. “The corner has definitely turned.”
Source: Football - nytimes.com
